Cypriot government begs potential PM Farage not to let US use UK bases

The Cypriot government has reportedly reached out to Reform UK leader Nigel Farage. They want to make sure Donald Trump can’t use British colonial bases if Farage becomes PM. It isn’t at all clear if Farage, a Trump sycophant and creepy embodiment of British empire, will oblige.

Politico reported on 2 June:

Cyprus wants to prevent Donald Trump from using the island’s British bases for wartime attacks and is asking the U.K. for guarantees in case right-winger Nigel Farage becomes prime minister.

Mind you, Politico reported in the same breath that current PM Keir Starmer:

refused to allow the United States to use Britain’s military bases in Cyprus for offensive airstrikes on Iran, but later allowed them to be used for the “specific and limited defensive purpose” of preventing Iranian attacks.

This ‘defensive operations’ guff is a standard legacy press canard. Starmer has allowed the US to use various British bases to be used to bomb Iran. And UK bases in Cyprus have been used to facilitate military operations over Gaza. Only a damned fool or a slippery liar would suggest this is a separate issue from the current debacle in the Middle East.

Additionally, the US has active spy bases on the Mediterranean island. As such, here is friend of the Canary Matt Kennard’s 2023 investigation in Declassified UK.

Farage: to base or not to base?

Politico said UK and Cypriot officials confirmed there had been some form discussions about basing. The issue will be fully raised after the US-Israeli attack on Iran has ended.

The outlet said:

the country wants concrete guarantees to ensure that future governments, such as one led by Farage — a Trump ally who previously backed U.S. military strikes in Iran before later questioning further involvement in the conflict — would not be able to unilaterally use the bases for military action.

UK military bases at Akrotiri and Dhekelia remained after Cypriot independence in 1960:

Cypriot concerns intensified after an Iranian drone struck RAF Akrotiri on March 2 following the start of the U.S.-Israeli campaign against Iran.

Nicosia criticized what it saw as poor communication from London over the incident, including on whether the base had been involved in defensive operations linked to the Iran conflict, and the lack of advance warning for local residents.

Farage initially argued for the American use of UK colonial bases to hit Iran but later wavered, as Politico pointed out. The UK has beefed up military capacity at its bases and activists have warned there is no British plan to remove them.

There is a grass-roots antiwar and anti-base movement in Cyprus. Which in the Canary’s view is as important as the wrangling of ambitious politicians. There have been protests over UK spy flights over Gaza.

You can read more about resistance to the bases here.

Farage’s hard-right party Reform UK is yet to release a full defence policy. When that lands their position on overseas base may be clearer.

Globe spanning base network

Meanwhile a current UK government official told Politico:

We have to be able to use our bases unfettered.

The UK maintains military bases around the globe. The UK had 145 known installations in 42 countries as of 2020. As Declassified UK had it:

The size of this global military presence is far larger than previously thought and is likely to mean that the UK has the second largest military network in the world, after the United States.

That survey included:

17 separate military installations in Cyprus.

The sites:

which were retained at independence in 1960, include runways, firing ranges, barracks, fuel bunkers and spy stations run by the UK’s signals intelligence agency – GCHQ.

Adding:

Declassified has also found that several of the sites are located beyond the sovereign base areas, including on the top of Mount Olympus, the highest point on Cyprus.

The British empire is not what it once was. And not a single tear will be shed in the Canary newsroom about that. But it isn’t quite as dead as some claim. Farage, a product of a political system built on colonialism, has modelled his politics closely on Trumpism. Cypriot politicians who think they can talk the tweed-clad right-winger out of those commitments will find they are barking up the wrong GCHQ radio mast pretty damned fast.

Featured image via Getty/Chip Somodevilla