Cyprus-Forum.com

[mehmet]

[quote="Piratis"][ I believe according to the plan the Turkish troops were not supposed to occupy Famagusta (but apparently they could not resist when they saw that there was no resistance).

When you say Famagusta are you referring to the Old Town that was home to Turkish Cypriots or Varosha/Maras? The way I understand it the Turkish army didn't have time to occupy Varosha due to agreeing a ceasefire but by that time Greek Cypriots (fearing the worst) evacuated the town and that's why it remains today unoccupied.

[insan]

A part of Birands 30 hot days can be found at:

http://www.cyprus-conflict.net/30%20Hot%20Days.htm

The Turkish Intervention, July-August 1974

There is a Turkish interpretation of the events of the summer of 1974 that is, as one would expect, quite different from the dominant Greek and Greek Cypriot view. In this seminal work, Turkish journalist Mehmet Ali Birand -- widely considered to be one of the best and fairest reporters in Turkey -- recounts the events of that July and August, leading up to the second and more decisive military intervention of August 14. This account is particularly useful for its reporting on Ankara=s decision making. It is excerpted from his 1985 book, 30 Hot Days.

[Piratis]

I wouldn't take everything that Mamet Ali Birand says at face value.

Lets not forget that while in Greece of that time was ruled by the military for some years, Turkey has been always ruled by the military. Democracy never existed there. The Generals of Turkey always had very close ties with the USA. The US knew that in Greece sooner or later democracy would return, and the plan of Kissinger was the partition of Cyprus and not to give Cyprus to Greece. They knew very well that the military rule wouldn't last long in Greece, and in democratic elections the Greeks would vote somebody not very friendly toward the US. (They did. Andreas Papandreou who wanted the American bases out of Greece).

So the theory that the US wanted Greece to annex the whole Cyprus is bullshit. Their interests would not be served in this way. Partition is what they wanted, and they needed a way to do it without having the USSR reacting.

[mehmet]

After writing yesterday, I search and find the book from Birand. I quote from '30 Hot Days'

The following account of events relating to Greece's decision to declare war on Turkey has been compiled from a) memoranda by Naval Forces Commander Arapkis and Air Force Commander Papanicolau, published in To Vima on 25 may, 1975 and 22 June, 1975 respectively, b) an interview with Averof which appeared in The Sunday Times of 21 October, 1974 and c) the book 'Storm in Athens' by Anastasakos.

Early on Sunday morning (21 July), Bonanos, Chief of the Greek General Staff, called a conference with the three commanders to review the situation in the light of the resolution to declare war on Turkey which had been adopted, some 20 hours previously, at his meeting with President Gizikis and Ioannides. Air Force Commander Papanicolau objected to the decision saying 'we need a preparatory before we can become operational. Of the Phantom jets we have been expecting, only a fraction has arrived.' Arapkis said that his forces were better prepared, but addes '.... nevertheless, two of our destroyers are undergoing repairs. Moreover, only a declaration of war BY Turkey on Greece can raise the morale of the naval forces. I do not approve of the resolution.' Land Forces Commander General Galatsanos, stated that it would take days for his forces to be massed on the border. He added 'we have 500 tanks. 100 of these are doing police duty in or around Athens; 200 more are some 200km from the frontier with Yurkey. It is extyremely difficult to get them operational in so short a time.' What all this added up to was that Greece was not in a position to fight. Bonanos was furious. He had been highly critical of the decision to go to war with Turkey without first ascertaining the state of the armed forces; he was even more critical of the action taken in Cyprus in such circumstances. The forces commander urged further, that Greece should return to civilian rule and the Administration taken out of the hands of the Junta, by force if necessary.

This was from page 36 of the English language version. From page 37

An important meeting was being held in another room at General Staff HQ. Here, Brigadier General Dimitrios Ioannides - who had engineered theanti-Mkarios coup singlehanded- and other members of the junta were discussing how and where Turkey should be taught a moral lesson. Suddenly, the door of the conference room where the Forces Commanders were meeting were thrown open and Ioannides walked in jubilantly: 'we have decided to attack Turkey on the Maritsa' he informed them. This revelation was greeted with utter silence. At last Bonanos fopund his voice: 'this is sheer folly. No one would support us. We are even facing opposition from the US.' Here Naval Commander Arapkis interjected: 'I have no air support. Without it I cannot help even Cyprus.' Bonanos went on: 'Our armed forces can protect the country against attack, but they cannot take the offensive.' The atmosphere became strained as Bonanos added that General Davos, in charge of the 3rd Army on the Turkish border, had refused to identify himself with the decision to attack Turkey and Ioannides realised that control of the situation was slipping out of his grasp. In a desperate effort he tried to talk the commanders into agreeing to the dispatch of reinforcements to Cyprus by sea and air. The commanders demurred but Ioannides persisted, and it was finally agreed that, using planes that were not fully operational because of a lack of spare parts, Commandos should be flown to Cyprus on what was virtually a 'suicide mission'. Far from satisfied Ioannides stormed out of the room in a rage. Re-joining the Junata, he declared: 'We have been twice betrayed; first in Cyprus and now here. We are faced with two alternatives; we can retire to our homes and watch developments from there or we can have the traitors arrested and fight the enemy.' About 25 of the officers present voted in favour of arresting the 'traitors' immediately, but the decision was shortlived. The armed forces were now under the command of General Davos, and he would have to direct any operation against Turkey. He, however, opposed this latest decision of the Junta; and so too did he General Staff, on the grounds that to attempt a purge at such a critical moment was asking for trouble.
This marked the collapse of the Junta. The coup in Cyprus had been planned and carried out in the belief that Turkey would be unable to interven, but declaring war on Turkey was a different matter. Almost everyone now realised that Ioannides was plunging the country into a mad adventure. A high ranking Greek officer, who was on duty that day, told journalists later: 'an attack on Turkey would have been catastrophic for Greece. With the army so deeply divided, we could have lost everything as far as Athens.
By evening the Junta officers were disappearing one by one, and the Ioannides Administration was being left in the hands of Bonanos and Presidnet Gizikis...there was only one way out of this predicament - to hand the government back to civilians.'


I would like to ask if people can confirm or add anything to these accounts. Perhaps some members of the forum have one of the books quoted or remember reading the articles either in the Greek press or the Sunday Times. If the whole thing is a fabrication it is certainly a most detailed one, and one from one of the most respected journalists in Turkey.

Assuming there is truth in the above accounts, it points to this

1) the greek government was unprepared for Turkey intervening in Cyprus, and was certainly unprepared for war with Turkey.

2) democracy returned to Greece not because of some law of nature that says Greece can never have dictatorships for too long whilst Turkey can never have democracy (for the time being I'm not even going to respond to the racist attitudes behind such attitudes) but because the military feared the anger of hte Greek population about Turkey's involvement in Cyprus and there was no other way out.

3) The US was not in control of the situation. The US may have approved of the idea of removing Makarios, only a genius would have been able to predict the Turkish response and the outcome of partition. If the US wanted partition this was not the cleverest way to go about it, by bringing Turkey and Greece close to war with each other.

My own belief is that US concern was this,

1) for Cyprus to stay out of Soviuet bloc (by any means necessary)
2) for NATO to remain strong. For this to happen conflict between Turkey and Greece had to be avoided.

Later I will detail US involvement to demonstate that they were not in control, they wanted to be and they had diplomats buzzing around like flies around Europe to prevent Cyprus conflict escalating.

[mehmet]

something that I have been thinking about recently is Tassos Papadopoulos. What was he doing during these events in 1974? After all he is someone who thought the 1960 Constitution was unacceptable (perhaps he has changed his mind). What was his public position when Makarios was overthrown and Nicos Sampson (who used to boast how many Turks he kill) was the President? Did he lie low and wait for things to settle or was he loyal to the Archbishop?

[Piratis]

I don't know what the exact plans of the US were. You can see from several of their policies that many times they didn't think everything very good.
But the facts are that they had Ioanides and the other traitors under their full control. This was not the first or only time that the US install puppet governments.
It is also true that Turkey was one of their biggest alie during the cold war, and that Turkey had plans to invade Cyprus long time before 74. Therefore you can not say "only a genius would have been able to predict the Turkish response". Makarios knew very well what the Turkish response would be, the Turks also knew and they were prepared for it, and of course the Americans knew as well. Actually the opposite can be said. That only an idiot would not be able to predict the Turkish response. An idiot like Inanides for example. Kissinger was not an idiot thought. He knew very well what he was doing.

[Bananiot]

Papadopoulos, if I remember correctly, was arrested by EOKA B thugs in Famagusta but was soon released when EOKA B leader in the area Kikis Constantinides ... explained to them.

Permit me to come back to Papadopoulos erratic and inexplicable behaviour. Take this business with the much-talked CBM (confidence building measures). When the idea was first put forward in 1994 by the UN, Papadopoulos rejected it outright, calling the CBM "the third attila". So did Christofias, by the way, but he used another phrase to describe them. Now, he has proposed some sorry, so called CBM,s, which include the return of Varoshia.

Dear friends, Varoshia would have been returned to the lawful oweners in 18 days from today had we not listened to the barbaric call of our president in April. We allowed history (Simitis) to bypass us and we lost the opportunity to reunite Cyprus.

Now, we are waiting for the better, european (sic) solution Papadopoulos promised, but he has never told us how we would go about achieving this goal. Yesterday, he told Kennedy that he cannot propose anything until he consults with the ... parties.

Dora is laughing all the way to Washington.

[MicAtCyp]

Thanks Mehmet for taking the time to write all those down. The whole thing certianly is NOT a fabrication as I remember reading most parts of it in Greek press.

From what I read it seems that the Generals did not really "refuse" to declare war on Turkey but rather admitted inability.Whether that inability was real or an orhestrated excuse is another story.

I noticed Ioannides said

'We have been twice betrayed; first in Cyprus and now here.

and really wonder what he meant by "betrayed first in Cyprus"?

Perhaps the TC friends in this forum may not know that there was an unexplainable non-response and a continuous "hold your fire" order to our soldiers during the 1974 Invasion. And also continuous orders for retreats with no reason.For example the ELDYK commandos penetrated to the borders of kionelli 5 times and in all occasions they were ordered to retreat for no reason. The Turkish ships were just outside the Kyrenia sea and the artillery commanders were asking "shal we open fire? And the order they were always getting was No.My own commander when I was a soldier a few years later was boasting to us that he was the only one who dis-obeyed the Orders and did open fire. I was 17 years old in 1974 and while the war was supposed to go on I could see hundreds of soldiers who abandoned their positions, threw their military uniforms away, and joined the rest of the wandering population up the mountains.Every single one was saying that this war was a theater/a treason/a setup.They were not even giving them bullets to load their guns.....

There is no other logical explanation in my opinion that can bound all events together other than most of the Junta Generals were following an agreed Plan.

I don't agree with MA Birants assesment that they miscalculated on Turkeys reaction because this does not explain the continuous orders aiming to let Turkey get in without bloodshed.

Many GCs beleive the plan was agreed with the US to let Turkey take something and then declare double Enosis. Although this also lacks logical explanation, it is possible that the Americans managed to convince key position Generals that this plan would solve the Cyprus problem the way everybody wanted. Most propably they backed up their proposal with some million $ to each General.

NB. You do know that the Eoka-B people were each receiving a cheque of $200 every 2-3 months don't you? This is a FACT and I witnessed it with my own eyes in 1972-73, from someone, who quite strangely one month after the 1974 Invasion, emmigrated to Canada without even been a refugee, and without even losing anything!! In fact that was the first time in my life I saw a foreign Bank draft, and I was so impressed that it was typewritten and so tidy made up. Eoka-B people were taking orders from the Junta Generals. Question:The Eoka B members were receiving US$, the Junta Generals were not receiving?

[insan]

http://www.hellas.org/cyprus/timeline.htm


The invasion timeline which published at www.hellas.org indicates that both Greek forces and National guard was ready and decisive to combat against Turkish and TC forces...

But what I wonder is what's the position of GC left? Were armed GC left wing in a different position in the first 7 days of the combat?

Perhaps the TC friends in this forum may not know that there was an unexplainable non-response and a continuous "hold your fire" order to our soldiers during the 1974 Invasion. And also continuous orders for retreats with no reason.For example the ELDYK commandos penetrated to the borders of kionelli 5 times and in all occasions they were ordered to retreat for no reason. The Turkish ships were just outside the Kyrenia sea and the artillery commanders were asking "shal we open fire? And the order they were always getting was No.My own commander when I was a soldier a few years later was boasting to us that he was the only one who dis-obeyed the Orders and did open fire. I was 17 years old in 1974 and while the war was supposed to go on I could see hundreds of soldiers who abandoned their positions, threw their military uniforms away, and joined the rest of the wandering population up the mountains.Every single one was saying that this war was a theater/a treason/a setup.They were not even giving them bullets to load their guns.....

Could it be the reason my adelfe MicAtCyp?[/url]

[mehmet]

I've no doubt US try to control events, but simply put they had friends in Greece like Ioannides. Ioannides also had his influence in Cyprus and therefore friends in Cyprus too.

What I have recently outlined by quotes is that the fall in Greek government happened because

1) Greek soldiers and their allies in Greek Cypriot community overthrow Makarios- provoking a civil war

2) Turkey send in soldiers to prevent Enosis

3) Greek government fall when key people say they are unequipped for war with Turkey (rather than refuse due to moral reasons- I agree with Micatcyp on this)

Was it part of the US plan to have Ioannides hand over power to Karamanlis? Is that a way to treat your friends? No, I find that hard to accept. It doesn't make sense to me.

Regarding the orders not to fire. When are we talking about? Before the first 'ceasefire' or between the two 'ceasefires'. I have just been reading some more and it is stated that there was never an effective ceasefire.

No I didn't know about EOKA b recieving cheques. Were these from a governmet or from overseas supporters (in the same way Irish Americans support the IRA?).