BFM Business: Greece buys 40 F-35s

On the BFM Business website, an article signed by Pascal Samama and titled: Fighter jets: Greece formalized its intention to buy 20 F-35s… and maybe 20 more states that after buying 24 Rafales (6 new and 18 used), Greece continues to modernize its warplane fleet.

A few days ago, at the NATO summit in Madrid, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced his intention to replace the aging F-16s with about twenty F-35s while considering the option of a second squadron of 20 aircraft.

Athens sent a letter to Washington to formalize its intention, specifying that deliveries should begin “in 2027 or 2028,” according to Reuters.

This letter is the starting point for a negotiation that could be “long-lasting” according to Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

“An F-35 sale to Greece could inflame Ankara, where there is growing rhetoric that the United States is using Greece as a pawn to control Turkey,” geostrategy expert Nicholas Danforth tells Breaking Defense.

It is noted, among other things, that President Biden, contrary to the position of Congress, declared in favor of the sale of F-16 to Ankara.

The acquisition of the F-35s raises another question, that of interoperability with the Rafales.

If from a strategic point of view, the two aircraft can be complementary, they are not fully compatible – the publication concludes, among other things.

Information from BFM Business
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