Greece and the United States have concluded an indefinite agreement on cooperation in the defense sector. The head of the US State Department, Michael Pompeo, and the Greek Foreign Minister, Nikos Dendias, signed the document. This was stated in an interview with Real by the Minister of National Defense of Greece, Nikolaos Panayotopoulos.

In addition, according to the document, the American military base of the Court on the island of Crete will be expanded - the Greek side will provide the Pentagon with the infrastructure of the bases of Stefanovikio, Larisa and Alexandroupolis.

According to Panayotopoulos, the new agreement aims to strategically strengthen relations and cooperation between Washington and Athens.

  • Nikolaos Panayotopoulos
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“We are talking about a“ community of interests ”with mutual benefit for the two sides,” RIA Novosti quoted the minister as saying.

The new agreement significantly expands the US military presence in the region, political analysts say. In fact, the American side gets the opportunity to use the four military bases for its own purposes, despite the fact that so far the US presence has been limited to the base of the Court, and Washington had to renew its right to use it annually under the terms of the "Base Agreement" signed by the parties in 1990.

It is worth noting that in practice the Pentagon began to use the above Greek bases even before the signing of the new treaty. So, earlier in Larisa the American army UAVs MQ-9 Reaper were deployed, and in Alexandroupolis it was planned to deploy a helicopter group.

Mediterranean strategy element

In April, US senators Marc Rubio and Bob Menendez introduced to Congress a bill on security and energy cooperation in the Eastern Mediterranean. This document spoke about the possible cessation of supplies of F-35 fighters to Turkey if Ankara follows its intention to acquire Russian S-400 systems.

At the same time, in the field of partnerships, emphasis was placed on Greece. The authors of the document even proposed lifting the arms embargo on the Republic of Cyprus, which enjoys the political patronage of Athens. The bill provided for the rapprochement of the United States with Greece in the defense field, the financing of a number of military programs, as well as the preservation and expansion of the American presence at military bases in this state.

  • Missile cruiser "Marshal Ustinov" during the call to the port of Limassol
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In Athens and Nicosia, on the whole, the American partners took this plan positively, with the exception of the point where the Greek side was asked to block Russian warships from accessing their ports. Neither Greece nor the Republic of Cyprus agreed to take this step, calling this proposal “unsuccessful”.

But the Greek leadership welcomed the idea of ​​deploying additional US military forces in the country. Moreover, the authorities of the country themselves had come forward with such an initiative. However, at the official level, this idea was fixed only now - against the backdrop of a cooling of US-Turkish relations, experts say.

Recall that the Greek-Turkish conflict has a long history, and the issue of Cyprus’s membership is most acute. The island changed its protectorate more than once, and since the 16th century the region was ruled by Ottoman Turks.

Following the First World War, Cyprus came under British control, which granted him independence in 1960. A bloody ethnic conflict broke out between the Turks and Greeks inhabiting the island, which was only stopped with the help of the UN peacekeeping contingent. Now in Cyprus there are two state entities - the Greek Republic of Cyprus recognized by the world community and the unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. The island remains the subject of a dispute between Athens and Ankara, for this reason the relations between the countries are very strained, despite their partnership within NATO.

As for Washington, before he tried to maintain a neutral line in this matter, but the cooling of relations with Turkey pushed America to build military ties with Greece, experts say.

The most acute contradictions between Washington and Ankara arose due to the decision of the Turkish leadership to purchase Russian S-400 air defense systems. These plans provoked irritation from the White House. Washington threatened to withdraw Turkey from the program for the creation and supply of fifth-generation fighter F-35, if the contract for the supply of S-400 is not terminated. The White House motivated its position by the “incompatibility” of the F-35 and Russian air defense: allegedly, the Russian side can use the complexes supplied by Turkey to read the tactical and technical characteristics of the latest American fighters.

However, the agreements between Ankara and Moscow remained unchanged, although the American side offered its Patriot systems as an alternative to the S-400.

Air defense issue

Speaking about the intensification of Greek-American cooperation, experts believe that in the future Athens, like Turkey, may face pressure from Washington. If Ankara only recently started importing Russian air defense systems, then in Greece the Russian S-300 air defense systems were deployed a few years ago.

The Greek Ministry of Defense announced a tender for the supply of air defense systems in 1998, then the main struggle for the future contract unfolded then between Rosvooruzhenie and the American Raytheon, who offered Athens the S-300V and Patriot-3, respectively. It is worth noting that initially the Americans did not show much interest in the contract and even doubted whether Greece should put the simplified Patriot-1 system, but in the end they offered Athens six batteries of the latest air defense systems at that time.

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The growing competition between the United States and Russia for the opportunity to supply Greece with arms was described by the head of the European Defense Ministry as "murderous." As a result, Greece settled on Raytheon Patriot complexes.

However, the S-300 air defense systems were still deployed subsequently on the territory of Greece - Cyprus purchased two S-300 air defense divisions PMU1 from Moscow back in 1996, but their use was limited by decision of the United States, Britain and Turkey. In 2006-2007, the air defense systems were transferred to Greece.

The Greek military made their first test launches of S-300 missiles as part of the White Eagle 2013 exercises. The complex hit the target on the first attempt at a distance of 30 km and an altitude of about 2 km, and at that moment the target was performing an evasion maneuver. The exercises showed the high efficiency of Russian air defense systems, experts say.

S-300 air defense systems came at the disposal of Greece for a long time, analysts say, and now they may need to be updated. As the director of the Russian Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation (FSVTS) Dmitry Shugaev stated at the end of September, Moscow has repeatedly proposed to Athens to modernize its air defense, but the parties have so far failed to start a discussion on this issue.

“Today we are talking about maintaining it (S-300. - RT system ) in the state in which it should be and perform the functions of air defense. The after-sales service contract is valid. The life of missiles has been extended, ”said Shugaev.

S-300 systems are not the only Russian weapons that are in service with the Greek army. The Armed Forces of this country also have the Kornet-E and Fagot anti-tank missile systems, the Zubr hovercraft and the Osa air defense missile systems.

In 2018, Russia and Greece signed an interstate agreement “Extending the life of weapons systems,” but the details of the document were not disclosed. In addition, there is a Russian-Greek commission on military-technical cooperation.

"Goes into the trap"

According to experts, Washington still has not tried to put pressure on Athens because of their military cooperation with Moscow, because it was afraid to push Greece away, part of the population of which does not hide its anti-American sentiment. As the economist Vasily Koltashov, head of the Center for Political Economic Studies at the Institute for Globalization and Social Movements, suggested in an interview with RT, Washington expects to use cooperation with Athens to advance its interests in the region, as well as to put pressure on Turkey.

"Now the Americans will by any means push through the supply of their weapons to Greece," Koltashov said.

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A similar point of view is shared by military expert Yuri Knutov. According to him, Athens went to rapprochement with the Pentagon in order to contain Turkey. However, deepening integration with the United States may impede the development of promising ties with other countries such as Russia, the expert explained in a commentary on RT. He believes that it would be more profitable for Greece to maintain the status quo by cooperating with the United States and other major international partners.

“Greece is driving itself into a dead end because the White House does not intend to provide free support. To get something, Athens each time will have to ask American partners. As a result, this may lead to the fact that Greece will be dependent on NATO and the United States, this trend has been observed for a long time. Today Greece itself is falling into a trap, from which it will then be difficult to get out, ”Knutov said.

Vasily Koltashov also believes that the current deal with Washington, as well as the general course towards rapprochement with American partners in economic terms, does not promise Greece “nothing good”.

“The country will simply be used, and it is unlikely that the Greeks will benefit greatly from this cooperation,” the expert concluded.