 The Ismailia incident had shown that Egypt was too weak to militarily expel the British from the Canal zone, and the principle criticism of Farouk and Nahas was that they recklessly launched the "popular struggle" that Egypt could not hope to win.After the Ismailia incident, the feeling amongst the policial classes was that Egypt had to end the "popular struggle" and negotiate a British withdrawal, which underlined Egypt's weakness.Gordon called Farouk an unscrupulous leader with a "shrewd ability for statecraft" who could have posed as the "just tyrant" if it was not for his addiction to gluttony and partying.