Britain's central role in the search for an international peacekeeping force for Cyprus, 1963–64

Abstract

This work examines the way in which the British, Greek and Turkish Governments established a peacekeeping force, the Joint Truce Force, in Cyprus in December 1963 and how the United Kingdom, aided by the United States, subsequently handled the creation of a replacement international peacekeeping force. Although the United Kingdom did everything in its power to keep peacekeeping efforts under its own control for as long as possible, when this was no longer feasible it tried to create a NATO-based peacekeeping force. This was opposed by the (Greek Cypriot) Government of Cyprus which favoured a United Nations peacekeeping force. Given the tensions between the British Government and the Government of Cyprus over which of these two international bodies should be responsible for peacekeeping it is strange that the United Kingdom never took seriously Greek Cypriot calls to have the Commonwealth considered as an alternative to the other two. This work examines these processes and analyses why the United Kingdom favoured NATO, opposed the UN and to all intents and purposes ignored the Commonwealth.