What was unofficial said a couple of days ago, now it seems to be the official position of Greece: we are in undeclared war with Turkey over the Aegean. This bombshell was dropped by Alternate Defense Minister Fotis Kouvelis asked to comment on the latest Turkish provocation in which Ankara claimed to have sent commandos to take down a Greek flag form an islet in the Aegean Sea.
“The Ministry of Defense is aware of the news about [Turkish PM Binali] Yildirim’s statements that the Turkish coastguard has lowered the Greek flag from a rocky island in the Aegean Sea, Kouvelis said speaking to state broadcaster ERT.
“We are in an undeclared war in the Aegean,” he said commenting on the Mirage 2000 crash last week, where a pilot lost his life. “However, the order of our own forces for interceptions is done in such a way that we do not put our pilot’s in distress.”
On Saturday, a high-ranking officer of the Greek General Staff was quoted in the media as saying, “We do not expect any war in the Aegean. It has already begun and we already have our first dead.,” a high-ranking official at Greece’s General staff said following the crash of Mirage 2000 and the death of Greek Air force pilot Lt Giorgos Baltadoros off the island of Skyros on Thursday.
According to Sunday newspaper, realnews, the high-ranking officer of the Greek General Staff “Giorgos Baltadoros is the first human loss in this undeclared Greek-Turkish war of nerves but also of wearing down of human resources.” The official spoke on conditions of anonymity.
