ABSTRACT
Turkey had remained neutral during World War II, taking great care to avoid becoming caught up in conflict the way that the Ottoman Empire had during World War I. Turkey joined the Council of Europe in 1949 and was brought into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1952. Upon the outbreak of hostilities in Korea in 1950, the Turkish army sent an infantry brigade to serve under the UN command. At a 1955 London conference between Turkey, Greece, and the UK, Prime Minister Menderes denounced Istanbul’s Greek minority population, using them as a convenient scapegoat during an economic crisis in which the Turkish economy contracted. The Cyprus issue had some new twists. In July 1974, the longstanding president of Cyprus, Greek Orthodox Archbishop Makarios III, was deposed by a coup arranged in Greece. In Iran, during and after World War II there were increasing demands for the nation to be freed from foreign influence and domination.
