197. Memorandum of Conversation0
UNITED STATES DELEGATION TO THE 21st MINISTERIAL MEETING OF THE NORTH ATLANTIC COUNCIL
Copenhagen, Denmark, May 5–7, 1958
PARTICIPANTS
- United States
- The Secretary Ambassador Burgess
- Mr. Reinhardt
- Mr. Elbrick
- Mr. Porter
- United Kingdom
- The Right Honorable Selwyn Lloyd
- Sir Frank Roberts
- Sir Roderick Barclay
- Sir Anthony Rumbold
- The Honorable C.D.W. O’Neil
- Mr. A. Ross
- Mr. D.S. Laskey
SUBJECT
- Cyprus
Mr. Lloyd said the British had just gone through an agonizing reappraisal of the whole Cyprus business. The Turks, he said, are completely unapproachable in the matter of giving up partition for a base on the island. He had found Zorlu simply not negotiable on the subject. The UK has decided, therefore, that after the Greek elections1 it will put forward the tri-dominium idea, which Mr. Macmillan feels is bold and imaginative even though it bristles with practical difficulties. Mr. Macmillan is prepared to go to Athens and Ankara not just to put forward the plan but to stay with it and push it for three months if necessary. He would beg them not to turn it down and try to get them to deal with it as a big idea.
If nothing comes of this the British will examine some kind of partition. Mr. Lloyd had always been against this idea and of course it could not be broached now because it would cause civil war. Eventually, however, after a try had been made at the tri-dominium concept he thought that the UK Government would have a great deal of support at home for an attempt at partition. Mr. Lloyd asked if the Secretary would think [Page 606] about this though he realized that we did not favor partition in principle.
The Secretary said that we are not against anything that seems likely to work. He felt, however, that the Greek Government could not accept such solutions. Today the Turks have only a moral position because Cyprus is close to Turkey, but they have no juridical status there and the Secretary believed the Greeks could not accept granting them such a status.
With respect to the plan under which the British offered the Turks a base this was something the British could do themselves. They could tell the Turks that this is the way it will be and if the Turks do not take advantage of it that would be up to them. The British under that plan could force the pace as against the need for negotiating the Greeks and Turks into a tripartite arrangement, for which he felt the possibility was slim. But if the UK desires it, the US will help in any way it can.
Mr. Lloyd felt that the Greeks are now getting frightened with respect to Turkish intentions and it was also true that the Turks are now saying very bad things about the British. They had started a campaign and he was not sure that they can stop it now though in the past they had occasionally turned the tap on and off. Mr. Lloyd felt that the British had erred in the past by not making public all of their offers on the Cyprus question. They would now wait until after the Greek elections, put the tri-dominium idea up to both Greeks and Turks, and make a public announcement concerning it. Mr. Lloyd repeated that Mr. Macmillan would not drop this idea simply because somebody says no to it at the outset.
(Mr. Ross of the British Delegation asked later that we hold the foregoing in strict confidence as they had not yet informed their people in the field concerning it.)