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The Fashoda Incident or Crisis was the climax of imperial territorial disputes between Britain and France in Eastern Africa, occurring in 1898. A French expedition to Fashoda on the White Nile river sought to gain control of the Upper Nile river basin and thereby exclude Britain from the Sudan. The two armies met on friendly terms but back in Europe it became a war scare. The British held firm as Britain and France were on the verge of war with heated rhetoric on both sides. Under heavy pressure the French withdrew, securing Anglo-Egyptian control over the area. The status quo was recognised by an agreement between the two states acknowledging British control over Egypt, while France became the dominant power in Morocco. France had failed in its main goals. P.M.H. Bell says: :Between the two governments there was a brief battle of wills, with the British insisting on immediate and unconditional French withdrawal from Fashoda. The French had to accept these terms, amounting to a public humiliation....Fashoda was long remembered in France as an example of British brutality and injustice. It was a diplomatic victory for the British as the French realized that in the long run they needed friendship with Britain in case of a war between France and Germany.〔A.J.P. Taylor, ''The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, 1848-1918'' (1954) pp 381-88〕〔D.W. Brogan, France under the Republic: The Development of Modern France (1870-1930) (1940) pp 321-26〕 It was the last crisis between the two that involved a threat of war (until 1940) and opened the way for closer relations in the Entente cordiale in 1904. It gave rise to the 'Fashoda syndrome' in French foreign policy, or seeking to assert French influence in areas which might be becoming susceptible to British influence.〔William L. Langer, ''The diplomacy of imperialism: 1890–1902'' (1951) pp 537–80〕 == Background == During the late 19th century, Africa was rapidly being claimed and exploited by European colonial powers. After the 1885 Berlin Conference regarding West Africa, Europe's great powers went after any remaining lands in Africa that weren't already under another European nation's influence. This period in African history is usually called the Scramble for Africa. The two principal powers involved in this scramble were Britain and France, along with Germany, Belgium, Italy, Portugal, and Spain.〔Thomas Pakenham, ''Scramble for Africa: The White Man's Conquest of the Dark Continent from 1876–1912'' (1991)〕 The French thrust into the African interior was mainly from the continent's Atlantic coast (modern Senegal) eastward, through the Sahel along the southern border of the Sahara, a territory covering modern Senegal, Mali, Niger, and Chad. Their ultimate goal was to have an uninterrupted link between the Niger River and the Nile, hence controlling all trade to and from the Sahel region, by virtue of their existing control over the caravan routes through the Sahara. France also had an outpost near the mouth of the Red Sea in Djibouti (French Somaliland), which could serve as an eastern anchor to an east-west belt of French territory across the continent.〔William Roger Louis, and Prosser Gifford, eds. ''France and Britain in Africa: imperial rivalry and colonial rule'' (Yale University Press, 1971).〕 The British, on the other hand, wanted to link their possessions in Southern Africa (modern South Africa, Botswana, Malawi, Lesotho, Zimbabwe, and Zambia), with their territories in East Africa (modern Kenya), and these two areas with the Nile basin. Sudan, which in those days included modern South Sudan and Uganda, was the key to the fulfilment of these ambitions, especially since Egypt was already under British control. This 'red line' (i.e. a proposed railway, see Cape-Cairo railway) through Africa was made most famous by the British and South African political force Cecil Rhodes, who wanted Africa "painted () Red".〔Louis and Gifford, eds. ''France and Britain in Africa: imperial rivalry and colonial rule'' (1971).〕 If one draws a line from Cape Town to Cairo (Rhodes' dream) and another line from Dakar to French Somaliland (now Djibouti) by the Red Sea in the Horn (the French ambition), these two lines intersect in eastern South Sudan near the town of Fashoda (present-day Kodok), explaining its strategic importance. The French east-west axis and the British north-south axis could not co-exist; the nation that could occupy and hold the crossing of the two axes would be the only one able to proceed with its plan. Fashoda was also bound up in the Egyptian Question, a long running dispute between the United Kingdom and France over the legality of the British occupation of Egypt. Since 1882 many French politicians, particularly those of the ''parti colonial'', had come to regret France’s decision not to join with Britain in occupying the country. They hoped to force Britain to leave, and thought that a colonial outpost on the Upper Nile could serve as a base for French gunboats. These in turn were expected to make the British abandon Egypt. Another proposed scheme involved a massive dam, cutting off the Nile’s water supply and forcing the British out. These ideas were highly impractical, but they succeeded in alarming many British officials.〔Henri L. Wesseling, ''Divide and rule: The partition of Africa, 1880–1914'' (1996).〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Fashoda Incident」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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