This is a story of two far-flung relics of the British Empire, two tiny dots in an ocean. It is a story of how saving one of them, in the name of science, wrecked the lives of citizens on the other, and of a scientist with deep regrets about his role in the tragedy. And it is the story of two great military powers in the 1960s, one rising and one falling, and of preparations for military action on the northern shores of the Indian Ocean that culminated in two Gulf Wars. The islands are Aldabra, a speck of land in the Seychelles off the east coast of Africa, and Diego Garcia, the largest and southernmost of the 55 islands that form the even more remote Chagos archipelago, smack in the middle of the Indian Ocean.
WHEN former British defence secretary Denis Healey wrote his autobiography, he did not forget the tiny island of Aldabra. It was, he wrote, 鈥渋nhabited only by giant tortoises, frigate birds and the great booby, so we expected no political difficulties鈥�. Difficulties, that is, when the UK decided in 1965 that it wanted to turn the island into a giant military airfield that could be reached from Europe without flying over potentially unfriendly Arab states.
But he had reckoned without David Stoddart, a young biologist at Cambridge University who had got wind of the government鈥檚 secret plan to build an airbase on one of four coral atolls in the Indian Ocean. On the shortlist were Aldabra, nearby Farquhar and Desroches, and the distant Diego Garcia 鈥� all of which had been retained by the UK as its British Indian Ocean Territory when other islands had been given their independence.
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Fearing the loss of a 鈥淕alapagos of the Indian Ocean鈥�, Stoddart persuaded the Royal Society in London to hire him to conduct ecological assessments of the islands. He returned from Aldabra, then the hot favourite, in 1966 and reported 鈥渢hat with its huge population of giant tortoises, unique land birds and large populations of sea birds, Aldabra was one of the most ecologically important atolls in the world and must not be developed by the military鈥�.
The Royal Society took up the case for its protection, and when the public learned what was afoot, there was a general outcry against the proposal. The Ministry of Defence conceded defeat in what became known as 鈥渢he Aldabra affair鈥�. It handed over the island and its population of giant tortoises to the Royal Society.
But as the scientists claimed victory, the ministry鈥檚 attention shifted to Diego Garcia. Here, the mandarins found Stoddart鈥檚 verdict more to their liking: 鈥淚t was simply a coconut plantation. The plants were common and the birds and land animals few.鈥� As a direct result of his findings, he admits, 鈥淎ldabra was saved and Diego Garcia was lost.鈥�
Healey had by then decided to abandon British military activity east of Suez. Instead, he gave a 50-year lease on Diego Garcia to the US, which wanted a new base in the region but lacked an island of its own on which to build it.
But there was a potential problem. Unlike Aldabra, people lived on the islands 鈥� some 1500 descendants of African slaves and Indian plantation workers brought to Chagos over the previous 200 years to cultivate coconuts. And the Americans wanted them out 鈥� not just from Diego Garcia, but from the entire archipelago. For a while they talked publicly of establishing an 鈥渁ustere communications facility鈥�. But what they actually built was a giant airbase and naval port.
And so, with Aldabra saved for science, began one of the more odious episodes in recent British colonial history. The British government secretly agreed to remove the islanders. Most were dumped on Mauritius, an island almost 2000 kilometres away, with a very different culture, religion and language. Some were offered free boat trips to Mauritius and then refused return passage. Others were simply rounded up and shipped out. The UK eventually paid Mauritius 拢4 million to relocate the Chagossians, though much of it went astray, and most of them ended up in slum shacks.
After the round-up came the cover-up. 鈥淲e would not wish it to become general knowledge that some of the inhabitants have lived on Diego Garcia for at least two generations and could therefore be regarded as 鈥榖elongers鈥�,鈥� says a Foreign Office memo from 1970. 鈥淲e would therefore advise ministers to say that there is only a small number of contract labourers.鈥� Questions about the fate of the Chagossians then being expelled 鈥渃an be brushed aside as a hypothetical question鈥�.
By 1973, every last Chagossian was gone and the US opened its new base. It took until 2001 for the High Court in London to rule that there had been 鈥渘o source of lawful authority鈥� for the eviction, and that the people had a right to return. The Chagossians began to look forward to going home.
Fat chance. The US would not allow Diego Garcia鈥檚 former residents to so much as set foot on the island, even to visit their ancestors鈥� graves. The Foreign Office suggested they might live instead on outlying islands of the archipelago, and promised to carry out feasibility studies.
But ever since, there has been ministerial silence, and negative whispering from Whitehall. The US, the whispers said, 鈥渉as reservations about resettlement of the outer islands鈥� because the Chagossians might become terrorists or harbour terrorists. Mauritius, which will take over the islands when the airfield closes, 鈥渄oesn鈥檛 want the Chagossians to go back there鈥�. There is no money for resettlement.
But what of the scientist who began all this? Throughout a long career, now drawing to a close at Berkeley in California, Stoddart has maintained a deep interest in Aldabra. Although pleased that Aldabra was saved, he says today: 鈥淚鈥檝e had to live with the advice I gave in the 1960s. The loss [of Diego Garcia] has distressed me ever since.鈥�
Back then, he says, the Ministry of Defence never gave a hint of what the US planned. 鈥淚 had the impression that only a shed for some radio operators was envisaged. No one realised that the entire population would be evacuated. In retrospect my conclusion that there was no reason to object to the facility simply looks naive and foolish.鈥�
And he believes that a whole new generation in Whitehall is once again short-changing the Chagossians. The government鈥檚 feasibility study into the return of the Chagossians to outer islands, such as Peros Banhos and Salomon Island, has been 鈥渁 waste of time and money鈥�, he says.
Carried out without seeking the opinions of the Chagossians, the study concludes that lack of water would be a critical constraint on any resettlement. 鈥淭his is frankly rubbish,鈥� Stoddart says. The two islands are respectively the third and fifth wettest atolls in the world. 鈥淭here are no droughts and there is never a month without rain.鈥�
It is an almost inescapable conclusion from all this that tortoises and birds have, throughout, counted for more than people 鈥� for governments, scientists and the public alike. Aldabra, returned to the Seychelles in 1979, is a famous conservation success, a World Heritage Site with a new research station that can house twenty scientists, satellite communications links and fast boats to hop around the islands. The island鈥檚 100,000 tortoises are in rude health.
Diego Garcia finally found its military role as a base for bombers during the Gulf War in 1991 and again in the recent conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. At weekends, US troops sun themselves on the beaches and picnic in the huts where the Chagossians once lived. Meanwhile the Chagossians sit out their long exile in leaky huts in Mauritius. Last month, a group of them declared that they were going to board a ship and head for Diego Garcia and 鈥渇orce Britain and the US to look them in the eye鈥�.