Greece will exercise the option purchase right
The decision to purchase a fourth French frigate Belh@rra from our country’s Navy after the successive provocations and threats of war from the neighboring Turkey should be considered as accepted.
In essence, our country will activate the right to purchase another state-of-the-art ship, based on the terms agreed between Athens and Paris. We remind you that we had decided to buy three frigates with an option for one more if we wished.
The General Staff of the Navy now deems it necessary to purchase the fourth FDI HN type ship, so it is expected to create a flotilla of Belh@rra frigates that have full interoperability with the French Rafale fighters that our country is gradually acquiring, “locking” with this way every hostile movement in the sky and sea of the Aegean.
According to sources from the Ministry of National Defense, the fact that the French will deliver the first two frigates to us within 2025, i.e. in record time and much earlier than the planned schedule, contributed to the fact that the decision to purchase a fourth frigate was made so immediately. The third frigate is expected to be launched in the Greek seas in 2026 and if everything goes well in the same year or at the beginning of 2027 at the latest, the fourth will arrive as well.
The Belh@rra frigate has high capabilities in every type of battle: anti-ship, anti-aircraft and anti-submarine. It ensures defense against air or ground attack with the most modern sensors, including Thales’ Seafire, which is the first all-digital multi-function radar with an active antenna and fixed panels.
It is also equipped with a single fully integrated mast that has all airborne sensors to achieve permanent 360° surveillance. As the first frigate on the market to have inherent protection against cyber attacks, it is equipped with two data-centers that host almost all of the ship’s applications.
It has a displacement of 4,500 tons, a length of about 122 m, a beam of 18 m, a maximum speed of 27 knots, it carries a 10-ton helicopter and a VTOL unmanned vehicle, and its main weapons are MBDA Aster missiles, MBDA Exocet MM40 B3C missiles.
76 mm gun, Naval Group MU 90 torpedoes, Naval Group CANTO countermeasures, RAM missile system and ‘Sea Fire’ multi-function digital radar.
