The British Indian Ocean Territory: A Secret and Strategic Cold War History

A vital investigation into the mysterious events behind the surreptitious, illegal creation of a British colony in 1965-just as the United Kingdom decolonised elsewhere. While Britain's empire decolonised after the Second World War, one more colony was created, in secret and against international law: the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT).This founding, in 1965, dismembered sixty Indian Ocean islands within the then British colonies of Mauritius and Seychelles.The entire population of these islands was forcibly displaced to make way for Anglo-American military facilities. Ostensibly, the new territory was first created to house a communications station on Diego Garcia.But BIOT's utility went far beyond this specific purpose: it facilitated the transfer of strategic power from the UK to the US in the new Cold War world.Samuel Bashfield's eye-opening account illuminates how British and American defence strategies each shaped BIOT's militarisation, with the territory used both by Lond