Britain's Anxious Debate

Nothing arouses the Briton like criticism, and last week Britons were getting plenty of it. The World Council of Churches condemned the exiling of Archbishop Makarios as an act "very deeply resented throughout the orthodox world," sent messages of sympathy and support to Makarios himself in his tropical island exile. Greece talked of withdrawing from NATO, and actually did withdraw its ambassador from London. The U.S. State Department tried to avoid taking sides between its Greek and British friends (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS), but in Athens, U.S. Ambassador Cavendish Cannon called on Greek Premier Konstantin

Karamanlis to offer the U.S.'s "sympathetic concern."

At this, the British press broke into howls of indignation. The Tory Daily Mail cried that young British soldiers had been shot in the back by cowards who were "now the new-found friends of America!"

"No Choice." With such encouragement, Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden rose in the House of Commons with newfound confidence to defend his government's action. He appeared in his most effective role--the put-upon man whose good intentions should be plain to all. He recalled how British troops at the end of World War II had fought and died to deliver Greece "from what I then believed, and still believe, was the certainty of Communist rule ... I was in Athens at the time." He accused Archbishop Makarios of negotiating in bad faith, of raising his demands, of refusing to disown the terrorists. Added Eden: "We had no choice but to fulfill our responsibilities or abdicate our authority, and we chose the former. It was not an agreeable decision."

British military authorities insist privately that Britain's bases on Cyprus are safe only if Britain controls the island. Eden could not say this, but concluded: "The welfare and even the very lives of our people depend on Cyprus as a protective guard and staging post to take care of [our Middle East] interests--above all, oil. This is not imperialism. It should be the plain duty of any government, and we intend to discharge it." Tories cheered.

Rebels or Heroes. Pressing Labor's motion of censure, Nye Bevan was somewhat subdued, getting in only a passing crack at the Tories' "truculent nostalgia" for empire. He made his central point simply: "We will never be able to have a satisfactory military base on the island of Cyprus surrounded by a hostile civil population."

Young Francis Noel-Baker, a Labor backbencher who speaks Greek and who acted as an intermediary in Field Marshal Sir John Harding's negotiations with Makarios, insisted stoutly that Makarios was "a sincere, patriotic, honest, moderate and very remarkable leader of his people. I am certain that one day, Archbishop Makarios will return as a hero to Cyprus. At that time, some British government will be only too ready to get the kind of agreement with him that I believe we could have got a couple of weeks ago."

In the House of Lords, Earl Attlee, making his maiden speech, vented his spleen on what he called the U.S.'s "rather outdated anti-colonialism." "I sometimes feel," said Attlee, "with all friendliness to our American friends, that they are a little apt to stand on the sidelines and leave us to carry the fight." But he too was critical of Makarios' exile. "The rebels of the past generally tend, sooner or later, to be the Prime Ministers of the British Commonwealth,"* he observed tartly.

"Exposed Risk." At week's end the most sober and considered contribution to the debate came from Dr. Geoffrey Fisher, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who sits in the House of Lords. Said Dr. Fisher: "It is important for the government to realize that it is in terms of sacrilege that much foreign opinion is viewing their action." He revealed that he had once written Makarios asking him to denounce terrorism. Makarios had replied: "I am sincerely afraid that an official condemnation of events by myself would not find at the present stage the necessary response, but would involve a risk of exposing me rather unprofitably." Dr. Fisher suggested a way out: Britain should immediately begin preparing a constitution for Cyprus; Makarios should be told that he will be allowed to return as soon as public order is restored. In the House of Commons, Eden's exiling of Makarios was approved 317 to 252. Eden had won back some of the sulking Conservative backbenchers, and stifled some of the press criticism of him. But it seemed increasingly clear that the British had removed the only man they could negotiate with--and had made a martyr of him.

* Such as India's Nehru, Eire's De Valera, South Africa's Smuts, Singapore's David Marshall, the Gold Coast's Kwame Nkrumah, many of whom spent time in British jails. Nkrumah campaigned wearing "PG" proudly on his cap, for "prison graduate."

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