War Office and Ministry of Defence: Headquarters Middle East and successors: Records

WO 386

1954-1974

This series consists of files and reports produced by Headquarters Middle East and some of its successor and associated bodies which covered British Army operations after the Second World War in the Mediterranean and Middle East as well as southern, central and East Africa. It includes intelligence reports from the Joint Intelligence Group (Cyprus).

Public Record(s)

English

• Ministry of Defence, Headquarters British Forces Gulf, 1967-1971
• Ministry of Defence, Headquarters British Troops Malta, 1967-1967
• Ministry of Defence, Headquarters Cyprus District, 1964-1967
• Ministry of Defence, Headquarters Malta and Libya, 1964-1967
• Ministry of Defence, Headquarters Middle East Land Forces, 1964-1967
• Ministry of Defence, Headquarters Near East Land Forces, 1967-1976
• War Office, Headquarters Malta and Libya, 1962-1964
• War Office, Headquarters Middle East Land Forces (Aden and Gulf), 1961-1964
• War Office, Headquarters, Cyprus District, 1962-1964

28 files and volumes

Open unless otherwise stated

From 1999 Ministry of Defence

Topics

Army

Europe and Russia

Conflict

Intelligence

Middle East

Armed Forces (General Administration)

Operations, battles and campaigns

Africa

Series is accruing

In 1960 the wartime Headquarters Middle East which had withdrawn from Egypt to Cyprus in 1954, were re-named Headquarters Middle East Land Forces (MELF).

In 1961 this became part of a tri-service command structure which linked British forces in the Mediterranean with those in Aden and the Persian Gulf. The headquarters in Cyprus was renamed Headquarters Near East Land Forces and the Headquarters British Forces Arabian Peninsula was renamed Headquarters Middle East Land Forces (Aden and Gulf).

The arrangement was reviewed a year later when, as a response to serious inter-communal violence in Cyprus, Headquarters Near East Land Forces was divided into Headquarters Cyprus District and Headquarters Malta and Libya.

In 1967 the headquarters in Cyprus became Headquarters Near East Land Forces again and the headquarters in Malta became Headquarters British Troops Malta, even though British forces did not pull out of Libya until 1970-1971. In the same year, following the four year internal security campaign in Aden, the tri-service Middle East Command, which included Headquarters Middle East Land Forces, was replaced by the tri-service Headquarters British Forces Gulf, based at Bahrein and Sharjah until withdrawal in 1971.

In 1976 the headquarters in Cyprus became Headquarters Land Forces, Cyprus and in 1988 it became a tri-service headquarters: Headquarters British Forces, Cyprus.