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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Silver Moon" data-source="post: 6244501" data-attributes="member: 8530">Ahmed Orabi says, "The AFRE was entirely my doing.  I accept full responsibility for it and if the monarch wishes to have any members brought forward on charges of treason I ask that I be the one punished and not any who I convinced to join me. My motivation was simple, undue Foreign influence.   Over the last fifteen years my King had allowed British and French interests to dictate Egyptian policy, to the financial ruin of this nation.  The British had pushed the issue of the building of canal linking the sea to the Indian Ocean, at Egypt's expense both figuratively and literally.  Our King signed papers for a pair of agreements, one having Egypt fund the construction of the canal, the other requiring us to offer absurdly low fees for ships from those same countries to use the canal.  That put us between a rock-and-a-hard-place.  The original loan was based upon the fee revenues to repay it, but the lowered fees would not allow it.  Britain and France refused to renegotiate the loans, and Britain's banks took matters one step further, stealing Egypt's ownership interests in the canal when we could not fully meet the repayment terms.  Mr. Eastman, I tried for over a decade to convince the King that this was wrong, that our country was suffering, but he would not hear of it.  He trusted his foreign friends, and they betrayed the trust.  That was my motivation, to bring about a change-in-government so that the foreign interests would have no choice in needing to renegotiate.  And for this year up until last week my strategy was working.  But General Garnet Wolseley's quick change in tactics, targeting this city that we now meet it, changed things.  We were forced to shift quickly from an offensive to a defensive mode, which gave the French opportunists that had wormed their way into our midst an opportunity to strike.  Their offer to be neutral observers and provide medical assistance should not have been accepted by me.  I fell victim to the very thing that I had accused the King of. So as I said before, I take full responsibility.  I have failed my followers and am willing to accept punishment for my failure.  I will turn myself over to the Royal Egyptian family, and my army will continue their cause without me.  The original reasons for this conflict still exist, so disbanding is not an option at this time."</blockquote>

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