Ayios Nikolaos Station (also spelled ''Agios Nikolaos''; el, Άγιος Νικόλαος, lit. "Saint Nicholas") is a British military station and part of in the British Sovereign Base Area of Dhekelia in

Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is ...

. It is a former village ( Ayios Nikolaos, SBA) connected by a road to the main area of the Dhekelia Garrison. The Joint Service Signal Unit (Cyprus) (JSSU(Cyp)), formerly 9th Signal Regiment and the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) an ...

's 33 Signals Unit, is based at Ayios Nikolaos. This unit is a

British Armed Forces The British Armed Forces, also known as His Majesty's Armed Forces, are the military forces responsible for the defence of the United Kingdom, its Overseas Territories and the Crown Dependencies. They also promote the UK's wider interests, s ...

run

electronic intelligence Signals intelligence (SIGINT) is intelligence-gathering by interception of '' signals'', whether communications between people (communications intelligence—abbreviated to COMINT) or from electronic signals not directly used in communication ...

gathering station. The current superior body to JSSU (Cyp) appears to be the Joint Service Signal Organisation.(JSSU (Cyp))
accessed January 2019. The JSSO, as of 2012, was located at

RAF Digby Royal Air Force Digby otherwise known as RAF Digby is a Royal Air Force station located near Scopwick and south east of Lincoln, in Lincolnshire, England. The station is home to the tri-service Joint Service Signals Organisation, part of the J ...

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-we ...

, under the command of a

Group Captain Group captain is a senior commissioned rank in the Royal Air Force, where it originated, as well as the air forces of many countries that have historical British influence. It is sometimes used as the English translation of an equivalent rank i ...

of the RAF Operations Support Branch and had 1,600 staff which are drawn from all three services.

History

The station was established at Ayios Nikolaos shortly after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

. In 1946 2 Wireless Company and 2 Special Wireless Group merged to become 2 Wireless Regiment RSigs. In 1959 2 Wireless Regiment became 9 Signal Regiment. In early 1956 No. 751 Signals Unit RAF, a mobile radar convoy, was located at RAF Ayios Nikolaos. The unit radars initially comprised one Type 15, two Type 14s, and two Type 13s, conducting air defence. It moved to

Cape Greco Cape Greco, also known as Capo Greco (Italian for "Greek cape"; el, Κάβο Γκρέκο), is a headland in the southeastern part of the island of Cyprus. It is at the southern end of Famagusta Bay and forms part of Ayia Napa Municipality. It ...

after March 1956. It was located there until 1959. There were a number of court cases involving servicemen from the regiment during the 1980s, including the Cyprus Seven Trial, an alleged spy-ring operating at Ayios Nikolaos Station in 1984. The Joint Service Signal Unit (Cyprus) (or JSSU (Cyp)) was formed on 1 April 1999, as a result of the amalgamation of the Joint Service Signal Unit (Ayios Nikolaos) and elements of 33 Signals Unit RAF. It is a three-squadron organisation, commanded by a

Royal Signals The Royal Corps of Signals (often simply known as the Royal Signals – abbreviated to R SIGNALS or R SIGS) is one of the combat support arms of the British Army. Signals units are among the first into action, providing the battlefield communi ...

Lieutenant Colonel, with a number of

and civilian contractors attached. ''Ayios Nikolaos'' or ''Agios Nikolaos'' is a very common place name in

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders wi ...

and

; it is Greek for "

Saint Nicholas Saint Nicholas of Myra, ; la, Sanctus Nicolaus (traditionally 15 March 270 – 6 December 343), also known as Nicholas of Bari, was an early Christian bishop of Greek descent from the maritime city of Myra in Asia Minor (; modern-day Dem ...

". For satellite interception, the Ayios Nikolaos station has a number of dish antennas of various sizes. Somewhere between 2008 and 2011, also a

torus antenna {{no footnotes, date=August 2017 A parabolic torus reflector antenna is a quasi- parabolic antenna, where the defining parabola is not rotated around the main transmission axis, but around an axis which stands vertically to this axis. Simulsat ...

was installed, which is able to receive the signals of up to 35 satellites simultaneously.Electrospaces.net
Torus: the antenna to significantly increase satellite interception
8 April 2015 Declassified documents show that the station was run for the

Government Communications Headquarters Government Communications Headquarters, commonly known as GCHQ, is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the Uni ...

(GCHQ), and documents released by Edward Snowden suggest that in recent years half the cost of running the station is funded by the U.S.

National Security Agency The National Security Agency (NSA) is a national-level intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense, under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). The NSA is responsible for global monitoring, collecti ...

. It became the largest GCHQ site outside the UK.

References

External links

Joint Service Signal Unit (only page 1; other pages withheld)
British military in Cyprus Earth stations in Cyprus UKUSA listening stations Military of Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia 1940s establishments in Cyprus {{Cyprus-geo-stub

History

See also

References

External links