The Grand Game and Britain’s Acquisition of Cyprus

Yıl 2014, Cilt: 12 Sayı: 17, 85 - 96, 03.02.2015

Heinz A. Rıchter

https://doi.org/10.17518/caty.41470

Cited By: 1

Öz

In my following exposition I will try to answer three questions (1) Why did Great Britain want Cyprus in 1878? (2) How and when did London achieve this task? (3) Why did Britain keep Cyprus even when London discovered that after the acquisition of Egypt it did not need Cyprus no longer from a military point of view? While answering these questions I give an outline of the main strands of the story and their interdependence. There were two main developments which led to the acquisition of Cyprus 1878: The growing nationalist unrest among the peoples in the Balkans many of which were still a part of the Ottoman Empire, and the global rivalry of Great Britain and Russia known as the Grand Game between the greatest naval power and the biggest land power of the time. Since Peter the Great the Russians had been trying to get acquire an icefree harbour and the British had done their best to contain this effort. These conflicts had been well known all through the 19th century and until 1878 had not had any influence on Cyprus. This time, however, it was different.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Ottoman Empire, Cyprus, Great Britain, Europe

Büyük Oyun ve İngiltere’nin Kıbrıs’ı İlhakı

Öz

Aşağıda yer alan çalışmamda üç soruya cevap bulmaya çalışacağım. 1. İngiltere 1878’de Kıbrıs’ı neden istedi? 2. Bu hedefe nasıl ve ne zaman ulaştı? 3. İngiltere Mısır’ı ilhak ettikten sonra artık bir askerî üs olarak Kıbrıs’a ihtiyacı olmadığını bildiği halde neden Kıbrıs’ı elinde tuttu? Bu soruları cevaplarken tarihî gelişmelerin ana aşamalarının bir taslağını ve onların birbirlerine olan bağlılıklarını ele alacağım.

Aşağıda yer alan çalışmamda üç soruya cevap bulmaya çalışacağım. 1. İngiltere 1878’de Kıbrıs’ı neden istedi? 2. Bu hedefe nasıl ve ne zaman ulaştı? 3. İngiltere Mısır’ı ilhak ettikten sonra artık bir askerî üs olarak Kıbrıs’a ihtiyacı olmadığını bildiği halde neden Kıbrıs’ı elinde tuttu? Bu soruları cevaplarken tarihî gelişmelerin ana aşamalarının bir taslağını ve onların birbirlerine olan bağlılıklarını ele alacağım.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Osmanlı İmparatorluğu, Kıbrıs, İngiltere, Avrupa

Kaynakça

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• Hailey, Lord, The Future of Colonial Peoples (Oxford, 1943).
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