Opinion
By Thanasis Photiou
The truth is that developments were torrential. Everything happened at breakneck speed and within such a short period of time that it left little room for the brain’s digestive system to process events. Even more so because, at the same time, we were experiencing a déjà vu of failures and structural dysfunctions in the field of Civil Defence and Protection. This, of course, was not a hallucination of memory or the brain’s mistaken impression that a new experience had already happened in the past, something science can explain. In this case, it was not even a new experience. On the contrary, it was the familiar “my history, my sin, my great mistake.” Most importantly, Science throws up its hands. It cannot offer even the slightest explanation for this chronic disorganization.
In short, we hardly noticed when our yard filled with Greek, French, and Spanish warships. We did not quite register when aircraft carriers and missile frigates arrived, when fighter jets landed, when Kimon came to life, when it linked arms with Centaur, or exactly when the distance between Greece and Cyprus seemed to shrink. We barely had time to understand why all those “security umbrellas” that from time to time, and more frequently in recent years, were said to be opening above our heads, always in triumphant headlines and to the sound of drumrolls, ultimately never opened. Instead, I suppose at enormous financial cost, legendary pieces of military hardware, both older and newer, along with air forces from European Union countries had to be deployed to line up against weapons that may be cheap but are nonetheless effective products of new technology.
The truth is that this last point was the only thing we could somewhat explain. Perhaps because last September, at an unsuspecting moment, we managed to comment on yet another hymn celebrating a new security umbrella. At the time we wrote that “the security umbrellas above our heads are part of a long tradition that confirms what we do not have inside our heads.” We added, “at least until it actually opens.”
To keep it brief, the developments themselves are understandable, as is the importance of ensuring that the public’s sense of security is protected and strengthened rather than shaken. What is harder to follow is how we moved from Sunday, when the government was making superhuman efforts to calm public concerns by denying the British official’s claims, to the President’s address on Monday morning that followed the same narrative. At that moment there was no mention at all of the members of the National Council who had gone to the Presidential Palace on Monday morning after the President’s address. The official statement about what took place at the National Council, which was issued and posted on the government website, made no reference to any of this. Yet suddenly we were hearing the Greek Minister of Defence speak about “unprovoked attacks” against Cyprus. The Greek Prime Minister had already taken Cyprus’s request for assistance and support to the Government Council for Foreign Affairs and Defence, which managed to convene quickly. The F-16s even managed to land in Paphos before the government posted the announcement about the National Council meeting. Still, nothing terrible happened. Under the circumstances, given the threats and the uncertainty, they were welcome.
It is simply that the analysis of the military mobilization in Cyprus by international analysts and think tanks goes far beyond the simple protection of a member state. It goes beyond whatever guilt a mother might feel toward her daughter for any number of reasons. Instead, it highlights a critical geopolitical arena of power with enormous strategic depth. Since all of this resembles the business slogan that crises create opportunities, it would be even more reassuring if we knew with certainty that it was indeed the President’s initiative. That way we could also feel confident that he knows what to do with the opportunity.
