342. Letter From the Ambassador to Cyprus (Belcher) to the Ambassador to Turkey (Handley)1
Dear Bill:
As I leave Cyprus and you arrive in the area,2 I wanted to welcome you to the club and to pass along some thoughts that may seem parochially Cypriot from where you sit in Ankara, but that have been concerns of ours during the whole period I have been here.
To be completely frank, we have never felt—and this has been more the case recently—that our Embassy in Ankara was managing to get a penetrating look into the Turkish Government thought processes about Cyprus. As a concomitant, we have seldom felt that the Embassy went much beyond listening to Turkish presentations. The whole relationship has seemed to lack the continuous, candid and close give-and-take that one would expect between two friendly nations regarding one of their half-dozen problems of greatest mutual concern.
Seeing Bulak is all well and good, although there again we seldom see much indication that anyone questions his obiter dicta. Bulak is certainly a key figure in the execution of GOT-Cyprus policy. But unless the Turkish Embassy here is leading us astray, that is his main role. We know that the subject is taken up periodically by the Ambassador and Chaglayangil, and certainly he is a key player although Osorio-Tafall and others have discovered that his propensity for moderate generalizations let his visitors go away happy but with little of substance in their pockets, and his words often belie much harder underlying Turkish positions. Obviously the Prime Minister is also useful on Cyprus. But from several sides we hear that the real architect of Turkeyʼs broad policy approach toward Cyprus is President Sunay himself with day-today details followed for him by a general on his staff. We reported this to you in Nicosia A–109.3
It is not my business to suggest any specific paths but I do feel there is a problem and I hope that you, as the newly-arrived Ambassador, will move to remedy it. The trouble in the past has always been that Cyprus stayed on the back burner of our diplomatic discourse with [Page 853] the Turkish Government until on several different occasions it erupted to become our central concern with Turkey, costing us dear in scarce credit, and sidetracking other issues of importance. I can remember Ray Hare expressing sympathy with my views back in 1964 on the need to get into closer touch with the Turks on the Cyprus problem and his comment that this would be done but would take time. Years later we still apparently have no such dialogue despite the fact that at several times we have come very close indeed to war.
One other thought I would leave with you. There are obvious connections between certain aspects of and events in Turkish domestic politics which have either direct or indirect bearing on this problem. We have not had the advantage of reading Embassy Ankaraʼs “think pieces” on the domestic scene—I do feel they would be helpful to us in interpreting this one—in view of the major if not controlling role played by the GOT as regards the Turk Cypriot community.
Dave Popper will, I am sure, appreciate anything you can do to keep all this in mind as you go about your arduous tasks.
With warm personal regards and best of luck in Ankara.
Sincerely,
- Source: Department of State, Cyprus Desk Files: Lot 72 D 476, Pol Turkey. Confidential; Personal. A copy was sent to Folsom. A notation on the letter reads: “Seen by Frank Cash, NEA/TUR, RSF.”↩
- Belcher left post on June 23. Popper was nominated as his successor on May 27 and presented his credentials on July 18. Komer left Ankara on May 7. Handley was appointed on May 1 and presented his credentials on July 1.↩
- Dated May 23. (National Archives, RG 59, Central Files 1967–69, POL 15–1 TUR)↩
- Printed from a copy that bears Belcherʼs typed signature.↩