ABSTRACT
The troubled relations of Greece and Turkey in recent decades are the legacy of their historical conflicts dating from Byzantine and Ottoman times. A major factor in the development of eventual detente between Greece and Turkey, which gained ground in the late 1920s, was a growing perception of common defense interests. The first addition of territory to the Greek state occurred not by taking up arms against the Turks but by persuading Britain to cede the Ionian islands in 1864. The next addition of territory occurred in 1881 when Greece was rewarded for her neutrality during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878. The settlement reached at Lausanne laid the foundations for peaceful relations between Greece and Turkey for many years to come. When the vital interests of one was seen to be threatened by the other, as happened with the Cyprus issue during 1954-1955, the progress attained in Greek-Turkish reconciliation and collaboration was threatened and, ultimately undone.
