The Minister of National Defence, Mr. Nikolaos Panagiotopoulos, declared the opening of the 3rd Land Forces Conference, on Thursday 7 November 2019, which is held at the premises of the Hellenic Army Academy in Vari, Attica.

The Conference is organized by the Hellenic Army General Staff in cooperation with the Institute of International Relations of Panteion University.

The opening ceremony of the conference was also attended by the Chief of Hellenic National Defence General Staff General Christos Christodoulou and the Chief of Hellenic Army General Staff Lieutenant General Georgios Kampas, as well as the Commander of U.S. Army Europe (USAREUR) Lieutenant General Christopher G. Cavoli.

The Minister of National Defence, in his address, stated the following:

“I am particularly pleased to be among you today, in this historical place of the Hellenic Army Academy, on the occasion of the organization of the 3rd Land Forces Conference. I would say that I tried, on a difficult day, with five previous commitments three of which are in the Hellenic Parliament, to attend this conference, mainly for three reasons:

Firstly, to address the personnel of the Hellenic Army Academy, the future of our country’s Armed Forces, for the first time. I am personally pleased for that.

Secondly, to point out the significance of this very important Conference, and of its topic, that is the importance and the invaluable contribution of Land Forces in military operations.

And thirdly, to honour also the presence of our foreign guests, in particular of the Commander of U.S. Army Europe.

So, I wish to highlight, how important it is that this conference is a joint activity of the Hellenic Army General Staff and the Institute of International Relations of Panteion University.

This is a conference which evolves into an institution and this synergy of the Military Academies with the academic community is one more field, which I think we should work to reinforce.

Events like this one have multiple and significant benefits for all of us and they are part of the constant outreach activities of the Ministry of National Defence towards the society, the academic community, as well as many national and international bodies.

In this spirit, I welcome our distinguished guests and our special analysts, looking forward to listening, with a strong interest, the conclusions which are expected to be drawn from their works.

It is a special honour for us that the Commander of the U.S. Army Europe participates, as keynote speaker, which renders respectively a particular importance to this conference and we, personally, thank him for that.

I believe that the topic which has been chosen by the Hellenic Army General Staff lies within the interests of all the services of the Armed Forces, since the Greek territory is a single theatre of operations.

More specifically, the multi-dimensional role of the Land Forces is proven both by the new form of warfare operations and the ways of dealing with security challenges, particularly with the new complex security challenges which emerge – I might say – more often than anywhere else, in the wider area surrounding our country and which waver among conventional, asymmetric and hybrid ones.

I cannot really imagine operations without the existence of land forces. The importance of land forces in the modern geostrategic environment remains unquestionable. It has been proven that the land forces contribute decisively to deterrence, guarantee the security and stability in the region and they are a pillar of power of the National Defence.

Yesterday, while I was observing the very successful exercise “Medusa 9” in which thousands of personnel and decades of components of the Armed Forces participated from three countries, Greece, Egypt and Israel, as you may know, I saw an exceptional variety of exercises by vessels of the Hellenic Navy, helicopters, fighting aircraft, chosen elements of the Special Forces.

The exercise was completed when the territory was occupied. Approximately fifteen vessels of the Navies of three countries operated (there was also a Cypriot patrol vessel), we watched parachute jumps, helicopters operating, overflights by fighting aircraft performing what they had been assigned to do as their mission. Finally, the territory was occupied when the Special Forces, the Land Forces stepped on it, and this is how the exercise ended.

So, it is primarily the Land Forces that establish the result of a conflict, whether this is about occupying a territory or defending a territory successfully.

The modern international environment is characterized by high uncertainty and instability and, therefore, by a rapid increase of security challenges. In this environment of fragile stability, Greece plays an important regional role by participating both in European and International Organisations and in bilateral and multilateral cooperations that it has established.

Moreover, regarding the wider region of Southeastern Europe and Eastern Mediterranean, this particularly sensitive part of the planet, in which, whenever peace prevailed, the whole world progressed and whenever it was in conflict the whole world suffered, allow me to add the following.

At this point, the Hellenic Armed Forces project their reliable deterrence force and they promote Greece’s stabilizing role across the world.

So, ladies and gentlemen, a new approach is required to conduct operations in a multidimensional and rapidly developing modern battlefield.

In this context, I am convinced that the opinions of our prominent speakers and the analyses of specific subjects will not only point out the importance of land operations for the Armed Forces across time, but they will give answers and produce fruitful conclusions for their development as well.

As a conclusion, before I pass the floor to the General and to our distinguished guests from abroad, I wish to express my satisfaction to the Hellenic Army General Staff and the Institute of International Relations of Panteion University for this effort.

Being certain that this event will be successful, I welcome you to the 3rd Land Forces Conference and I declare the opening of its works.

Thank you”.

Afterwards, the Minister of National Defence, regarding the attendance by the Commander of U.S. Army in Europe, Lieutenant General Christopher Cavoli, stated the following:

“Ladies and Gentlemen,

Honourable General Cavoli,

We are very delighted to have you with us, all of you, especially you, General,

We are looking into very fruitful and useful discussions on the impact of land forces in modern military operations.

Land forces have always been present in military warfare from the times of the Athenian hoplites, the Spartan warriors and the Macedonian phalanx. Now they have evolved into something different, but the end result, the final aim is the same, either to conquer ground or successfully defend ground and that’s where it all ends.

But, please, allow me to make another comment, sir. If you turn your head back, apart from the entire military leadership of our country, you will see the young cadets of our military academy. They are young men, strong, they love their country, very committed to that cause, they aspire to becoming a part of what is an excellent and glorious tradition of the Greek Armed Forces. Their mission in life is that now. And that what we are striving to do: make it easier for them to whatever it takes to make this mission worthwhile.

Throughout history, whenever our country, Greece has gone to war, it went to war with a numerical disadvantage. However, more often than not, Greece has won most of the wars it has been involved in, not because of the numerical disadvantage, but because of a distinct advantage in the quality of its personnel. And the quality of its personnel has to do with the military leadership, the officers of the Greek army, as well as the often unusual gallantry of the Greek soldiers in the battle. And that is an element that will not be broken and has never been broken throughout history, and will never be broken in the future as well.

Greece is standing by its allies. It has always stood by its allies, at least those allies that do not dispute our territorial rights and our sovereign integrity. We are building on the alliances with our strategic allies, most of all on our strategic alliance with the United States of America. We have fought alongside the USA, our men have bled alongside American soldiers in the wars that we fought and that is how it is going to be in the future as well.

We cherish our membership in those Alliances, we cherish being on the frontline of the western world, defending at times the integrity of the western world’s freedom and democracy.

And our goal as the political leadership of the Ministry of the Defence of Greece is to work jointly along with the military leadership of the Ministry of Defence of Greece in order to make sure to whatever it takes that this will go on happening.

We had to spend, some times, more that we can afford in order to maintain strong military presence, but we’ve done that and we are ready to do that in the future as well.

Our goal is to keep the excellent operational capability of our Armed forces. Greece is one of the few countries in Europe that maintain such a ready, well trained army in all types of warfare, all types of weapon systems. We are doing our best to keep our weapon systems up to date, with modern technology.

But, first and foremost, we have to do our best to keep the excellent standard of the quality of our personnel and these personnel are the men before you. I ask you to acknowledge that, I ask all of you to respect that and also respect the fact that this small country with its excellent military tradition over the centuries has stood sometimes as the watchers on the wall for the freedom of western world.

With those few words, sir, I welcome you to this conference, I wish everybody to extract many useful conclusions from this conference, I thank you all for being here and I hereby declare the official beginning of this conference.”