The decision was made about a month ago by the SAGE to acquire 76 AAV7 amphibious armored personnel carriers from the US stockpile, and the responsible US Defense Security Cooperation Agency in Washington approved their possible sale, opening a new era for the Greek marines who in recent times had essentially only been left with the inflatable boats, the 5 tankers and the 4 airships but essentially without any armor for landings on a fortified defensive beach.
It is undoubtedly a step, but much remains to be done and even bigger if we want to talk about the possibility of landings and not landings on the part of the Greek marines.
In the opinion of military and non-military with whom we spoke in the last few days, the necessary work should be done on the AAV7s to be received in order to avoid bad incidents like that of the sinking of such a tank in California in 2020, which as a result turned into "steel coffin" for 8 US Marines who drowned in it along with a nurse.
However, apart from amphibious armored vehicles, what is missing from the arsenal of the Greek marines, according to our experts, is at least a landing ship or other solutions for the rapid transport of armored vehicles and other material in the event of a mission to recapture a major island such as Lesvos or Chios. A "floating tank" (Landing Platform Dock/LPD) from which the amphibious armored personnel carriers can disembark after first being transported off the "target" island or airbed, would be a consideration as the existing low-speed tankers that have is in fact for sending aid. Of a second or third wave, that is.
Ships of this type are needed so that the tankers and existing large air carriers can carry the non-amphibious vehicles and armor that the Marines will need after landing. That is, since the coast has been occupied. They can also function as command centers for a landing on a defensively fortified beach.
Ships of this type are not unknown to the Greek navy and marines as in the past Greece had the infamous "Navkratousa" which was decommissioned on January 31, 2000.
If the authorities decided to do so, there are ships of this type that are to be retired from the US Navy, but anyway with the largest piece of the pie for the Navy having been taken by frigates, corvettes and other necessary systems for strike missions, there does not seem to be much left in the case of boats that will be needed in cases of landings.
Of course, for the acquisition of such a large ship, there is also a counter argument according to which, on the one hand, an LPD in particular will be a first-class target for the Turkish submarines that will be waiting for it to come out of Pagasitikos, which will have loaded the material of the marines, and on the other hand, the manning it will be a headache for the Navy which is already facing manning problems.
The same argument for such ships states that Greece does not need them as there are already sufficient forces on the islands and the truth is that if Greece loses an island the size of Lesvos it is very likely that everything has gone very wrong and it is time for diplomacy and not for recapture operations.
