Indulge me. Cyprus is in the news, and I have a special emotional connection with that beautiful island having served there as a soldier many years ago.

In 1878 the British, under the Cyprus Convention, took over the effective rule of Cyprus from Turkey. The objective was to underpin the weak Ottoman Empire and stop the Russian move towards the Mediterranean. A British base was established (still there). The British built some roads, and that was that. It was ignored. The schools were controlled from Athens, would you believe? In all other respects the island stayed the same as it always had been – one of the most beautiful and unspoiled places I have ever seen, occupied by people whose principle activity was gossiping in coffee shops and picking the odd olive, if they had the energy.

In the meantime, the island has been divided, and the eastern half occupied by Turkish soldiers and dirt-poor Turkish farmers. The Greek part, especially Paphos, birthplace of Aphrodite, goddess of love, has been turned into a beer palace for tourist louts.

And guess what? The fears of the European politicians of 1878 have, after all, come to pass – Cyprus is now in hock to Russia,and its top politicians are in Moscow trying to wheedle cash out of Putin and his money-laundering friends. They hope to turn over oil concessions to the Russians in return for a bailout. Thus Russia is realizing its old geo-political objective.

What has this to do with Epicureanism? Well, I would argue that the highly bogus* idea of enosis, or union with Greece, caused the rupture between the Greek and Turkish communities, and that the only thing maintaining the peace was a foreign (read British) presence. For most of the Period of British hegemony the island was idyllic ( read “Bitter Lemons” by Durrell). Cyprus was no great shakes economically, but until the agitators got going it was peaceful, sunny and chock full of history. Once the umpire left the locals were unable to run the place properly, and it has gone to bad and then to worse. There is neither peace nor moderation, just more involvement in jostling foreign powers. I am against colonialism in principle, but in this case Cyprus would have been better served by staying under British rule, which for a good many years was Epicurean in spirit, although nobody would have realized or admitted it.

Epicureanism can be applied to geo-politics as well as in our personal lives. In other words, if you find a nice, happy island, leave it alone.

* Cyprus was last under the rule of Greece, whatever that means, in the days of the ancient Athenian empire.

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