Why did EOKA fail in its objectives in Cyprus?

Why did EOKA fail in its objectives in Cyprus?
Here Cypriot academic DEMETRIS ASSOS gives his answer and argues

COMMONLY held Greek Cypriot opinion contends the EOKA struggle failed to achieve its objective of enosis because of dark machinations. According to this view, the 'heroic' struggle of EOKA was frustrated either because of the inept handling of the Cyprus problem by the Greek government and/or Makarios or because of some international intrigue, which undermined the 'fair' demand for enosis and resulted only independence for Cyprus and not union with Greece.

These arguments are fundamentally flawed. There was no conspiracy and independence was the only logical consequence of forces set in motion in the 1950s.

The desalinization of Cyprus was a complex and tortuous process, which did not turn out as the Greek Cypriots, the ethnic majority group on the island, had hoped.

Reasons for conspiracies

ON 1 April 1955, the Greek Cypriot paramilitary organization EOKA launched a campaign that aimed to end British rule and unite Cyprus with Greece. However, the outcome of the EOKA struggle was the establishment of an independent bi-communal republic in partnership with Turkish Cypriots, under the international guarantee of Britain, Greece and Turkey.

In response to the frustration of enosis (union with Greece), which was a long cherished Greek Cypriot national aspiration, different conspiracy theories have proliferated and still influence their perceptions of how Cypriot independence was achieved despite their false assumptions.

Many Greek Cypriots contend the treaties of Zurich-London, which established an independent Cyprus, were the result of either the Greek government or Makarios selling out on their vision of enosis. Union with Greece could have been achieved, they say, if they had stuck to the ideals.

Archbishop Makarios signs the agreement that grants Cyprus independence and becomes the Island's first President. Sir Hugh Foot (1st right) and Turkish Cypriot Dr Kutchuk, the new Vice President (2nd right) watch with approval.

Grivas and his supporters who maintained that the signing of the agreements was not only a mistake, but also the result of a plot to undermine EOKA's 'heroic' struggle initially promoted this theory. It glosses over the actual conditions, which led the Greek government and Makarios to accept the compromise of Zurich and ignores the historical record, which contradicts their stance.

A reluctant Greece

THE fact is that Greece had always been reluctant to get involved in the Cyprus problem. After the end of the Second World War successive governments in Athens had maintained a cautious attitude on the issue.

When the Greek Cypriots sent a delegation to Greece to raise awareness about their plebiscite, held in January 1950, which called for enosis, the delegation was told: 'Today Greece breathes with two lungs; one British, the other American. Therefore she cannot afford to be suffocated because of the Cyprus problem.'

But Makarios, after he became Archbishop, launched a sustained effort to convince the Greek government to take up the Cyprus case at the United Nations, but again was met with similar comments from the Greek government both in 1951 and in 1952.

Sophocles Venizelos, the Greek foreign minister, bluntly told Makarios: 'I will not allow you to direct the foreign policy of Greece'.

Field Marshal Papagos

Only when Field Marshal Papagos, 'the strongman of Greece', came to power in November 1952, did the Greek government adopt a more assertive policy on Cyprus. Even then, it was partly in response to British Prime Minister Eden's refusal to talk to Papagos about Cyprus. He was so infuriated that he agreed to take up the Cyprus question at the UN for the first time.

Nevertheless Papagos did not approve of paramilitary action in Cyprus against the British. Papagos' secret police kept a careful watch on Grivas' clandestine activities and even issued an arrest warrant against him. Only when the diplomatic options were thoroughly exhausted did Papagos finally acquiesce to violence.

But on his deathbed, the Field Marshal, appears to have had second thoughts about the struggle. By then he was too infirm to act on them.

Why were successive Greek governments cautious in embracing the cause of Cyprus?

Cautious attitudes

THE Greek caution was grounded in the Cold War realities and the greater strategic needs of the nation. The Greek Civil War (1946-1949) had been won with American and British aid. Greece, therefore, was reluctant to offend Britain, which wanted to retain Cyprus, and the US, which did not want disunity among its allies, by raising the question of Cyprus. Greek reliance on its British and American allies did not end with the conclusion of the Civil War, but continued unabated because of the 'menace from the north'.

This was a fusion of the old regional rivalries with other Balkan states and the Cold War polarization. Yugoslavia had aided the Communist guerrillas during the civil war but even more dangerous was the Bulgarian threat. Bulgaria traditionally coveted Salonica, Greece's second largest city, to become its outlet to the Mediterranean. It had tried to capture it on three separate occasions - 1913, 1916 and 1941.

The fact that Bulgaria was now a Soviet satellite turned Greece's northern border into a long, vulnerable defense line. This need to defend this border dominated early Greek Cold War strategy, which was bent on the preservation of the status quo, and made imperative the need to join NATO in order to counterbalance the pressure on its northern border.

There were also domestic considerations in Greece that militated against an adventurous foreign policy.

After the Civil War there was urgent need to restore the economy and rebuild the country's damaged infrastructure. Economic weakness was coupled with chronic political weakness.

Since the end of the Civil War, the country was ruled by a string of weak coalition governments, which did not have the political capital or will to embark on such any foreign adventures.

Finally, Greece had to nurse a burgeoning but delicate Greco-Turkish friendship that was partly stimulated by the common Soviet threat and their simultaneous accession into NATO.

In the early 1950s, officially at least, Turkey showed little interest in the Cypriot issue, even though Turkish emotion was brewing both on the island and in Turkey itself. In this sense it was wiser for the Greek government to avoid agitation over Cyprus lest it would provoke the interest and latent rivalry of Turkey.

In the greater scheme of things Cyprus was only one of the many issues, which preoccupied Greek foreign policy. Raising the Cyprus issue would alienate Greece within NATO at a time when NATO membership was considered to be the cornerstone of Greek foreign and security policy.

Greek Cypriots fail to understand

THE Greek Cypriots consistently failed to appreciate that Greece had other objectives and policies beyond the Cyprus problem. They could not understand why Greece was reluctant to bend its entire foreign policy toward this end and refused to acknowledge the possibility that Greece might lack the capacity to achieve this aim.

Prime Minister Karamanlis greets Colonel Grivas (center) and his wife in Athens, when the EOKA leader returned to Athens in March 1959.

The attitude of Premier Constantine Karamanlis, who essentially handled the Cyprus problem after the death of Papagos, until the signing of the agreements, observed: 'I will not blow up Greece for their sake! The Cypriots must cease to think that they can dictate to me the policy of Greece. I determine Greek policy and the limits within which it operates.'

As the EOKA struggle started to unfold the cautious stance of the Greek government proved to be correct. Greece was too weak to promote the cause of enosis. Efforts in the UN to secure favorable resolutions proved unsuccessful, with Britain capable of blocking such moves. The futility of the UN strategy was underlined further by the fact that it was not an international court of justice, which could issue legally binding decisions.

Britain aiming to counterbalance the Greek claims introduced Turkey as an interested party in the dispute. This eventually transformed the whole issue into a full-blown international dispute but also led Britain to increasingly to rely on Turkey to maintain its position in Cyprus.

As a result Britain made concessions to the Turkish side, which undermined the Greek Cypriot demand for enosis and eventually outflanked entirely the EOKA struggle. A crucial turning point was the statement on double self-determination that was made in the House of Commons on 19 December 1956 by the Colonial Secretary Lennox-Boyd:

Any exercise of self-determination should be effected in such a manner that the Turkish Cypriot community, no less than the Greek Cypriot community, shall, in the special circumstances of Cyprus, be given freedom to decide for themselves their future status. In other words, Her Majesty's Government recognizes that the exercise of self-determination in such a mixed population must include partition among the eventual options.

British pressure

A BBC correspondent interviews Lord Radcliffe at Nicosia Airport when he arrived in Cyprus on a fact-finding mission in 1956.

THE aim of this statement was to make Lord Radcliffe's constitutional proposals - which were to be submitted to the consideration of the two Cypriot communities - more palatable and to use the specter of partition as a stick against the demand for enosis.

The introduction of the idea of partition of the Island and 'double self-determination' struck a mortal blow to the idea of enosis for two reasons.

Firstly, the application of the principle of self-determination could now lead to partition. This undermined the EOKA struggle and made its continuation counter-productive because partition was not part of its aims.

Second, Britain, by acknowledging that partition was a possible outcome for the future of Cyprus, even if it was an expedient tactic rather than genuine intention, encouraged Turkey and the Turkish Cypriots to work towards that objective. Turkey progressively hardened its attitude on the Cyprus issue and started to demand partition as the only possible outcome of this dispute, after the release of Makarios from exile in spring 1957. At the same time the Turkish Cypriots launched their own counter-campaign for partition, which complicated the political situation on the island immensely.

After the emergence of the Turkish demand for partition, short of an overwhelming military victory against both the British Security Forces and the Turkish Cypriots, which was beyond EOKA's capacity, enosis was no longer feasible.

A tipping point

Prime Minister Harold Macmillan (right) with the Governor Sir Hugh Foot to discuss his plans for the future of Cyprus.

THE Macmillan Plan was the tipping point for the Greek side. It forced the switch from enosis to independence as a compromise in order to avert an even worse solution.

The plan envisioned the separation of the island's population into two nominal communities - Greek and Turkish Cypriot - which would be given equal rights, accorded 'self-government and communal autonomy', which translated into separate Houses of Representatives for each community. Members of the two communities would have the right to dual nationality, Greek or Turkish, while retaining their British one. The most problematic provision was the legal standing, which was conceded to Turkey a right to involve itself in Cypriot internal affairs.

Both Greek and Turkish governments were given the right to appoint special representatives, to help in the administration of the island. This meant that Turkey and Greece acquired a legal stake in Cyprus. Matters pertaining to foreign policy, internal security and defense were reserved to the Governor, who would seek the advice of the Greek and the Turkish representatives on such matters.

At the end of a seven-year period, Britain would ask Greece and Turkey to share sovereignty of the island, except for the military enclaves reserved for strategic reasons, thus leading to a tridominium.

The pending implementation of the Macmillan plan left the Greek government and Makarios with few options. There was little that could be achieved in the UN. As the British Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd told his Greek counter part Evangelos Averoff, no recourse to the UN could change the British position which was to press ahead with the implementation of the plan: 'We have no other choice but to apply it. Do you wish to accept it? We shall be happy. If you do not, we shall implement it with the Turks as best we can. Sooner or later a part of the population will help us. In one way or another we must close this problem.'

Continuation of the EOKA struggle now bore the danger of partition because further violence in Cyprus could trigger the British decision for the division of the island.

Partition threatened

WHEN the Cyprus Committee was established in April 1957, its mission was 'to review the implications of a Partition of Cyprus'. However - because of the ethnic composition of the island - virtually no part of the island were Turkish Cypriots in a majority - any partition would involve substantial forced migration across artificially created borders.

Yet all British plans after the Radcliffe constitution included the promise of partition in order to gain Turkish endorsement. Nevertheless the cabinet concluded that outright partition remained a last resort option in face of protracted terrorism, reasoning that the British government 'could not carry indefinitely the burden of sole responsibility for the administration of the island'.

A Green Line that separated Greek and Turkish Cypriots in Nicosia was established in 1958 after British troops were forced to intervene to prevent intercommunal fighting in the capital.

It was a message reiterated on 22 January 1958: 'If terrorism broke out again in Cyprus, we could not afford indefinitely to devote military resources to its repression.' This warning was conveyed to the Greek government and Makarios in February 1958 when a British delegation traveled to Athens for consultations and was later repeated in May. When the British Cabinet discussed the Macmillan Plan in that month, it concluded:

If, however, the plan failed and it became necessary to seek a final solution of the problem of Cyprus on other lines, we should regard ourselves as bound by our previous assurances in regard to the application of the principle of self-determination.

In other words if EOKA were to oppose the plan through widespread violence to further destabilize the Island further, the British would be forced to divide Cyprus and withdraw.

'Abandon enosis'

THE Karamanlis administration now had two options: either to risk an all-out war with Turkey or stop demanding Cypriot self-determination.

A war with Turkey held too many risks. It could lead to Greece's expulsion from NATO, with Bulgaria and the Soviet Union exploiting the situation to acquire Salonika. More importantly, it was far from clear if Greece had the military strength to force Turkey to accept enosis for Cyprus. Clearly the risks were too great and the possible gains outweighed the sacrifices Greece would have to make.

For Karamanlis there was only one option: to abandon the demand of enosis and seek a compromise solution. Makarios was more reluctant to accept the realities of the issue, but eventually declared his support for an independent Cyprus in order to avert the implementation of the Macmillan plan.

Once the Archbishop gave his blessing to this compromise, Karamanlis seized the opportunity of the Greco-Turkish rapprochement that had started to blossom in December 1958, when Averoff and his Turkish counterpart Fatin Zorlu met secretly to discuss the Cyprus issue.

The treaties of Zurich-London were the price the Greek side paid to avoid the Macmillan plan, which was so detrimental to the Greek Cypriots.

The accusation, therefore, that either the Greek government or Makarios could have done something more, but instead chose to "betray" the Greek Cypriots and the cause of enosis, must be dismissed as false.

Grivas may have said that he was prepared to fight to the last man, but such self-consuming heroism would merely have accelerated the advance to partition, as there was no chance of an EOKA victory.

Politics, after all is the art of the possible, and this must be borne in mind when the treaties are explained away as 'treason' by the enosists.

The treaties were not to the liking of the majority of the Greek Cypriots, but what else could be done?

The treaties simply reflected the weakness of the Greek side and not some dark conspiracy, which for an unspecified reason chose to frustrate enosis.

The only 'conspiracy' - if this word can be used - that merits mention is the substantial disagreement between the Archbishop and the Greek government regarding the terms of the agreements, but, nevertheless, the Archbishop signed, declaring afterwards that he chose the lesser evil.

The second conspiracy is more popular and is slightly harder to refute because it contains some grains of truth.

The blame game

Makarios and his advisors face the media on their arrival in London to discuss the future of Cyprus. The conference, in February 1959, concluded with agreements between Britain, Turkey, Greece and the Cypriot delegations that led to the independence of the Island a year later.

ACCORDING to this theory the only reason why enosis was not achieved is because of some dark international conspiracy. The blame is shifted on the international community and often more specifically on Britain.

For example in a book published under the auspices of the EOKA foundation, the author claims that the British foreign policy diverted the Cyprus problem from its 'natural course'.

Claims of international conspiracies and British machinations are fairly common in Greek Cypriot media and are probably the most popular explanation since it glosses over a complex issue and any need for introspection and critical approach to this period of Cypriot history.

In a nutshell the argument is that the 'fair' demand for enosis was ignored by the British who did their best to block enosis by conspiring against the Greek Cypriots primarily through the employment of 'divide and rule' tactics.

Although this argument emotionally resonates in Greek Cypriot society, it is misleading and offers a biased and simplistic understanding of the causes and processes that led to the reluctant independence agreements of 1959. Essentially the end point of independence was not the result of a British conspiracy but a case of a political strategy that went wrong resulting in unintended consequences.

Grivas receives a VIP welcome in Athens on his arrival after leaving Cyprus in March 1959.

Grivas himself wrote that 'through military action we did not seek to defeat the English but to coerce a political solution according to our desires'. This comment goes to the heart of the matter. In retrospect the aim of the EOKA struggle was rather sophisticated, which required political prudence and an impeccable sense of timing. That is an important factor to be borne in mind when assessing the reasons why it failed.

Essentially the aim of EOKA's violence was to nudge the British from the position of 'never' they had publicly taken in the summer of 1954 to negotiations that would pave the way to enosis.

Signs misread

THE EOKA campaign, therefore, had to be a balancing act between striking a sense of urgency into the British over Cyprus and avoiding the destruction of Greco-British relations, as a solution would be decided by negotiations between the two states.

Archbishop Makarios shows his support for enosis and EOKA in early 1955.

For this reason, Makarios, from the start of the conflict, wanted to avoid bloodshed and insisted on a 'sabotage only' campaign and envisioned it would be over in less than a year. At no point did he envisage all the bloodshed and ill will that would stem from the four-year-long 'small war'.

There were two important flaws in this strategy, which contributed significantly to the undoing of enosis.

The first was to ignore Turkish objections. The Greek Cypriot leadership overlooked Turkish Cypriots' anxiety regarding their welfare in case Cyprus became part of Greece. The enosists thought the Turkish Cypriots would simply have to accept their fate as a minority. Not for a moment did they consider Turkey might concern itself with the Island's political future.

As soon as Greek Cypriot calls for enosis grew louder, the Turkish Cypriots began venting their opposition. Here, in 1955, they march through London to demand the British recognize their rights.

Greek Cypriots' common belief that the Turkish Cypriots were driven to violence because of British encouragement or that Turkey became interested in Cyprus only because of Britain's policy is naive to say the least.

The Turkish Cypriots had always feared the possibility of enosis; it was the Greek Cypriots who failed to heed their concerns.

Anti-Enosis Turkish Cypriot demonstrations in Cyprus, encouraged by Turkey, were stepped up with cries for partition.

Greek Cypriot youth countered Turkish Cypriot demonstrations with their own to stress enosis.

Turkey, too, was bound to oppose enosis for a number of reasons. British diplomacy did not create the Greco-Turkish rivalry, which went back to the 1800s, although it exploited this by encouraging the Turkish government to become more involved once the EOKA conflict started. With the outbreak of violence, Cyprus was destined to become a cause for renewing old animosities and hatreds.

Vital British interests

THE second flaw in the enosist strategy was it underestimation of British determination to remain on the Island. In the mid-1950s, Britain saw Cyprus as vital to its strategic interests in the eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East.

In 1950 the British Chiefs of Staff committee unequivocally urged the full retention of the island under British sovereignty if Britain were to retain its influence in the region. By 1954, the Island's value had increased even further, with the transfer of the Middle East Headquarters there.

In fact the EOKA campaign also seriously damaged Greece's image in London, as the British policy-makers now regarded Greece as a weak and unreliable ally compared to Turkey.

Turkey became an increasingly important ally to Britain in the 1950s because of its geographical location. Bordering the Soviet Union, it was considered an important bulwark against Soviet efforts to penetrate the Middle East. In addition, Turkey was a senior member of the Baghdad Pact, an anti-Soviet alliance, which Britain hoped to use to extend its influence and prestige in the Arab world.

As a result of Greek Cypriot violence and the perception that Greek had become unreliable, Britain turned to Turkey as the perfect foil to Greek demands. It was expediency rather than pure Machiavellian 'divide and rule' tactics that guided British policy on Cyprus.

The British aim was to maintain Cyprus in face of enosis demands and the best way was to highlight Turkish reservations and counter claims. The 1955 Tripartite Conference in London was cleverly engineered to prove the impossibility of union with Greece because of Turkish objections.

Pragmatic expediency also led to the systematic recruitment of Turkish Cypriots in the Island's internal security forces, a practice resented deeply by the Greek Cypriots and led to accusations of 'divide and rule'. It was done primarily because there had been an exodus of Greek Cypriots from the police force after the outbreak of violence and the increased need for more policemen.

A Turkish Cypriot mobile police unit trains to deal with any Greek Cypriot anti-British riots.

Subsequent British measures were interpreted as part of a conspiracy when, in fact, they were the reaction of an administration, which chose to obstinately dig in its position of 'no change'.

By turning to Turkey was not part of a conspiracy, but an act of necessity to preserve what Britain considered its vital interests.

The theory of collusion does not hold up in face of the deterioration of Turco-British relations after the release of Makarios in the spring of 1957, which lasted until the acceptance of the Macmillan plan by Turkey in August 1958. During this period Turkey adopted a more aggressive stance vis-a-vis Britain demanding the immediate implementation of partition. At the same time the Turkish Cypriots, through their own paramilitary campaign, attempted to demonstrate the impossibility of peaceful co-existence of the two communities.

The Macmillan Plan, many believe, conceded too much to the Turkish side, not because of some pre-arranged agreement, but because it had come to rely on Turkish goodwill to preserve its position in Cyprus.

When Turkey demanded partition for Cyprus, the British government was forced to make even more concessions in order to regain the support of Turkey. It was British weakness vis-a-vis Turkey that led to the Macmillan Plan and not collusion.

Makarios misses an opportunity

NEVERTHELESS, despite the strategic mistakes of the EOKA struggle the Greek Cypriots were given an opportunity to achieve their original aim. It occurred during the negotiations of Makarios with the Governor, Field Marshal Sir John Harding, when the British offered the promise of self-determination at some unspecified moment in future. But the talks collapsed.

Field Marshal Sir John Harding and Archbishop meet before their talks on Cyprus collapse in February-March 1956.

This was the first and last time that the British talked with the Greek Cypriot leadership, hoping to achieve the pacification of the Island through a political settlement. It was also the only time when the British government conceded, theoretically at least, the possibility of unitary self-determination, fulfilling one of EOKA's original objectives. This proposal was made at a time when certain officials were contemplating to 'tell the Turks that 18 per cent of the [Cypriot] population cannot have an unqualified veto on the remaining 82 per cent'.

Unwittingly Makarios turned down the Harding proposal and failed the litmus test that the British policy makers had set up for him. His refusal to co-operate with the British was fatal. From that moment the British government resolved it could no longer deal with the Greek Cypriots or the Greek government.

Makarios leaves his offices on 9 March 1956, expecting to fly to Athens for to garner more Greek Government support for enosis. A few minutes later he was arrested at Nicosia Airport and read Governor Harding's deportation order.

And so Makarios was deported to the Seychelles, Harding began a vigorous anti-terrorist campaign to suppress EOKA and all further Greek government proposals were ignored.

With the failure of the talks the Greek Cypriot strategy became derailed, as there was no hope of achieving its aim, as since 'the prospect of Cypriot self-determination had now faded into the realms of political make-believe'.

Britain now sought the support of Turkey in its Cyprus policy. This sealed the fate of enosis forever.

Britain backs Turkey

FROM now on, the consent of the Turkish Cypriots would be sought first. With the Greek government's weakness to promote enosis meant EOKA had no chance of achieving its aim.

The preoccupation of British policy to secure Turkish assent to its plans and the uneven treatment of Turkish Cypriot violence compared to how ruthlessly EOKA was hunted down, understandably fed Greek Cypriot suspicions and has developed the current conspiracy theories.

British Paras display captured EOKA weapons for media cameramen.

In reality, British policy was merely the response to the Greek Cypriot violence. Resorting to violence was a massive gamble given the British attitude of 'no change'. This gamble failed the moment Governor Harding's proposal was turned down by Makarios.

The Zurich agreements merely reflect the failure of EOKA's strategy and the Greek side's weakness.

Conspiracy theories have always been part of the public discourse in Cyprus, a place where urban myths and Chinese whispers blend seamlessly into each other. The prime reason behind the proliferation of such theories lies in the nature of Greek nationalism, which prevails.

'Manifest destiny'

WHEN the EOKA campaign began the majority of the Greek Cypriots genuinely thought that the manifest destiny of Cyprus was to be part of Greece. This was especially true for EOKA leadership and its members.

A Greco-centric education system for decades had inculcated Greek consciousness into the minds of Greek Cypriot students. In combination with the rise of a militantly nationalist Church in the late 1940s, enosis became a by-word for a worldly deliverance from all worries.

Students of the Pancyprian Gymnasium in Nicosia battle security forces with stones and bottles.

In many respects the enosis movement by the mid-1950s had become a secular millenarian movement, which anticipated its eschatological salvation with an almost religious zeal. Therefore When EOKA's campaign ended, for Greek Cypriots it was a severe psychological blow: they had neither sought or fought for independence.

Officials sanction 'conspiracies'

CONSPIRACY theories offer a way of reconciling their fervent belief in enosis as the natural course of history, but not with the reality on the ground. Therefore, enosis must have been denied them because of some dark plot.

The ideological apparatus of the 1960 Republic encouraged the proliferation of conspiracy theories as a means of deflecting attention from the flaws of the EOKA struggle and to legitimize the process of independence.

Archbishop Makarios watches a battle between Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot fighters after the breakdown of the co-partnership government of Cyprus in 1963.

Turkish Cypriots in Limassol defend their enclave from Greek Cypriot militia attack during the intercommunal conflict in 1964.

As the majority of the Greek Cypriot politicians in power in the 1960s, 1970s and beyond had been intimately involved in the struggle, it was in their interest to cultivate an uncritical adoration of the EOKA campaign. This was especially true after the intercommunal conflict that started in 1964 and led to the Turkish Cypriots setting up their administrations in Island-wide enclaves.

Now the use of the EOKA struggle as the foundation myth for a virtually Greek Cypriot Cyprus Republic went entirely unchallenged.

Greek Cypriots as 'victims'

THE narrative of the EOKA campaign in school text books, state propaganda, rhetoric and commemoration has always glossed over why enosis failed, thus giving plenty of scope to the general public to explain this contradiction by inventing conspiracy theories. Vague references to impersonal international forces, which opposed the 'fair' demand of enosis has encouraged this speculation.

According to Eco the need for conspiracy beliefs stem from a 'deep, private frustration'. A conspiracy theory offers a way out of this frustration because 'there can be no failure if there really is' a conspiracy theory. The frustration of the failure to achieve enosis is, therefore, ascribed to some superior 'dark force' that absolves its victims from any guilt and instead raises them to the status of martyrs.

Fittingly the EOKA narrative stresses the victimization of the Greek Cypriots and venerates as martyrs of the nation all the fighters who lost their life during the campaign.

In the same vein the proliferation of conspiracy theories reflects the collective low self-esteem of Greek Cypriot society and a lack of confidence to accept reality for what it is. Power struggles are hardly 'fair'. Every action has a reaction and violence not only causes counter-violence but often it has unpleasant unintended consequences.

There was nothing unique about the case of Cyprus or was it the only colony to go through a tortuous process to independence.

More importantly, there was nothing inevitable about enosis and, like any other political aim, it was not achieved because of the mistakes made in the execution of a strategy.

Because the Greek Cypriot 'lacks steady nerves (he) asks himself: "Who's behind this plot, who's benefiting?" He has to find an enemy, a plotter, or it will be, God forbid, his fault".

Time for the truth

HISTORICAL truth matters and for this reason these conspiracy theories need to be tackled because they obscure our understanding of the past. This is not to say that the concept of historical truth is unproblematic or that truth no matter how one may define it is easy to establish. Yet certain interpretations should be dismissed as false or else we open the doors to a pernicious relativism where anything goes. That is not the aim of history and for this reason the historian has a duty to separate the metaphorical dross from the gold.

The second point, which is especially pertinent to the Cypriot context, is that conspiracy theories have a disproportional influence on non-academic historical knowledge. The belief that at some point a conspiracy changed the course of history is still widespread in Greek Cypriot society.

Because of the reluctance of the historians to challenge this attitude the popular understanding of Cypriot history has been dominated by conspiracies and a simplistic binary worldview where the non-Greek Cypriots are often perceived as potential plotters or enemies of the state. Whereas in other countries conspiracy theories are on the fringe of historiography, in Cyprus they are virtually embedded in the public discourse and their proponents even challenge scholarly historical interpretations.

Interpretations, which call for self-criticism and a cool appraisal of the EOKA struggle, are dismissed by EOKA supporters as yet another conspiracy that aims to undermine the national identity of the Greek Cypriots.

Behind such theories lies a reluctance to accept the findings of scientific historical inquiry and a deep-seated anti-intellectualism that prefers to view history in emotional terms.

In reality the decolonization of Cyprus was the result of a Greek Cypriot strategy going awry in the face of superior conflicting forces. Crucially its end was unintentional, a compromise born out of necessity between all interested parties as everybody settled for less than they had hoped.

Editor's Note: This article is based on a paper delivered by Demetris Assos to the PRIO Cyprus Center's 3rd Annual Conference held in Nicosia on 28-29 November 2008 under the title of One Island Many Histories: Rethinking the Politics of the Past in Cyprus. It has been edited and published here with the author's permission. To read the author's original article in full, unedited, including footnotes and bibliography, visit the author's blog site:

http://unfashionablerantings.blogspot.com/search/label/conspiracy%20theories

where there are several other articles about the Cyprus conundrum among other things. The blog is bilingual - English and Greek.

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