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This stupid little cold war between Greece and Turkey has to end. It's not affordable to Greece to waste so much money on it year after year when super-cheap diplomacy is the alternative.
Greece is member of Lisbon Treaty, its article 42 is an alliance provision. An attack by Turkey means all EU members are obliged to defend Greece. Yes, even the Austrians Their opinion on this matter is irrelevant, for they ratified the treaty and are bound by it.
To end this stupid little cold war requires one major EU country to have not completely useless politicians in charge. The Greeks should propose the plan to elevate Article 42 Lisbon treaty to general knowledge, then the Turks commit a single provocation of any kind (such as airspace violation), then said not completely useless politicians react to it as they would react to an incursion by Iran into turkey: Send a couple fighters and a SAM battery. Dare the Turks to repeat the provocation and if they do, shoot down that aircraft or bomb that territorial waters-invading ship.
Gloves off, skipped gloves on - just as Turkey did with the Russians, shooting down a Russian jet that invaded Turkish airspace for a few seconds only.
They will understand and Europe will have its alliance lifted from paper tiger to living alliance. Greece can henceforth reduce its military spending to 1% GDP while being safer than on its status quo trajectory.
And now for something completely different:
Did I ever mention that our politicians are completely useless pussies?
related:
/2009/12/greek-fiscal-troubles-and-military.html
/2014/08/if-western-great-power-gaming-wasnt-so.html
/2015/02/the-miracle-of-greeces-defence-spending.html
/2017/12/that-stupid-little-cold-war.html
I get your point, but just because some treaty is signed doesn't mean it'll be honored when the time comes. I'd rather put my trust in an actual national military than in some vague treaty the average european probably doesn't even know about.
ReplyDeleteTurkey is the biggest threat to the greeks and they are preparing to face it if necessary, cowardly politicians would babble about both being NATO members and the Lisbon Treaty being a perfect infallible shield and use that as an excuse to cut military spending.
I do agree that provocations should be met with deadly force from time to time, so tired of everyone pussying out and airspace violations etc. being so normalized, no wonder no one takes europe seriously.
My point was that an alliance on paper that almost nobody knows about is a dead alliance.
DeleteAn alliance that's called to widespread public knowledge and acted on is an effective alliance.
It's possible to do so far short of going to actual war.
An effective and powerful alliance reduces the national need to spend on the military (even though idiotic propaganda made many people think the opposite is true).
But even if you make it public knowledge, and you do find that one politician with the balls to get unpleasant shit done, would you risk your countries security by relying on other european politicians to not pussyfoot around and make excuses?
DeleteBecause if the turks retaliate I'm pretty sure I know how german politicians would react. They would call for calm and negotiations and then when ignored they'd repeat those offers ad infinitum without ever actually doing anything. Not to forget that getting involved also destabilizes our domestic situation because of how well integrated everyone is...
Thats not to say it's impossible that europe helps but if I were greek, I would never trust some piece of paper. For your suggestion to work you would need leaders with balls in many countries and the way our systems work is purposefully designed to prevent that.
GDP ratio: x8
Deletepopulation ratio: x8.
%GDP public debt: 146
It's about time to stop being delusional.
Greece's security lies in its European allies, whether that's comfortable or not.
Very small powers don't get to secure themselves, period.
Could they successfully fight a total war with Turkey? No, probably not, but if they don't have meaningful defenses, then Turkey could move in, take an Island and present it as fait accompli, would all of europe go to war over a small island right off the turkish coast? No they wouldn't, they would dither and make excuses.
DeleteYes, you are right in that alliances are very important and should perhaps even be strengthened but massively scaling back your armed forces and counting on the alliance is very shortsighted especially if we look at the destabilizing global situation. You need a credible way to defend what is yours or someone will just take it, see Crimea.
Debt to GDP is a real problem, but skimping on defense just leads to you funding the occupiers armed forces, you'll pay either way.
We frequently send Patriot batteries and such as gesture of willingness to defend to NATO allies, including Turkey.
DeleteThe Greeks have not yet made use of this.
Have a Greek head of government visit Germany, France, UK, Spain, Italy and on press conference standing next to their heads of state talk about Turkish provocations and violations of Greek airspace and territorial waters for decades, demanding that they signal their willingness to live up to their Lisbon Treaty Art. 42 obligation by sending a symbolic Patriot battery of flight of fighters.
I'm pretty sure they didn't try this. This in turn means they didn't try the smart and cheap method, but readily threw away dozens of %GDP since 1992 for that stupid little cold war.
Look at Sanchez (Spain). He appears to have some balls. Macron (France) wants to play great power, but doesn't get the mil spending boost that Scholz got. He may pick up a cheap opportunity to play protective great power. Look at Poland, which clearly is interested in strengthening alliance ties. They cannot spare SAM batteries, but they can spare fighters. Quite the same with Denmark - they, too, want to strengthen alliance ties and could push Lisbon Treaty 42 to public perception.
Yet the Greek government does not appear to try this at all. I also don't remember them effectively calling attention to the topic in their last EU Council presidency in 2014.
Fair enough, you make some good points, but I'd still be wary of not being able to put up a fight by myself.
DeleteEspecially your fixation on lowered spending could end up being an issue, money buys materiel and I'd rather europeans spend iron than blood, we have too little of that already. Though of course you can take that one too far, balance is preferred, I just believe one percent will leave you shortchanged if things ever do go hot.
Good discussion, thanks for the taking the time to answer :)
It is true that greece could and should rely on its nominal european allies more. I can understand why they are determined to do it alone. I wonder if they spent any thought on the drone heavy way of fighting to make any turkish aggression really painful.
ReplyDelete"painful" is not enough deterrence against people like Putin or Erdogan. You need to convince them that they would fail.
DeleteThe Greek military is hardly doing this now, its air and naval power could be crashed by a surprise attack and Greece could not withstand in a long war.
Thus I conclude that the risk of Greek allies intervening and the domestic instability in Turkey are today already the decisive parts of deterrence in the Aegean.
Didn't Turkey and Greece fight over Cyprus in the 70s when both were NATO like now? Study that to draw conclusions. Alternatively, instigate Turkey on Israel. They have failed to protect the petrodollar so let's make those desert wanderers useful again.
ReplyDeleteThe Treaty of Lisbon entered into force late in 2009.
DeleteTurkey didn't attack Greece during the invasion of Cyprus in 1974 and Cyprus has never been a NATO member.