Lebanon

1958

6 Reviewed

The 1958 crisis in Lebanon is a Lebanese political crisis caused by internal political and religious tensions in the country. She sees the intervention of American forces.

The pro-Western President Camille Chamoun, refuses to sever diplomatic relations with the United Kingdom and France as they attack Egypt during the Suez crisis in 1956. The Muslim community pushes the government to merge with the United Arab Republic, which categorically denies the Maronite Christian community.

Bombings and assassinations precede vast street demonstrations. From June 1958 bursts a guerilla in the mountain between loyalists led by Naim Moghabghab and insurgents led by Kamal Jumblatt.

Faced with this agitation and the same-day revolution in Iraq causing the death of the pro-Western king, Faisal II and his prime minister, Chamoun obtains the landing of 14,000 American soldiers (Operation Blue Bat) comprising 8,509 members of the US Army including a contingent of the 24th US Infantry Division and 5,670 Marines of the 2nd Marine Division under the leadership of the United States European Command which secures the port of Beirut and its international airport which ensures the triumph of the counterrevolution led by the Kataeb.

These forces will leave the country on October 28, 1958, they suffered a slain because of a sniper and three other accidental deaths.

6 Amerindians will be part of this American armed force.