Soldier's Mission

Jaw set and eyes grim, Field Marshal Sir John Harding flew into London last week with the air of a soldier preparing to straighten out some muddled civilian thinking. For days, London had been bustling hopefully over the sudden offer of EOKA's chieftain Colonel George Grivas to "suspend" operations if Britain would free and negotiate with the exiled Archbishop Makarios. Macmillan's Cabinet had met in special session; there was talk of bringing the archbishop to some neutral city, perhaps Paris. The government announced it would make a statement on Cyprus and asked the Greek chargee d'affaires, who has been discreetly ostracized since Greece's withdrawal of its ambassador a year ago, to meet Colonial Secretary Alan Lennox-Boyd "in a few days or so." Driving out to meet Field Marshal Harding at the airport, Lennox-Boyd had a statement all prepared.

Harding had scarcely put foot to ground before he was making his points plain. The "terrorists" had suffered "heavy losses," which had "obviously" affected their morale, he told airport reporters. Said Harding dourly: "Take note of the fact the word used is suspend, not cease, operations. I think you should also want to have regard, when you consider any truce offer, to the status and reputation of the man who made it."

On the Run. Lennox-Boyd hustled Harding into an official car, and back to the Colonial Office. Harding's argument: Why take the pressure off now when EOKA is on the run? Once EOKA is crushed, the Cypriots will be easy to deal with. As governor of Cyprus, he was flatly opposed to negotiating with the archbishop under any circumstances; in private conversations he has reportedly referred to Makarios as a cheat, liar and fraud. After two hours of argument, the two men hurried over to 10 Downing Street where Prime Minister Macmillan, just hours before his departure for Bermuda, had hastily assembled a few top ministers. Without stopping for lunch, the conferees battled on until midafternoon, were finally forced to defer the government's scheduled statement by 24 hours.

Next day Harding and the government reached a compromise. The government would accept the recent offer of NATO's Secretary-General Lord Ismay to undertake conciliation of the Cyprus dispute among Greece. Turkey and Britain. They also agreed to renew their offer to free Makarios (but not to return him to Cyprus), provided he publicly called on EOKA to cease all violence. But, at Harding's insistence, the government agreed to make no mention of negotiating with him, now or ever.

On Again. As Harding watched grim-faced from the gallery a few yards from the equally grim-faced Greek Chargee d'Affaires Demetrios Nickolairezis, Lennox-Boyd made the announcement to an angry House of Commons. "Another opportunity muffed," cried one Laborite. Insisted Lennox-Boyd: "Clearly the government of Cyprus cannot allow--under the cover of an offer of suspension--the chance of regrouping and rearming of the hard-hit terrorist group." Opposition Leader Hugh Gaitskell declared that the EOKA offer created "a new situation" and demanded: "Is it not the case that only the imprisonment of the archbishop stands between us and the end of terrorism in Cyprus?" Retorted Lennox-Boyd: "I do not think [that] conclusion will be shared by the family of the man who was murdered yesterday." There was a rumble of boos and cries of "cheap!"

In a matter of hours, Greece rejected the offer of NATO conciliation (which Greece had once favored) on the ground that "the Cypriot people cannot be bound by any decision taken in their absence." Mission accomplished, Harding prepared to fly back to Cyprus where British troops inexorably drove on into the mountains, carrying out his orders to crush the last EOKA survivors. The Cypriots--tired of terrorism and tired of counter-terrorism --resigned themselves to more of both.

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