Greece’s priorities were described by the Minister of Defense, Nikos Dendias, saying that the goal is the creation of two domes, an anti-aircraft and an anti-drone dome, for which the sum of 2 billion euros has been committed.
Nikos Dendias emphasized to the Economic Post that our defense ecosystem contributes to the GDP the negligible, as he characterized it, 0.74% and added that Greece buys equipment from abroad “to be able to maintain our independence, our territorial integrity , and to do this we must be at least in a phase that allows us to respond to the challenges of our environment”.
He also appeared extremely optimistic that Greece will manage to create an ecosystem of defense industries, which will be able to produce innovative products to meet the existing and recorded needs of the Greek Armed Forces.
“As you know, Greece – I always say – is not Luxembourg, not everyone is our friend next door, they don’t throw carnations at us. You look at the shipbuilding program of, for example, our neighbor Turkey. Look at our neighbor Turkey’s drone program. We must have a reasonable response to them. I’m not saying let’s get into a competition of who will be first. We want to defend ourselves, but to be able to have a deterrent option,” he said.
In a related question, the Minister of Defense said that technologies and capabilities were found in the ODA that, if developed, will surprise us all, but added that there was a complete lack of connection with the Greek armed forces and the defense ecosystem.
Furthermore, he characterized the Constellation program, which we are co-designing with the USA, as a huge opportunity, which provides for the production of frigates in Greek shipyards and service for ships in the Mediterranean, the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. “So, we are talking about a job that will take 60-70 years in our shipyards”, he added
