A Franco-Imperial army of 42,000 attempted to outflank Frederick's 22,000 Prussians near the village of Rossbach. Frederick spotted the movement, had his cavalry strike before the enemy completed their maneuver, and unleashed his infantry. The entire battle lasted 90 minutes. The French and Imperial forces — attacking each other in the confusion as much as the Prussians — suffered 10,000 casualties and fled in disorder. Prussia lost 548 men.
The most humiliating French military defeat in a generation. Rossbach shattered French military prestige across Europe, delighted the British (who subsidized Prussia to keep France busy), and made Frederick II a pan-European celebrity. Voltaire sent him a congratulatory poem. The defeat convinced many French officers that their army needed fundamental reform — a process that, ironically, produced the army that would fight the Revolution and Napoleon.
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British and French paratroopers drop on Port Said while amphibious forces storm the beaches in an operation that recalls World War II. Egyptian resistance is fierce — civilians join the defense with weapons from army armories. The Anglo-French force captures the city but halts when the UN ceasefire comes into effect. They have advanced just 23 miles down the Canal when they are ordered to stop.
Port Said became a symbol of Egyptian resistance and anti-colonial defiance across the Arab world. The ceasefire, forced by US financial pressure on the pound sterling and Soviet nuclear threats, proved a decisive turning point — European powers would never again launch independent military operations in the Middle East without American approval.
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