The atmosphere on the island was
tense. On December 21, 1963, serious
violence erupted in Nicosia when
a Greek Cypriot police patrol, ostensibly
checking identification documents,
stopped a Turkish Cypriot couple
on the edge of the Turkish quarter.
A hostile crowd gathered, shots were
fired, and two Turkish Cypriots were
killed. As the news spread, members
of the underground organizations
began firing and taking hostages.
North of Nicosia, Turkish forces
occupied a strong position at St.
Hilarion Castle, dominating the road
to Kyrenia on the northern coast.
The road became a principal combat
area as both sides fought to control
it. Much intercommunal fighting occurred
in Nicosia along the line separating
the Greek and Turkish quarters of
the city (known later as the Green
Line). Turkish Cypriots were not
concentrated in one area, but lived
throughout the island, making their
position precarious. Vice-President
Küçük and Turkish
Cypriot ministers and members of
the House of Representatives ceased
participating in the government.
In January 1964, after an inconclusive
conference in London among representatives
of Britain, Greece, Turkey, and the
two Cypriot communities, UN Secretary
General U Thant, at the request of
the Cyprus government, sent a special
representative to the island. After
receiving a firsthand report in February,
the Security Council authorized a
peace-keeping force under the direction
of the secretary general. Advance
units reached Cyprus in March, and
by May the United Nations Peace-keeping
Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) totaled
about 6,500 troops. Originally authorized
for a three-month period, the force,
at decreased strength, was still
in position in the early 1990s.
Severe intercommunal fighting occurred
in March and April 1964. When the
worst of the fighting was over, Turkish
Cypriots--sometimes of their own
volition and at other times forced
by the TMT--began moving from isolated
rural areas and mixed villages into
enclaves. Before long, a substantial
portion of the island's Turkish Cypriot
population was crowded into the Turkish
quarter of Nicosia in tents and hastily
constructed shacks. Slum conditions
resulted from the serious overcrowding.
All necessities as well as utilities
had to be brought in through the
Greek Cypriot lines. Many Turkish
Cypriots who had not moved into Nicosia
gave up their land and houses for
the security of other enclaves.
In June 1964, the House of Representatives,
functioning with only its Greek Cypriot
members, passed a bill establishing
the National Guard, in which all
Cypriot males between the ages of
eighteen and fifty-nine were liable
to compulsory service. The right
of Cypriots to bear arms was then
limited to this National Guard and
to the police. Invited by Makarios,
General Grivas returned to Cyprus
in June to assume command of the
National Guard; the purpose of the
new law was to curb the proliferation
of Greek Cypriot irregular bands
and bring them under control in an
organization commanded by the prestigious
Grivas. Turks and Turkish Cypriots
meanwhile charged that large numbers
of Greek regular troops were being
clandestinely infiltrated into the
island to lend professionalism to
the National Guard. Turkey began
military preparations for an invasion
of the island. A brutally frank warning
from United States president Lyndon
B. Johnson to Prime Minister Ismet
Inönü caused the Turks
to call off the invasion. In August,
however, Turkish jets attacked Greek
Cypriot forces besieging Turkish
Cypriot villages on the northwestern
coast near Kokkina.
In July, veteran United States diplomat
Dean Acheson met with Greek and Turkish
representatives in Geneva. From this
meeting emerged what became known
as the Acheson Plan, according to
which Greek Cypriots would have enosis
and Greece was to award the Aegean
island of Kastelorrizon to Turkey
and compensate Turkish Cypriots wishing
to emigrate. Secure Turkish enclaves
and a Turkish sovereign military
base area were to be provided on
Cyprus. Makarios rejected the plan,
because it called for what he saw
as a modified form of partition.
Throughout 1964 and later, President
Makarios and the Greek Cypriot leadership
adopted the view that the establishment
of UNFICYP by the UN Security Council
had set aside the rights of intervention
granted to the guarantor powers--Britain,
Greece, and Turkey--by the Treaty
of Guarantee. The Turkish leadership,
on the other hand, contended that
the Security Council action had reinforced
the provisions of the treaty. These
diametrically opposed views illustrated
the basic Greek Cypriot and Turkish
Cypriot positions; the former holding
that the constitution and the other
provisions of the treaties were flexible
and subject to change under changing
conditions, and the latter, that
they were fixed agreements, not subject
to change.
Grivas and the National Guard reacted
to Turkish pressure by initiating
patrols into the Turkish Cypriot
enclaves. Patrols surrounded two
villages, Ayios Theodhoros and Kophinou,
about twenty-five kilometers southwest
of Larnaca, and began sending in
heavily armed patrols. Fighting broke
out, and by the time the Guard withdrew,
twenty-six Turkish Cypriots had been
killed. Turkey issued an ultimatum
and threatened to intervene in force
to protect Turkish Cypriots. To back
up their demands, the Turks massed
troops on the Thracian border separating
Greece and Turkey and began assembling
an amphibious invasion force. The
ultimatum's conditions included the
expulsion of Grivas from Cyprus,
removal of Greek troops from Cyprus,
payment of indemnity for the casualties
at Ayios Theodhoros and Kophinou,
cessation of pressure on the Turkish
Cypriot community, and the disbanding
of the National Guard.
Grivas resigned as commander of
the Greek Cypriot forces on November
20, 1967, and left the island, but
the Turks did not reduce their readiness
posture, and the dangerous situation
of two NATO nations on the threshold
of war with each other continued.
President Johnson dispatched Cyrus
R. Vance as his special envoy to
Turkey, Greece, and Cyprus. Vance
arrived in Ankara in late November
and began ten days of negotiations
that defused the situation. Greece
agreed to withdraw its forces on
Cyprus except for the contingent
allowed by the 1960 treaties, provided
that Turkey did the same and also
dismounted its invasion force. Turkey
agreed, and the crisis passed. During
December 1967 and early January 1968,
about 10,000 Greek troops were withdrawn.
Makarios did not disband the National
Guard, however, something he came
to regret when it rebelled against
him in 1974.
