By Michael Karadjis
July 15 was the 18th anniversary of the NATO-organised destruction of Cyprus, in a joint action by the then military junta of Greece and the Turkish regime.
Following a struggle against British colonial rule in the 1950s, Cyprus gained independence in 1960.
The attempt by the Cypriot regime of Archbishop Makarios to maintain a neutralist position and reject incorporation into NATO led to the open hostility of the US government, which declared Makarios (an Orthodox archbishop) to be the "Castro of the Mediterranean"!
Washington used its surrogate regimes in Greece and Turkey to encourage extreme nationalists among Greek and Turkish Cypriots and to sow clashes between the two communities, undermine the Cypriot government and pave the way for "double enosis" — the forced division of the island between the two "mother countries".
On July 15, 1974, the Greek junta carried out a coup in Cyprus, bringing to power extreme nationalist forces who wanted union with Greece. Claiming to want to defend the Turkish Cypriots, Turkey responded with a massive invasion of the island.
While this is often viewed as a Greek-Turkish war, in fact not a shot was fired between the two powers. Both governments have largely covered up their then quite public alliance and their open encouragement by the US, in trying to destroy the Makarios regime. They used extreme nationalist rhetoric to get their local clients to clear their respective areas of the opposing community.
However, the Cypriot junta fell five days later, and the Greek junta itself the following day. But instead of withdrawing its troops, Turkey intensified its invasion, occupying 38% of Cyprus (Turkish Cypriots are 18% of the population) and driving two-fifths of the Greek Cypriot population, 200,000 people, from their homes.
Since then, Turkey has maintained an occupation force of 35,000 troops, and has brought in about 80,000 Turkish (non-Cypriot) colonists to take over occupied homes and property. In the same period, the Turkish Cypriot population has declined to 90,000. Hence the Turkish Cypriots are unable to change the rightist regime, which opposes all attempts to find a solution.
While the US justified the slaughter in the Gulf on the basis of "not rewarding aggression" in the case of the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, Turkey has been rewarded with untold billions in US and NATO military and economic aid for the service it performed on their behalf.