Office of the Historian

147. Telegram From the Mission in Geneva to the Department of State1

Geneva, August 26, 1964, noon.

482. For Ball from Acheson. Reference: Athens’ 407 and 408 to Department.2 I see nothing in King’s statements to Labouisse or his message to President which warrants any optimism. Having balked at leased base in own name, Turks certainly will treat with contempt proposal that they have NATO base instead. Lease of base on Castellorizon will not make any difference. “Full guarantees” for Turkish minority on Cyprus is old story. Although I think Turks would probably settle for my revised minority proposals, they have never flatly said so and in any case sovereignty and size and location of base are key questions.

Fact that settlement on basis King’s proposal would be Greek national solution and would involve negotiation rather than coup d’etat is undoubtedly important from Greek point of view but, I should say, totally irrelevant from viewpoint of GOT.

I would therefore reiterate my advice against giving USG agreement to instant enosis without prior agreement with Turks.3

Re Deptel 492 to Geneva,4 I accept changes proposed in my letter to Papandreou but would like third sentence of your new third paragraph to read as follows: “However, as you know, the Government of Turkey is finding as much difficulty in accepting these proposals as you are, although it has not, as I understand it, finally rejected them.” As implied by my comments above, I think there is no advantage in holding up delivery of letter (as instructed Deptel 364 to Athens).5

In mentioning “period of silence on our part”, do you have in mind that Jernegan and I should simply sit in Geneva awaiting developments or that we should come home for consultation, thus emphasizing “shock treatment”?

Tubby
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, POL 27 CYP. Secret; Immediate; Nodis-TAG. Received at 9:22 a.m. and repeated to Ankara, Athens, and London. Passed to the White House.↩
  2. See footnote 2, Document 148.↩
  3. In telegram 503 to Geneva, August 26, Ball responded: “You can be assured that I have no intention of giving USG agreement to instant enosis without prior agreement with Turks. We are definitely off that ticket.” (Department of State, Central Files, POL 27 CYP)↩
  4. In telegram 492, August 25, Ball explained that he wanted to allow both governments, but especially Papandreou, to ruminate over the proposals they had rejected and suggested changes to a proposed letter from Acheson. (Ibid.)↩
  5. Telegram 364 to Athens, August 25, instructed Labouisse to hold up delivery of Acheson’s letter. (Ibid.)↩