It was the prospect of Russia's increased influence in Istanbul and its southward expansion towards India rather than any loss of actual or potential markets in the eastern Mediterranean that inflamed Palmerston's feelings against Mehmed Ali's monopoly policies. For it was precisely the system of monopolies that the Pasha had introduced, Palmerston again rightly thought, that allowed the Pasha to syphon profits accrued from the agricultural and commercial sectors to the military, thus enabling him to build a powerful army and a formidable navy that he then used to threaten the Sultan's dominions. Ultimately Palmerston's greatest concern was for British possessions in Asia; his greatest fear was that Russia might interfere there. In other words, what was at stake was the British market in Asia rather than the much smaller ones in the eastern Mediterranean.

Builds on: "Great-power rivalry turned Egypt's crisis into a European-balance matter."

Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed…, loc. 1569