In a wide-ranging interview, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsosakis said the current fleet of 24 Rafale fighter jets is ‘sufficient,’ reversing earlier plans to acquire up to 12 more newly built Rafales upgraded to the latest F4 standard, the avionist.com reported on Thursday.
Greece will not buy additional Dassault Rafale fighters and will operate only 24 aircraft as the current numbers are considered sufficient, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsosakis revealed in an interview to Defence Review. [*Correct is: Mitsotakis’ interview was to ALPHA TV on Nov 27. 2024.]
He also suggested that a reason could be Athens rather going for an additional 20 F-35 Lightning IIs, apart from the 20 it announced in July 2024 in a $3.5 billion deal.
The development is a near reversal of the plans reported since May 2024 to add 10 to 12 more Rafales of the F4 standard to the fleet of 24 initially ordered.
These 24 aircraft, which are all Rafales F3R, include second-hand sales from the Armée de l’Air et de l’Espace (French Air and Space Force) and newly built aircraft. The fleet comprises 18 single seater Rafale EG and six two-seater Rafale DG.
Among these aircraft there is also a batch ordered in Mar. 2022, which is scheduled to be delivered to the HAF (Hellenic Air Force) between Sep. 2024 to Jan. 2025. The plan to buy around a dozen more aircraft was to maintain force levels while retiring its older F-4 Phantom IIs, Mirage 2000-5 Mk.2, and some F-16s. The plans were also driven by the possible sale of the older Mirages to the IAF (Indian Air Force), which was also looking at Qatari Mirages, as per Greek and Indian reports.
