[agere_contra]

Cyprus. You mean Cyprus.

Yes the evil British set up the Ottoman empire, had it invade Cyprus in the 16th century and so set up two mutually hostile ethnic and cultural groups on the island. We do that stuff in our sleep.

The truth is: Britain destroyed the Ottoman Empire pretty much single handed - it’s only because of us that there is even a Greek-Cypriot administered area of Cyprus today.

Don’t get me wrong: the Turks shouldn’t be running any part of Cyprus. The Turkish invasion in the 1970’s was and remains completely immoral.

But the fact that NATO and the United States - not Britain, but NATO and the United States - did nothing about it was to do with the deadly danger of splitting NATO in the face of the Soviet Union. The division of Cyprus was one more concession forced on the Free World by the fight against Communism.

[Ravnagora]

Agere_contra said:

The truth is: Britain destroyed the Ottoman Empire pretty much single handed...

Can you please elaborate on this? Are you talking about the Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913, or something else?

I was under the impression that other countries and "groups" were instrumental in 'destroying the Ottoman Empire', one of those being the Serbs.

*****

[Verginius Rufus]

The Austrians and the Russians also played a role in driving the Ottomans out of their European conquests, along with some of the Balkan peoples (Serbs, Bulgarians, and others). The victory at Navarino in 1827 which led to the creation of an independent Greece was won by the British, French, and Russian fleets.

In 1878 the Russians tried to create a "big Bulgaria" including Macedonia, but were thwarted by the British. The short-term result was that a part of the Balkans had to suffer under Ottoman rule for several more decades. In the long run Greece benefited because they ended up with Thessalonica and a large part of Macedonia which otherwise might now belong to Bulgaria.

The spelling oxi is misleading for English-speakers--the X is not the English "x" sound but the letter chi (pronounced like "kh" in Khrushchev). "Okhi Day" would be a better transliteration.

[eleni121]

Britain destroyed the Ottoman Empire pretty much single handed

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Lots of Laughter being heard by all heroes up there who died defending freedom and Christianity and destroying the Muslim Turks while the Brits were busy expanding colonial empires and welcoming the Turks to the family of Empire.

And the OW is still playing games with Christians in the Balkans.