The Greek edition of ProNews claims that, according to the information available to the editors, the United States offered Greece to send the Russian S-300PMU1, Tor-M1 and OSA-AKM air defense systems in service with the country to Ukraine, and in return receive 49 Black Hawk helicopters.
A proposal to supply Ukraine by the beginning of autumn with all Russian anti-aircraft systems S-300PMU1, Tor-M1 and OSA-AKM of Greek production was submitted by the United States to Athens in the amount of $2.2 billion. At the same time, a similar offer was made to Cyprus in relation to Tor-M1 and Buk-M1, although the amount promised to the Cypriots in Washington is unknown, the newspaper reports. Pronews.
According to Greek authors, the Greek National Guard is armed with two (2) Buk-M1-2 batteries, Buk-M1-2 are medium-range self-propelled anti-aircraft systems. In this case, the transfer of the OSA-AKM anti-aircraft complex can begin immediately.
This amount will be used to finance the delivery of transport helicopters to Greece. UH-60 Blackhawkbehind which is a well-known arms dealer who also appears in the purchase of MH-60 anti-submarine helicopters (and is known for his involvement in the General Staff of the Hellenic Army Α/ΓΕΕΘΑ K. Floros, who was followed by the NSA under the code 519C) and the purchase of Israeli anti-aircraft systems.
The US is “fighting” to get weapons, especially anti-aircraft, for Ukraine, since the losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces from Russian missiles and aircraft are high, and Western anti-aircraft weapons are being supplied “drop by drop” by France, Germany, Britain and Italy, but more importantly, the training of Ukrainians takes too much time. At least a year of training is required to train Ukrainian operators of operational anti-aircraft weapons. At the same time, the number of losses among them is very high.
While the Greek weapons, Russian-made, are familiar to Ukrainians, and especially the S-300PMU1 are at a higher level than the Ukrainian S-300, produced under the USSR.
However, the factor of time during which this exchange will take place should also be noted. Time in the sense of how simultaneously the replacement of the S-300 will take place, mainly the main one, and the rest of the systems.
This is because the Greek Army cannot afford to deprive the Southeast Aegean of the protection of the S-300PMU-1 until the arrival of the Israeli systems that will replace them. But on the other hand, the Ukrainians want them immediately … now. The Armed Forces of Ukraine are in a borderline situation in terms of air defense (and not only, of course) and require Russian air defense systems immediately.
How will this problem be solved? Only if the Israelis deliver theirs at the same time. Feasible? Extremely difficult, if not impossible, when it comes to new systems.
Therefore, the most likely scenario is that the “weakest link”, i.e. Greece, notoriously easily succumbing to pressure, will once again, for the umpteenth time, be pressured to hand over Russian systems now with a promise to deliver other systems as soon as possible. When? Unknown, but ASAP…
It’s safe to say that the DoD will resort to various tricks to overcome this particular hurdle.
So, they will transfer the Patriot battery to Crete to say that this gap is temporarily closed, and for the islands they will say that there will be a “relocation” of existing V-SHORADS systems, etc. (perhaps moving some Crotales) so that there is no gap in the air defense.
A spring and summer counter-offensive with Russian Air Force flying over Ukrainians is very difficult to pull off, and Greece is the only country that can supply Ukrainians with both long-range and anti-aircraft weapons like SHORADwhich, in the case of the Tor-M1, has anti-ballistic and anti-ship missile capabilities.
In connection with the above, it seems that the joint acquisition of two Israeli systems – Spyder from Rafael Defense Systems and Barak 8 LRAD & ER from IAI – is a significant advantage. These are old systems, but “on paper” they still work.
Thus, the Americans are asking to supply 38 Osa-AK / Osa-AKM systems (SA-8 Mod-0 / 1 Gecko), 25 TOR-M1 (SA-15 Gauntlet) and two S-300PMU-1 (SA-20) systems from Greece and corresponding systems from Cyprus.
The Americans, in addition to American used helicopters, which they put “in a package” to strengthen the Air Force and naturally “a little bit in the pocket” of some friendly representatives and senior officers associated with them, propose, since they themselves do not have similar systems, to replace the S-300PMU1 with IAI’s Barak 8 LRAD and Barak 8 ER, which, however, allegedly have a range of only 100 km, thus improving the protection range provided by the S-300PMU1 by 50 km.
More importantly, with the withdrawal of the OSA-AKM (SA-8b Gecko) short-range anti-aircraft systems from the islands, they cannot be replaced by another proposed Spyder MR / LR anti-aircraft system that is not of the SHORAD class, and it is also impossible that the Israelis allowed its deployment on the islands (as was the case with the BMP-1 / Marder-1A3 when Germany opposed it), but this will lead to a serious deterioration in relations with Turkey, since their range is higher than that of Russian systems and is about 60-80 km.
And experience shows that, as in the case of the Turkish veto and the threat of war from Turkey over the Cypriot S-300s, Greece and Cyprus are the losers. Therefore, the withdrawal of 38 Osa-AK / Osa-AKM air defense systems (SA-8 Mod-0 / 1 Gecko) from the islands of the Eastern Aegean will simply leave them unprotected on the battlefield in terms of missile defense, where only ASRAD and 4 km portable Stingers will remain.
This proposal was enthusiastically accepted by General Floros, under whose supervision the islands of the Eastern Aegean will be left without weapons (BMP-1, OSA-AKM, Stinger, etc.). But at least he endowed his daughters…
National Defense Secretary Nikos Panagiotopoulos (also known as the “thug” based on Α/ΓΕΕΘΑ supporting K. Floros on the phone) has all but disappeared, and K. Mitsotakis always says yes to the Biden administration’s proposals, even before they will be worded.
But let us say something: After the deterioration of relations with Russia, the maintenance of Russian weapons has become a difficult task. Let’s not forget that Mitsotakis declared war on Moscow…
The opinion of the authors of the ProNews edition may not coincide with the opinion of the editors.
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