TSAMTO, July 22. The French company Dassault Aviation announced the ceremony of handing over the first multi-purpose fighter "Rafale" to the command of the Greek Air Force on July 21 at the Flight Test Center at the Istres Air Base.
The event was attended by the Minister of National Defense of Greece Nikolaos Panagiotopoulos and the head and Chief Executive Officer of Dassault Aviation Eric Trapier.
The transfer of the first aircraft took place six months after the signing of a contract for the supply of 18 fighters to the Greek Air Force. The transferred Rafale, as well as the next five aircraft from the French Air Force, will be used to train pilots and technical specialists of the Greek Air Force in France before being sent to the Tanagra Air Force Base.
The first group of pilots of the Greek Air Force, who were trained for several months as part of the French Aerospace Forces, and 50 technical specialists will continue their training at the Dassault Aviation Conversion Training Center (CTC) in Merignac (France).
As stated, the delivery of Rafale fighters demonstrates the success of Dassault Aviation's cooperation with the Greek Air Force over the past 45 years. The new fighter will be adopted after the Mirage F1 acquired in 1974, the Mirage-2000 in 1985 and the Mirage-2000-5 in 2000.
As reported by TSAMTO, in January 2021, Greece and France signed a contract for the supply of 18 multifunctional Rafale fighters from Dassault Aviation to the Greek Air Force, the cost of which was about 1.92 billion rubles. euro ($2.35 billion). Another 400 million euros are intended for the purchase of Meteor air-to-air missiles and the modernization of missiles in service with the Greek Air Force, including the Mika air-to-air missile system, the Scalp missile system and the Exocet anti-ship missiles, for use from the Rafale.
To reduce costs, the Greek Air Force ordered 6 new fighters and 12 aircraft from the French Aerospace Forces (10 single-seat and two double-seat). It is planned that the first 6 aircraft from the French Air Force will be transferred at a rate of one per month, starting from July 2021 (6 months after the signing of the contract), 6 new aircraft-by the 20th month after the conclusion of the contract, the remaining 6 aircraft from the French Air Force – by the 26th month (at the beginning of 2023).
In April of this year, information appeared about the intention of the Greek Defense Ministry to purchase an additional batch of Rafale fighters and increase the number of squadrons formed as part of the Greek Air Force to 24 units. Based on the purchase price of the first batch of aircraft, it is assumed that the purchase of 6 additional fighters will cost 800 million euros.
