Excerpts from Books and Wikipedia
"On 28 February 1922, the United Kingdom issued a declaration through which it unilaterally ended its protectorate over Egypt. As a result, Sultan Fuad I promulgated a decree on 15 March 1922 whereby he adopted the title of King of Egypt. It has been reported that the title change was due not only to Egypt's newly independent status as the Kingdom of Egypt, but also to Fuad I's desire to be accorded the same title as the newly installed rulers of the newly created kingdoms of Hejaz, Syria and Iraq. . . . Egyptian independence was limited severely by the continuing British occupation of the country." [Wikipedia] "British control remained quite firm--indeed it was to last until 1952--but the unpopularity of the direct colonial rule was such that it was to be abandoned after the war (1922) for a less direct form of management, which implied a certain Egyptianization of the administration. Irish semi-independence and Egyptian semi-autonomy, both won in 1921-2, were to mark the first partial retreat of empires." [Hobsbawm: Empire, p. 287]