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William Mallinson

Ph.D., Professor of Political Ideas and Institutions, Università degli Studi Guglielmo Marconi

It is perhaps well enough known that both the US and the USSR encouraged the end of the British Empire, the former for business reasons (the Americans disliked Britain’s ‘imperial preference’ in trade), the latter for strategic and nominally ideological ones. Apart from that, Britain could not afford to keep its empire and gave up India and Burma, and its mandate in Palestine, in the aftermath of the last war. But Cyprus, as we shall see, bucked the trend. Not that there was not considerable debate within the British Foreign Office: the hawkish wing claimed that Cyprus was vital strategically, and that union with Greece would strengthen the (pro-Soviet) Communists. In contrast, the more thoughtful wing believed that Alliance would weaken the Communists [1]. Let us now scrutinize Cyprus and its connection with the ending of British independence.

For a crude geopolitician, Cyprus has long been a strategic location, à la Gibraltar or Diego Garcia, situated in the Eastern Mediterranean, close to Turkey but not far from Syria, Lebanon, and Israel. For hundreds of years, great powers have coveted the island. Settled by Greeks in the second millennium BC, the population has remained mainly Greek by language, culture, religion, and blood, despite the island has changed hands on numerous occasions. Union with Greece had been increasingly on the minds of most Cypriots since the outbreak of Greece’s war of independence against the Ottoman empire [2]. The path to becoming a republic had been fraught with difficulties, due, to a considerable extent, to backstage British collusion with Turkey and the Turkish Cypriots, even to the extent of helping them with their propaganda [3]. The objective was to divide the population — and Greece and Turkey — to make it easier to hang on to the island [4].

No papers have yet emerged about whether or not the US now pays for the British presence in Cyprus, and a parliamentary question to ascertain the facts would well elicit a response such as: ‘Her Majesty’s Government does not reveal matters pertaining to the security of the Realm’.

Britain has an unbalanced extradition agreement with the US; sold its MOD research arm to a US conglomerate, and handed over its nuclear research facility at Aldermaston to the US [5]. It is hardly surprising that Blair’s Britain joined the US in attacking Iraq. And the Cyprus story serves as a useful example of the process of Britain’s submissiveness that led to today’s lack of independence.


It is perhaps well enough known that both the US and the USSR encouraged the end of the British Empire, the former for business reasons (the Americans disliked Britain’s ‘imperial preference’ in trade), the latter for strategic and nominally ideological ones. Apart from that, Britain could not afford to keep its empire and gave up India and Burma, and its mandate in Palestine, in the aftermath of the last war. But Cyprus, as we shall see, bucked the trend. Not that there was not considerable debate within the British Foreign Office: the hawkish wing claimed that Cyprus was vital strategically, and that union with Greece would strengthen the (pro-Soviet) Communists. In contrast, the more thoughtful wing believed that Alliance would weaken the Communists [6]. Fear of the Soviet Union was the order of the day, not just in the German question, but even as far away as Cyprus. The situation is the same today, albeit in different colors. Anti-Russian became anti-Soviet and anti-Communist and is now again anti-Russian. Let us now scrutinize Cyprus and its connection with the ending of British independence.

From the Archives

For a crude geopolitician, Cyprus has long been a strategic location, à la Gibraltar or Diego Garcia, situated in the Eastern Mediterranean, close to Turkey but not far from Syria, Lebanon, and Israel. For hundreds of years, great powers have coveted the island. Settled by Greeks in the second millennium BC, the population has remained mainly Greek by language, culture, religion, and blood, despite the island has changed hands on numerous occasions. It has been successively controlled by Mycenaean Greeks, Phoenicians, Assyrians, Egyptians, Persians, Macedonian Greeks, Romans, Byzantine Eastern Romans, Franco-English (Richard Coeur de Lion), Franks, Venetians, Turks (Ottomans), British and, since 1960, to some extent by its own people. Union with Greece had been increasingly on the minds of most Cypriots since the outbreak of Greece’s war of independence against the Ottoman empire [7]. At its somewhat constrained independence from Britain, following an armed liberation struggle that began on April Fools’ Day 1955, led by a Cypriot-born Greek army officer, Colonel Grivas, some 18 percent of the population were described as Turkish Cypriots and the rest as Greek Cypriot, bar a tiny number of Armenians and Maronites. The path to becoming a republic had been fraught with difficulties, due, to a considerable extent, to backstage British collusion with Turkey and the Turkish Cypriots, even to the extent of helping them with their propaganda [8]. The objective was to divide the population — and Greece and Turkey — to make it easier to hang on to the island [9].

Apart from secretly colluding with the Turkish Government and helping it with its propaganda, Britain’s objective was to give Turkey a stake in Cyprus, even though the Treaty of Lausanne expressly forbade this. According to Article 16, the new Republic of Turkey was to have no rights in territories under the former jurisdiction of the Ottomans. Britain nevertheless brought Turkey into the Cyprus question, with disastrous consequences. She invited Greece and Turkey to a conference on ‘political and defence questions in the Eastern Mediterranean, including Cyprus’. Britain’s secret objectives can be encapsulated in two quotations, from the Permanent Under Secretary of the Foreign Office (FO) and the Foreign Secretary respectively:

I have always been attracted by the idea of a 3 Power Conference, simply because I believe that it would seriously embarrass the Greek Government. And if such a conference were held, I should not produce any British plan or proposal until a Greek-Turkish deadlock has been defined [10]. […] Throughout the negotiations, our aim would be to bring the Greeks up against the Turkish refusal to accept enosis and so condition them to accept a solution, which would leave sovereignty in our hands [11].

The conference predictably broke down and was followed by massive anti-Greek rioting in Turkey and the end of the cold but correct Greek-Turkish relations established in 1930 by Greek premier Venizelos and Turkish president Kamal Ataturk. Britain bears considerable responsibility for the abysmal state of Greek-Turkish ties today. The conditional independence of 1960 entailed Britain annexing [12] 99 square miles of Cypriot territory (which it keeps to this day) in the shape of the Sovereign Base Areas (SBAs), retaining various sites, overflying rights, and rights of passage. The SBAs house the controversial electronic eavesdropping stations that had been transferred from Suez. The whole arrangement was predicated on three interrelated treaties of Establishment (over half of which was devoted to the SBAs), Alliance, and Guarantee. The package gave the Turkish Cypriots more influence than their 18 percent presence merited (for example, 30 percent of civil service posts). The minority could apply the veto in foreign policy, defense, internal security, and taxation. The treaties detracted from the idea of a unitary state based on equal rights. They reflected a range of outside interests that bore little relation to the rights of the Cypriots, namely the US-British interest in maintaining the SBAs for strategic Cold War purposes; the perceived need to keep Cyprus NATO-friendly; and Greek and Turkish interests in maintaining their interests (in unhealthy competition with each other, into the bargain). The somewhat convoluted and unique legal package was, on the face of things, intended to work correctly, but even the Foreign Office later admitted that the Treaty of Guarantee was contrary to Article 2.4 of the UN Charter, and overridden by Article 103 [13].

Britain, Greece, and Turkey had left a critical job undone: the question of the separate municipalities. The communities were unable to agree, and President Makarios, with the help of the FO and the British High Commissioner, proposed 13 amendments to the constitution [14]. The Turkish Government got wind of it, and anti-Greek rioting broke out in major towns of Cyprus, leading to an intense Greek Cypriot backlash and the breakdown of the constitution. The Turkish Cypriots unilaterally set up enclaves, resulting in further radicalization by extremist elements. The cost to Greece was the expulsion of most of the 12,000 Greek nationals residing in Turkey and 60,000 Turkish citizens of Greek stock living in Istanbul and on the islands of Imbros and Tenedos. The Greek Government chose not to reciprocate in the case of the thousands of Moslems of Turkish stock living in Western Thrace, who thrive there to this day.

This event was only a decade after the Suez debacle of 1956, when Britain (and pre-Gaullist France) withdrew from Egypt on America’s instructions, and moved its electronic spying equipment to Cyprus. The Foreign Office was already questioning the viability of keeping the land it had annexed from Cyprus on the latter’s so-called independence in 1960. It was the troubles of 1963/4 that worried the Foreign Office, which wrote:

There seems little doubt, however, that in the long term, our sovereign rights in the SBAs and Treaty rights in Republican territory will be considered increasingly irksome by the Greek Cypriots and will be regarded as increasingly anachronistic by world public opinion [15].

However, the Kissinger-condoned invasion of Cyprus proved to be the final nail in the coffin of British independence in the military and, therefore, foreign policy [16]. De Gaulle’s comment that Britain did not have its own foreign policy was to be proven correct.

Just after the Turks landed on Cyprus, the Foreign Office wrote that Britain’s military bases on the island had usually been more of a liability than an asset, and that at least a de facto and temporary partition of the island into two clearly defined Greek and Turkish areas seem essential [17].

A further look at Foreign and Commonwealth Office views shows us how Britain gave in to Kissinger. In September 1974, a brief for the British Foreign Secretary stated that although the bases were an embarrassment, ‘we would wish to talk to the Americans before anyone else’ [18].

Kissinger then wrote to the Foreign Secretary, stressing his strong belief that elimination of the SBAs in Cyprus could have a destabilising effect on the region as a whole, encouraging the Soviet Union and others to believe that the strategic position of the West has been weakened in that area [19].

Following the meeting, Callaghan began to cave in, replying to Kissinger: ‘we shall not in present circumstances proceed with our preferred policy of withdrawing from the Bases altogether [20].’

The unavoidable fact was nevertheless that Britain wished to give up its territories on Cyprus, as the following, written in April 1975, makes clear:

The US Government is now firmly attached to the view that withdrawal from our bases in Cyprus would have a destabilizing effect upon the Eastern Mediterranean, with implications for the Middle East. We do not believe that it would have any significant effect on Arab/Israel relations; […] Dr. Kissinger, in particular, is anxious that we should ‘continue to occupy this square of the world chessboard’; we do not any longer seek such a world role [21].

Six months later, the British High Commissioner in Cyprus wrote that the bases ‘were not diamonds’ [22] , in direct contradiction to Kissinger, who ‘was concerned with United States policy over Cyprus on the resolution of the Arab/Israel problem’, regarding this ‘as more important than Greek hostility towards the United States’ [23]. Despite Kissinger’s pressure – he had even cynically referred to the bases as ‘real estate’ [24] - the British diplomats continued to squirm. Following a sudden and uninvited American visit to the bases in June 1976, ‘pressed on the British at short notice’, to assess electronic intelligence-gathering [25], the Secretary to the Cabinet wrote to the Head of the Foreign Office, mentioning a JIC [26] assessment; pointing out that the Americans knew that Britain did not wish to remain in Cyprus indefinitely; and mentioning the Americans’ wish to expand their Over the Horizon radar.’ [27] Nevertheless, an FCO paper prepared for the Cabinet in September 1976, stated that the aim was still to give up the bases [28]. And in early 1977, the British were still serious about getting out:

Since it is unlikely that HMG would consider a military withdrawal from Cyprus while maintaining sovereignty over the SBAs, any plan for a military withdrawal must take into account the need to transfer the sovereignty of the SBAs to the Government of Cyprus […] The loss of the Cyprus training facilities would be serious and it is hoped that it will be possible to negotiate with the Cyprus Government for the training to continue [29].

By the end of the year, however, the British were beginning to realize that the ‘special relationship’ was somehow more important than getting out of Cyprus, even if the FCO did not agree with Kissinger’s arguments. While a Ministry of Defense paper [30] was still talking about mid-1978 as the earliest possible date for withdrawal, Britain now looked at the next best option: the Americans paying for the bases. The Foreign Secretary, Owen, said that the policy decision to leave the SBAs was not being implemented while the hope of progress towards a settlement remained [31]. At the same meeting, an official told Owen that the FCO was waiting to hear from the Americans about financing the British presence, and were pressing for an answer. Over two years previously, the Americans had been so worried about the British relinquishing their bases that they had told them that they would be prepared to finance the SBAs, ‘secretly if necessary.’ [32]

To Conclude

No papers have yet emerged about whether or not the US now pays for the British presence in Cyprus, and a parliamentary question to ascertain the facts would well elicit a response such as: ‘Her Majesty’s Government does not reveal matters pertaining to the security of the Realm’.

When the US left UNESCO, Britain followed. When Britain rented to the US Diego Garcia (of extraordinary rendition fame), she succumbed to American terms, forcing her own brown-skinned subjects to leave their homes, and even gassing their animals. This policy contrasted with Britain’s defense of her white-skinned Falkland Islanders, for whom Britain fought against Argentina. Britain was after that used as a base from which to bomb Libya, during the Thatcher era, and was to unilaterally attack Iraq with the Americans during Blair’s dreadful premiership, an attack based on simple lying. It is, however, the case of Cyprus that provides a good example and understanding of Britain’s weakness in foreign affairs, and, in late British Prime Minister Edward Heath’s words, of its piggy-backing the USA. A cynical observer might conclude that it is a simple case of post-imperial rigor mortis.

To conclude, de Gaulle’s view that Britain had no foreign policy of its own certainly appears to hold plenty of water. If Suez was a watershed in terms of Britain’s strategic independence from the US, then Cyprus can be seen as one of the final nails in the coffin of British military (if not only foreign policy) independence.

Today, Britain cannot fire cruise missiles without US permission; cannot expel the US from its bases on British territories; relies more on the US for intelligence-gathering than vice-versa, with the US receiving all Britain’s intelligence (hence the US insistence on keeping the British bases on Cyprus) [34]; Britain has an unbalanced extradition agreement with the US; sold its MOD research arm to a US conglomerate, and handed over its nuclear research facility at Aldermaston to the US [35]. It is hardly surprising that Blair’s Britain joined the US in attacking Iraq. And the Cyprus story serves as a useful example of the process of Britain’s submissiveness that led to today’s lack of independence. As for Brexit (an emotional party-political gamble par excellence if ever there was one), it could well prove to be the final nail in the coffin of British independence.

1. Mallinson, William, Cyprus, Diplomatic History and the Clash of Theory in International Relations, IB Tauris, London, and New York, 2010, pp. 53-54, Britain and Cyprus, IB Tauris, 2016 and Bloomsbury, 2020, pp. 12-18,

2. Paul W. Wallace and Andreas G. Orphanides (eds), Sources for the History of Cyprus, vol. XI, Enosis and the British: British Official Documents 1878–1950, selected and edited by Coughlan, Reed, Greece, and Cyprus Research Center, Altamont (Albany, NY, 1990–2004). A reading of this volume quickly dispels the myth, invented by some, that the idea of union with Greece came only very late to Cyprus.

3. Bowker to Young, February 15, 1955, letter, PRO FO 371/117625, file RG 1081/120. See Mallinson, William, Cyprus, A Modern History, I. B. Tauris, London, and New York, 2005, 2008, and 2012, pp. 21-27.

4. The policy of divide et impera is, of course, not exclusive to Britain.

5. The announcement was made while members of Parliament were on their Christmas break, to avoid discussion. See a short letter in the Daily Mail of January 7, 2009.

6. Mallinson, William, Cyprus, Diplomatic History and the Clash of Theory in International Relations, IB Tauris, London, and New York, 2010, pp. 53-54, Britain and Cyprus, IB Tauris, 2016 and Bloomsbury, 2020, pp. 12-18,

7. Paul W. Wallace and Andreas G. Orphanides (eds), Sources for the History of Cyprus, vol. XI, Enosis and the British: British Official Documents 1878–1950, selected and edited by Coughlan, Reed, Greece, and Cyprus Research Center, Altamont (Albany, NY, 1990–2004). A reading of this volume quickly dispels the myth, invented by some, that the idea of union with Greece came only very late to Cyprus.

8. Bowker to Young, February 15, 1955, letter, PRO FO 371/117625, file RG 1081/120. See Mallinson, William, Cyprus, A Modern History, I. B. Tauris, London, and New York, 2005, 2008, and 2012, pp. 21-27.

9. The policy of divide et impera is, of course, not exclusive to Britain.

10. William Mallinson, ‘Turkish Invasions, Britain, Cyprus and the Treaty of Guarantee’, Synthesis, Review of Modern Greek Studies 3(1) (1999), 47, in William Mallinson, Cyprus, a Modern History (London and New York 2005); Kirkpatrick to Nutting, June 26, 1955, minute, PRO FO. 371/17640, file RG 1081/535.

11. Mallinson, Cyprus, op. cit., 24.

.

12. Some lawyers might argue that technically speaking, the SBAs were annexed by Britain from its Crown Colony, which was then granted limited independence.

13. Mallinson, Cyprus, op. cit., 53–6; Moreton to McPetrie, minute, December 14, 1967, and McPetrie’s reply, March 1, 1968, PRO 27/166/MF/10/41.

14. Ibid., 35. The British rôle is indisputable: in a letter of March 13, 1971, from Secondé (Southern European Department FCO) to Ramsbotham (High Commissioner in Cyprus), the former wrote: ‘We have been through the 1963 papers, which tend to confirm that the Thirteen Points were indeed framed with British help and encouragement; that the then High Commissioner [Clark] considered them to be reasonable prospects; and that we intended to promote their acceptance by the Turks.’ Ramsbotham later wrote to Secondé: ‘Makarios, ever the gentleman took sole responsibility for the Thirteen Points’. See also Diana Markides, Cyprus 1957–1963; from Colonial Conflict to Constitutional Crisis: the Key Role of the Municipal Issue (Minneapolis, MI, 2001), for an analysis of the 1963 outburst.

15. Brief for High Commissioner’s visit to London, June 18, 1964, DO/220/170, file Z MED/193/105/2, part A.

16. See Mallinson, William, Kissinger, and the Invasion of Cyprus, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne, 2016, and 2017.

17. FCO paper, July 22, 1974, FCO 0/1916, file WSC 1/11.

18. Steering Brief for Secretary of State’s discussions with Dr. Kissinger in New York, September 24, 1974, FCO 82/446, file AMU 3/548/8, part B.

19. FCO 46/1178, file DP/13/441/2, part C.

20. Telegram 2427 from FCO to Washington, of November 26 1974, FCO 46/1178, file DP 12/441, part C.

21. ‘British Interests in the Eastern Mediterranean’, paper by Western European Department, April 11, 1975, FCO 46/1248, file DPI/516/1

22. Diplomatic Report No. 353/75, October 10, 1975, FCO 9/2169, file WSC 1/12.

23. ‘British Policy on Cyprus, July to September 1974’, paper prepared by FCO, January 14, 1976, FCO 9/2379, file WSC 020/548/1.

24. Paper by Southern European Department, October 27, 1976, FCO 9/2388, file WSC 023/1, part H.

25. The visit was on May 27 1976, DEFE 11/832, file BFC/1120/21.

26. Joint Intelligence Committee.

27. Letter from Hunt to Palliser, July 22, 1976, DEFE 68/373, file D/DPS(C) 103, part 8.

28. Defense and Overseas Policy paper, September 29, 1976, DEFE68/373, file D/DPS (C) 103, part 8.

29. MOD report (Annex A to covering memorandum by Bliss, January 28, 1977, file DEFE 24/152.

30. Ibid.

31. Record of meeting on Cyprus at FCO, September 19, 1977, FCO 9/2505, file WSG 014/4.

32. Weston to Morgan, minute, April 28, 1975, FCO 9/2152, file WSC 1/5, part C. As for (Lord) Owen, with whom this author has met several times over the years, he is remarkably coy about the question of what happened over the financing of the bases and did not want to meet in Greece last summer, claiming that he does not discuss politics on holiday, thus escaping by equating history with politics.

33. A few years ago, the author of this article dropped into the British Embassy in Athens for a chat with the ambassador, Simon Gass, a former colleague of his in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s United Nations Department. They discussed Cyprus, and he asked for the author’s view on a solution. When the author gave his view, the ambassador wondered what the Americans would think. The author had come across this substitute thinking when in the Diplomatic Service. The Americans always had to be ‘consulted’.

34. David Leigh and Richard Norton-Taylor, ‘We are now a Client State’, The Guardian, July 17, 2003.

35. The announcement was made while members of Parliament were on their Christmas break, to avoid discussion. See a short letter in the Daily Mail of January 7, 2009.


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