Of lost monkeys and broken vehicles

[Serpent]

If I recall correctly the Americans came to the Greek civil war guns blazing and did the same on Korea. The reason? Communism. I would agree that on the long term Greece should leave the Balkans to sort themselves out but hindsight is 20-20. The contemporary politicians would view the Soviets as a existential threat and a regional threat to their interest an as the Yugoslavs, Albanians and Bulgarians help the Greek communist OTL so would the Greeks to the same if the situation allows it of course. I doubt the Americans or the British would disagree with the sentiment and If I remember correctly Ion Dragoumis was an anti-Communist which could have an impact on how he views the Balkans. I will remain vague on the subjects as we don't know how the Yugoslavian situation will go nor the Albanian or Bulgarian for that matter. Still getting involved on anti communism won't have a diplomatic impact on the Western side only on the eastern with the Soviets, I would argue that both the Americans and British would be happy to see Greece contain communism.

There propably won't be even a need for Greece to directly intervene against communist partisans in the Balkans, because the ITTL East-West division line is gonna steer a whole lot easternwards, limiting Warsaw Pact space, especially in the Balkans, if the ongoing northeastern offensive is successful at trapping the enormous non-Turkish Axis forces that have been recently deployed to Anatolia in a desperate attempt to halt the fresh Allied offensive out of Smyrna.

So the Western Allies would be more than able to handle the Balkans against the Axis ITTL, without the need to include Greece into that mess. By the time shit hits the fan, Greece would hopefully be too busy bickering with the Turkish state(-s) over Anatolia, (garrisoning the last remaining Turkish industrial districts more than likely) to offer any substantial assistance against the communist partisans in the Balkans. Greece should of course participate in a somewhat limited fashion (deploying elite units, the most modern part of the Hellenic airforce, think of the IOTL Russian intervention in Syria [2015] for scale, anything grander would be a mistake etc), against the communist Balkan partisans, but must not go overboard, after all Greece would still be heavily exhausted from the war to deal with the Balkan mess. Greece would still get to reap all of the benefits this way, without bleeding itself much more. The NATO Allies would have to understand or simply deal with it, for Greece has lost way too much conscripts/civilian population way too recently (WWII) to handle the needs of this kind of exhausting grueling attention warfare.

But generally conflicts dealing with communist partisans are massive sinkholes with little tangible benefits and a whole lot of losses to be inevitably inflicted when participating.

So if Greece wants to dominate those Balkan states economically post WWII, then it must at all costs avoid anything bigger than limited participation, lest it turns the population of those states completely hostile to Greece as a whole, because the communist partisans are really popular there. By letting the NATO Allies deal with it for the most part, Greece avoids getting the blame for the deaths during this civil conflicts for the most part, thus setting the foundations for positive future relations and cooperation, whether economical, political or military in nature, again, for little to no losses. Even if NATO somehow loses these conflicts because of Greece's limited participation, Greece still gets to benefit more than it would had if it had bled to win those civil wars, as Greece will inevitably get strengthened by fellow NATO members to defend its borders from Warsaw Pact states.

 

[Quinkana]

Snip

I basically think that Greece would be primarily giving material support (ofc with a price) and the such as that's what's needed the most really since the US would lessen their logistical capabilities that way.

 

[WillErfono]

What are the populations of affected nations in ttl?

 

[emperor joe]

What are the populations of affected nations in ttl?

There both in-depth population charts of both greece and Turkey.. Greece's is after part 61 while turkey's is the second to last part

 

[WillErfono]

There both in-depth population charts of both greece and Turkey.. Greece's is after part 61 while turkey's is the second to last part

I mean for places like Armenia, Georgia, and Syria. They all gained land at Turkey's expense so I'd be interested to know what this could change for them, particularly Armenia.

 

[Lascaris]

I mean for places like Armenia, Georgia, and Syria. They all gained land at Turkey's expense so I'd be interested to know what this could change for them, particularly Armenia.

The additional territories of Syria would be this, data for 1927.

French Syria	Total	Kurds	Turks	Arabs
Kilic	45761	3504​	41497​	760​
Antep	48211	3692​	43719​	800​
Urfa	64001	25408​	30739​	7855​
Mardin	47621	28619​	5523​	13479​
Sirnak	10512	7857​	569​	2087​

So TTL Syria is 3,151,756 people by the time of the war compared to 2,860,411.

Georgia should be effectively unchanged. The only difference in its territory is retaining the Artvin okrug which in 1916 had supposedly 37,414 people. Given that the majority in the whole of Batumi oblast were Christians who voted with their feet in 1921, the difference to the population of Georgia should be negligible, despite the 3272 square km of additional land. Something in the region of ~6-12,000 people in 1922 if the Turks have not fled west to avoid the returning Russians, sorry Soviets. Also more Greeks left it for Greece so it even out.

Armenia... ok for a start Armenia has got the Russian 1914 border which means Kars, Ardahan and modern Igdir. The "Caucasus Calendar" published in Tbilisi in 1917 gives ~471,000 for the area including ~188,000 Christians and ~64,000 Azeris. The Turkish 1927 census gives us a population of 205,464, including 42,945 Kurds. No Christians any more, for uhm obvious reasons but also no Azeris either. Had they preferred Azerbaijan or both they and the Yazidis got counted as Turks in the census? I'd guess the latter. Per the 1926 Soviet census you had a total Armenian population of 1,567,568 of which only 743,571 lived in Armenia with another 111,694 in Nagorno Karabah. It's not unreasonable to assume that at least a fraction of these end up in Kars TTL. So lets call it 393,715 people on TTL Kars+Igdir in 1926, adding up the 188,251 non-Muslims of 1917 with the 205,464 of the Turkish 1927 census. Add 1,110,673 for OTL Armenia SSR, Nagorno Karabakh and Nakhchivan to get 1,504,388 in 1926. Should grow to 2,034,362 by 1939.

 

[Sphenodon]

I'm in the boat of not really seeing why the Greeks here would try to intervene in Egypt unless their arms were twisted by the U.K over Cyprus (which I suspect will be resolved earlier and independently, given Greek diplomatic capital postwar). They are going to have their hands full with managing the Anatolian territories, and as mentioned earlier Greece tended to be relatively friendly with the Arab states in the eastern Mediterranean. If anything, trying to play as a negotiating middleman between Egypt and the Franco-British coalition could serve its interests while also being the best play for securing the status of the Aegyptiote Greeks. As for the ideas about Greece focusing on the Copts, while I could see them inviting some to settle in depopulated parts of Cyprus or Aegean Anatolia postwar should significant numbers for some reason be pushed out of Egypt, I don't think Athens would go out of their way to jeopardize their political standing with Egypt in their defense unless relations are already somehow hostile.

That said, I do wonder how the divergences in TTL's interbellum and WWII will impact Arab nationalism and its development. IOTL there was, very briefly, a British-supported Hashemite Arab federation serving as an attempted counterweight to the wave of Arab nationalism seen in Nasserist Egypt and Syria; with Syria being in a completely different spot versus OTL and Iraq probably being weakened postwar (should Assyrian and/or Kurdish state plans come into being), it is quite possible that Franco-British machinations to retain some hegemony and influence in the Arab world through such projects will yield more fruit (or potentially less - the Soviets' trajectory will also be completely different in this area, given how massively different the situation in Turkey and the Black Sea Straits is). To that end, Greece being in a better place and more politically influential could be a significant boon given their sway with the Levantine Greeks and their Arab trading partners.

 

[Serpent]

I'm in the boat of not really seeing why the Greeks here would try to intervene in Egypt unless their arms were twisted by the U.K over Cyprus (which I suspect will be resolved earlier and independently, given Greek diplomatic capital postwar). They are going to have their hands full with managing the Anatolian territories, and as mentioned earlier Greece tended to be relatively friendly with the Arab states in the eastern Mediterranean. If anything, trying to play as a negotiating middleman between Egypt and the Franco-British coalition could serve its interests while also being the best play for securing the status of the Aegyptiote Greeks. As for the ideas about Greece focusing on the Copts, while I could see them inviting some to settle in depopulated parts of Cyprus or Aegean Anatolia postwar should significant numbers for some reason be pushed out of Egypt, I don't think Athens would go out of their way to jeopardize their political standing with Egypt in their defense unless relations are already somehow hostile.

Yes and spent all of the political capital that Greece has bled for, over the patch of land that is Cyprus, to acquire it from an ALLY, which would prove much much much more difficult than acquiring land from a defeated enemy power, leaving Turks and Bulgarians to celebrate the idiocy of Greek diplomacy, for with this blunder they'd literally alienate their Franco-British allies, which, in the near east, post Suez, still yield MORE power/have more of a say in regards to the future of the region, than the USA could realistically yield. In essence sacrifice all the other Greek territorial claims (Constantinople, Biga, Bythinia, Caria, Rhodope mountains strategic borderline passages etc), in exchange for just Cyprus... You seem to forget that decolonization by the end of WWII is not a given, at the end of WWII we're still a decade and a half away from decolonization occuring over the globe. Nevermind that the state of the Hellenic military would fall into decay sooner or later, with the Turks twice defeated, they'd stop being perceived as a real threat by the Greek political leadership, only to suddenly emerge as one such once again... Participating in foreign interventions will ensure not only that the Hellenic military is kept up to date, but also that it remained battle hardened and doesn't decay in the slightest, forced to constantly be on its feet, much like the modern day French military thanks to its multiple interventions in west Africa & elsewhere in the relatively recent past.

That said, I do wonder how the divergences in TTL's interbellum and WWII will impact Arab nationalism and its development. IOTL there was, very briefly, a British-supported Hashemite Arab federation serving as an attempted counterweight to the wave of Arab nationalism seen in Nasserist Egypt and Syria; with Syria being in a completely different spot versus OTL and Iraq probably being weakened postwar (should Assyrian and/or Kurdish state plans come into being), it is quite possible that Franco-British machinations to retain some hegemony and influence in the Arab world through such projects will yield more fruit (or potentially less - the Soviets' trajectory will also be completely different in this area, given how massively different the situation in Turkey and the Black Sea Straits is). To that end, Greece being in a better place and more politically influential could be a significant boon given their sway with the Levantine Greeks and their Arab trading partners.

Egypt does not have any significant amounts of oil and won't even discover those reserves for a few more decades and while the Alexandrian enclave could fall in a matter of 5-10 years for good measure, that time won't affect that much relations with oil producing nations in the gulf, no more than the Algerian independence war interrupted French supply of oil from the Arab Gulf and other Arab states.

 

[Asriellian]

Language!

Okay Cap America

 

[Starinski]

Okay Cap America

I appreciate the reference

 

[goumaister]

Yes and spent all of the political capital that Greece has bled for, over the patch of land that is Cyprus, to acquire it from an ALLY, which would prove much much much more difficult than acquiring land from a defeated enemy power, leaving Turks and Bulgarians to celebrate the idiocy of Greek diplomacy, for with this blunder they'd literally alienate their Franco-British allies

Why would it be so expensive diplomatically really? The French don't care if the British lose Cyprus and the British could accept if they keep their bases there, especially if there is civil unrest on the island. Also Cyprus isn't just a patch of land. It's part of the homeland being occupied with living Greek majority inside. Greece can demand more than one thing and what Sphenodon meant that this matter would be solved before Suez Crisis could well be after the Indian decolonization.

In essence sacrifice all the other Greek territorial claims (Constantinople, Biga, Bythinia, Caria, Rhodope mountains strategic borderline passages etc), in exchange for just Cyprus...

So you clearly jumped with with conclusion as I see it. You can have first the WW2 peace and then after 4-5 years with the creation of UN and NATO as well as the abandonment of India by the British a new treaty specifically on Cyprus.

Nevermind that the state of the Hellenic military would fall into decay sooner or later, with the Turks twice defeated, they'd stop being perceived as a real threat by the Greek political leadership, only to suddenly emerge as one such once again.

This is incorrect assessment IMHO. For the obvious thing I have mentioned multiple times: USSR. Greece would be on the border with the Black sea straits and would always need to have a working and ready army, navy and airforce. Also the junior officers of WW2 will be active till the 60's providing said experience. Now if you want more battle hardness which to me is warmongering to be real you can help America in whatever shit they go in like Korea, Vietnam, Israel wars and all the African civil wars if you want. I don't know why you compare Greece with France OTL though. France had the economy to support all of that activity Greece not so much... for now to be honest. Still joint exercises with NATO would be enough for a good level of battle readiness.

Greece needs to develop itself far more to be compared with France and its geography makes that said development more expensive. I don't say to ignore the military but going on pointless foreign adventures is not the best way to spend money. Having an Alexandrian Free State is a clear money sink just take all the refugees at once, it would be preferable to both you and Egypt(if they expel them). Going to Lebanon is just out of nowhere and getting mixed in a seriously complicated situation.

Building the EU and having a prominent place there is Greece's best bet on the future not going full Alexander the Great on its neighbors.
On this note I wonder will there be Greek oil on the plans in the future? I mean OTL there is the whole EEZ thing with Turkey and the whole thing is pushed back but ITTL all the potential oil deposits would be on Greek EEZ and on top of that Greece would be able to enforce it. Just throwing it out there.

 

[Quinkana]

Greece needs to develop itself far more to be compared with France and its geography makes that said development more expensive. I don't say to ignore the military but going on pointless foreign adventures is not the best way to spend money. Having an Alexandrian Free State is a clear money sink just take all the refugees at once, it would be preferable to both you and Egypt(if they expel them). Going to Lebanon is just out of nowhere and getting mixed in a seriously complicated situation.

Tbf ittl Greece at least has Ionia and Caria to play with and if they're lucky bithnyia which would make them have a majority of Turkey's industry too so they would have more resources and more land to develop stuff.

 

[Serpent]

Why would it be so expensive diplomatically really? The French don't care if the British lose Cyprus and the British could accept if they keep their bases there, especially if there is civil unrest on the island. Also Cyprus isn't just a patch of land. It's part of the homeland being occupied with living Greek majority inside. Greece can demand more than one thing and what Sphenodon meant that this matter would be solved before Suez Crisis could well be after the Indian decolonization.

I'm sure the British would be super thrilled to entertain the Greek demands for Cyprus right after losing the entire British Raj... While the wound is still fresh... For no other reason but just because Greece wants Cyprus... They'll be super thoughtful... The French too... it's not like they'd fear a colonial "domino", that by setting free one colony, they embolden all the others to demand and press for their own independence...

So you clearly jumped with with conclusion as I see it. You can have first the WW2 peace and then after 4-5 years with the creation of UN and NATO as well as the abandonment of India by the British a new treaty specifically on Cyprus.

This is incorrect assessment IMHO. For the obvious thing I have mentioned multiple times: USSR. Greece would be on the border with the Black sea straits and would always need to have a working and ready army, navy and airforce.

ITTL if the rest of the Balkan states join NATO, then the Bosporus Straits alone, a coastline of just Eastern Thrace (or even possibly Bithynia too), it is about the size of the Romanian coastline in Dobruja. A nothingburger... not nearly enough to warrant anything more than local defensive preparations and a sizable unit presence locally. How does that help the state of the Hellenic military as a whole moving forward is beyond me. After all, the Ottomans had half the Black Sea (or whole if you go further into the past) on top of the Bosporus Straits, the Russian boogeyman was always there and that didn't stop the Ottoman military from severely decaying over the years...

Also the junior officers of WW2 will be active till the 60's providing said experience.

So what happens after the 60s?

Now if you want more battle hardness which to me is warmongering to be real you can help America in whatever shit they go in like Korea, Vietnam, Israel wars and all the African civil wars if you want.

That's the whole point, US led interventions are a really bad cause to bleed and die for, because you end up gaining nothing from the whole affair, as US doesn't really reward its allies, the US are firmly in favor of uber rigid borders. The European powers on the other hand... Suez Crisis is the defining event that can alter the balance of power within NATO one way or another... I'm not saying that the US should not be the prime nation in NATO, I'm merely saying that the US could become more akin to a first among equals in the ITTL version of NATO, instead of overly dominating the military alliance like IOTL, with the European powers retaining a bit more of their powers, for a more fair, balanced and interesting "free world".

I don't know why you compare Greece with France OTL though. France had the economy to support all of that activity Greece not so much... for now to be honest. Still joint exercises with NATO would be enough for a good level of battle readiness.

ITTL Greece is more than likely the most powerful nation on it's region, that of the Balkans & the Middle East. ITTL Greece is much much more powerful than IOTL Greece, and it would be a shame not to take the slightest advantage of that. While it is true that ITTL Greece still is considerably weaker than France, that doesn't mean that Greece cannot take more initiatives than IOTL, simply because it didn't take any such initiatives IOTL, for ITTL Greece has a completely different political/economical and even social situation, that any such reasoning is flawed beyond reason. Similarly, Greece could possibly work with France in Northwest Africa, to ensure the stability of the region, but that's later down the line.

Greece needs to develop itself far more to be compared with France and its geography makes that said development more expensive. I don't say to ignore the military but going on pointless foreign adventures is not the best way to spend money.

If ITTL Greece were to enhance it's cooperation with France, such as participating in French led interventions aiming to stabilize West Africa in the future, thereby becoming a strategic partner to France, then funds from French industries or even French public funds may flow in to Greece both as reward for the assistance offered, as well as an effort to strengthen ITTL Greece's military and even economic capabilities, to be more useful as a strategic partner in the future for France. After all, IOTL France did prop up Poland's industry, infrastructure and economy in the interbellum period. And that with the weak government system of the Third French Republic. Now imagine what France could do for Greece ITTL under the powerful presidential system of the Fifth Republic.

Having an Alexandrian Free State is a clear money sink just take all the refugees at once, it would be preferable to both you and Egypt(if they expel them).

Egypt would never expel the Copts on it's own, there isn't any reasoning for that unless Greece participates in the Suez intervention and enlists them in a substantial manner. The Greek people residing within Egypt are going to be deported no matter what, only this time, if Greece stays out of the whole affair, they might immigrate to Greece in larger numbers than IOTL, instead of the United States, taking into consideration ITTL Greece's better economy, better demographics, more available (arable) land, more work opportunities and a bit less urbanized centers, but 4-5 major ones, (Athens, Thessaloniki, Smyrna, Constantinople, Patra or Prusa? post war), all that makes immigration to Greece all that more attractive, considering that the deported Greeks immigrated to the US in search of economic opportunities, that ITTL they might just find closer to home. The main issue is that the deported Greeks from Egypt are just a mere 500.000 people, not nearly enough to settle and secure the Anatolian lands gained post war (if that includes Biga, Bithynia and all of Caria, other than Constantinople.
That would leave these aforementioned lands sparsely populated, which would increase the threat posed to them by neighboring Turkey, to seek to reclaim them in the future. Maybe not in a decade, but in 2 or 3 decades they could start a war over these regions, if they aren't secure enough, considering the advantage that higher birthrates would provide to Turkey in the future, in the event of any future war. ITTL Greece participating in foreign endeavors would in turn make both Turkey's populace and political elite be extra weary of Greece, similar to how Western Germany didn't even considered contesting any disagreements with France militarily post WWII, for any reason, even for Saarland.
The "Free City of Alexandria" state would be pretty much doomed to fail, as soon as Israel loses control of the Sinai peninsula, but again, that is not necessarily a bad thing, for it would provide Greece with a lot of Coptic refugees (maybe even a few arab muslim allies that fought for Greece, similar to the Circassian allies that were granted Greek citizenship ITTL, or even the example of the Harki in Algeria IOTL), that would in turn help secure Anatolia for good.
So long story short, the best foreign policy is an assertive one.

Going to Lebanon is just out of nowhere and getting mixed in a seriously complicated situation.

You've completely lost the point with Lebanon here, never said that Greece should colonize it, idk why you even assumed as such, simply said that Greece could pressure France to change their Lebanese protectorate borders, for additional stability in the region, and to further their influence over the state, by influence I clearly mean soft power/popularity, not boots on the ground or anything like that you've just assumed here, because I clearly have a "warmongering" vision for Greece, everything I advocate for must be warmongering stuff welp...

Building the EU and having a prominent place there is Greece's best bet on the future not going full Alexander the Great on its neighbors.

Debatable, ITTL Greece could even create a Balkan group (think of Visegrad Group or the informal northern EU states group led by Germany, but instead putting forward whatever Greece's interests are), with within the EU to defend its interests, if the Balkans remain outside of the Warsaw Pact post WWII. But that is after economically dominating the Balkans. Regardless, the vision of an ITTL Greece with more assertive foreign policy isn't remotely incompatible with EU ideals, no more than France's IOTL assertive foreign policy is.

On this note I wonder will there be Greek oil on the plans in the future? I mean OTL there is the whole EEZ thing with Turkey and the whole thing is pushed back but ITTL all the potential oil deposits would be on Greek EEZ and on top of that Greece would be able to enforce it. Just throwing it out there.

Yet another reason why participating in the Suez intervention would be good for Greece ITTL. The Egyptian oil/gas fields in the Mediterranean sea e.g. Zohr field for example. Not that the Aegean doesn't have it's very own oil/gas fields, but it's much easier for the author to accurately calculate the yield of a operating oil or gas field with all fossil fuel reserves in the area already discovered accounted for, having been made public knowledge at this point, than either speculate on the actual amount of oil/gas reserves, because not even that is known for the Aegean basin, due to the disagreements between Turkey and Greece IOTL, much less calculate a realistic amount of production for the entire Aegean basin.

Otherwise, in order to be plausible, ITTL Greece would be stuck with just the really conservative estimate that the author would have to go for just the Aegean basin reserves, so that won't account for a whole lot, it would be quite lucrative for Greece yes, but not nearly as much as it actually should be.

 

[emperor joe]

I don't think that greece would have an issue with populating any new territories post war...they can settle people from the Peloponnese, central greece,the Cyclades and Epirus..these are areas with a dearth of land and a lot of population that would move in the new lands if given some land to settle on

 

[Lascaris]

Considering that the Greek gov and the Greek forces of the interior is present as a resistance force ittl I'd think the LAS would be much weaker espicially when the Greek forces of the interior would fight against the las. So it seems that we won't get a Greek civil war or it'd be a much smaller conflict?

It IS far weaker. On multiple counts. You have a Greek government securely established in Athens. That government was elected, currently includes both major parties and fought off an Axis invasion. As if all that was not enough it's armed forces have something like half a million men and growing while Nationalist guerrilas had an early start and direct support from Athens. That said Ares in OTL was charismatic, patriotic... and by all accounts very prone to bouts of anger and violence that ended damaging his own reputation and his own side. That he'll come to conflict with his Nationalist counterparts seems all too likely. And on the Nationalist side, well Dragoumis had started his career a generation before coordinating a Greek guerilla in Macedonia. It's all too logical that he will resorting to men an methods his familiar with for such activity. Which means people like Gyparis. So the only question is how much of a conflict actually occurs. Because if things get out of hand you won't get a civil war, or even the threat of one, you'll get the bourgeois government getting inconvenienced as it smashes flat LAS/

Getting hard with the Egyptians. Sure re economic policy. Defying a Soviet nuclear threat, and potential US pressure, in order to occupy Egyptian territory and set up a statelet? I do not think so. The Suez crisis and the role of Greece will probably play role in Lascaris scenario in clarifying the Greek relationship vis a vis the US, but that is about it.

There are multiple factors at play I would think. Both Britain and France should be affected in various degrees by the events so far. Frex you have a far stronger Free France so far. Does this translate to De Gaulle having enough influence to get you a Gaullist 4th republic in 1946? If you do what's its policy in Indochina and Algeria? Would he be more or less prone to military intervention in Suez (at a guess less, Le Grand Charles was many things, an idiot was not among them) For that matter the somewhat more influential Lloyd George meant Britain getting alternate voting in 1929. How does this affect British electoral politics like Attlee committing political suicide in 1951 in order to not inconvenience the monarch's travel arrangements?

Really slow progress in this front. I wonder if that has to do with the hilly terrain or the Turkish stubbornness and throwing their soldiers to the Allies or that this is the moment the Allies start truly break this siege lines and rout the Axis or force them to retreat to new defensive lines way back. Considering the Allies vehicle, armor and air superiority they should break Axis retreat lines and block roads and rails.

Of course it's slow progress. The Greeks (and Americans) broke out of a 130km front that was being fought over for two years, by brute force. It's not a situation facilitating fast advances. But they have broken out...

I wonder are there any Greeks left behind the siege lines... alive?

Yes. The occupation can be politely described as harsh, I'm not inclined to go to graphic details, I'll only point to the post detailing casualties to the end of 1942 mentioning 290,000 civilian deaths so far though this is for all of Greece not just Ionia.

Damn the Greeks are back at that civil war sentiment again. Hope it is less blood spilled ITTL and that even Ares is persuaded or even overthrown by his peers so that this madness won't continue.

Hey it's traditional! Although at the moment the opposite bands are not directly massacring each other.

Is Mordecai fritzis still alive ittl?

As a matter of fact yes. I'm entitled to having a soft spot for fellow reserve officers.

The British only need their military bases within Cyprus, the rest is a burden, do not forget that the British government decided to release Malta as an independent state, despite it's extremely strategic location, out of fear for the less than ~150.000 welfare recipients burdening their welfare system, and that was Malta, a much much much smaller and half the population of Cyprus.

Malta I understand came pretty close to getting its 3 MPs at Westminster... but the Maltese unlike the Cypriots were not waging a guerrilla campaign necessitating 30-40,000 British soldiers to control.

If only America would even bother doing as such a favor, but as numerous American analysts throughout the decades have pointed out, the cost/benefit analysis is strictly prohibitive for such an action on the American behalf, and that still holds true even in this ITTL environment.

Actually based in more recently publicised documents from US archives, the US government came close in 1964 to backing/accepting unilateral enosis... for Makarios to torpedo it. But this is neither here nor there.

The US would at best stay neutral in the matter of Cyprus, out of fear of further alienating their already frailing, unstable & enraged NATO ally, Turkey, which could very well easily decide to abandon NATO and turncoat, instead align with the USSR, at any given time, far more so ITTL than IOTL.

I wouldn't be taking for granted either NATO... or that TTL Turkey would be part of it. Frex even in OTL there were British objections to including Turkey in NATO, with participation solely to what was to become the Baghdad pact proposed as an alternative. Ironically enough in OTL Greece was strongly supporting her then Turkish ally joining NATO together with it. But again... we are still in 1943.

 

[Ammonios]

Hello,

But again... we are still in 1943.

Now that things are starting to settle down, are the Greeks contributing forces for the effort to retake Europe from the Germans?

 

[Duke of Orlando]

It feels like we’re making a lot of assumptions that decolonization will look anything like OTL. Sure nothing says it’ll be different either but it’s very easy for butterflies to work their magic over time. I wouldn’t be surprised if France and the UK both had different decolonization policies as they’re both likely to be in better positions post war. We don’t even know if there will be a Suez crisis ITTL.

 

[Quinkana]

Actually based in more recently publicised documents from US archives, the US government came close in 1964 to backing/accepting unilateral enosis... for Makarios to torpedo it. But this is neither here nor there

Well I think America would fully support enosis ittl then and the Brits will lose the colony even if it would still have basing rights and such.

There are multiple factors at play I would think. Both Britain and France should be affected in various degrees by the events so far. Frex you have a far stronger Free France so far. Does this translate to De Gaulle having enough influence to get you a Gaullist 4th republic in 1946? If you do what's its policy in Indochina and Algeria? Would he be more or less prone to military intervention in Suez (at a guess less,

Well I'd guess America would react more strongly if de Gaulle is the new president and fighting native populations in Africa.

 

[emperor joe]

.


Actually based in more recently publicised documents from US archives, the US government came close in 1964 to backing/accepting unilateral enosis... for Makarios to torpedo it. But this is neither here nor there.

Really? What caused the plan to fall thru?

 

[Duke of Orlando]

Well I think America would fully support enosis ittl then and the Brits will lose the colony even if it would still have basing rights and such.

Well I'd guess America would react more strongly if de Gaulle is the new president and fighting native populations in Africa.

Honestly I’m not sure how much de Gaulle would fight in Africa. Judging by his OTL actions he’s much more likely to try soft power. The only thing I think that could be drastically different in Africa if he were in charge is he would likely try to negotiate peacefully for some of Algeria if he could.