The Minister of National Defence Nikos Dendias attended today, Tuesday July 1st, the oath taking ceremony of six Reserve Second Lieutenants, holders of a PhD Degree, who completed a 6-month service as Potential Reserve Officers held at the Hellenic Center for Defence Innovation (HCDI).
It should be noted that the legislation now provides for the performance of the mandatory military service for holders of a PhD Degree on any field of technology (Informatics, Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Chemical Engineering, New Technologies – Artificial Intelligence, Finance and Business Administration, Biology – Molecular Biology and Genetics and Automation Engineering) as Potential Reserve Officers as soon as they complete their basic training.
The ceremony that was held at the HCDI premises was honoured by the presence of the Chief HNDGS General Dimitrios Choupis, the General Director of Defence Investments and Armaments Major General Ioannis Bouras, the HCDI’s CEO Pantelis Tzortzakis, as well as the Director of HNDGS/F Staff Directorate Major General Georgios Panousis. The ceremony was also attended by Senior Officers, members of the Civilian Personnel, as well as members of the Reserve Second Lieutenants’ families.
In his address, the Minister of National Defence noted the following:
“What one says on such occasions goes beyond the formalistic pleasant things; it is a great pleasure and honour for me, because honestly Ladies and Gentlemen, Chief of HNDGS, Generals, Officers, this is a new consideration of things that we are attempting and I think it is the only way of survival for our Country.
Your Eminence, you know better than we do that the country is facing a threat. We are not one of these countries that are fortunate in that they have a safe life, with what is heard for NATO, for defence expenditure, being merely a debate that concerns only a few.
For us, modernization, the great reform, constitutes an essential condition for our survival. And unfortunately there is a difficult parameter: the threat is posed by someone who is ten times larger than we are and spends 10 times more on defence that we do. Therefore, we have to create and trigger capabilities out of the deficit of the Greek taxpayer. And the minds of young people that have a good knowledge of new technologies is precisely the main driver for amplifying capabilities.
It is an entirely novel approach for Greece, an innovative one I believe for most countries on earth; however, Pantelis Tzortzakis, I am confident that this will work together with the help of experience of older generations (and I am referring to you), as well as of Officers who provide their services at the Hellenic Center for Defence Innovation, and I think that we can create an entirely new reality for the Armed Forces.
As well as another reality for the Greek economy. Because this example may lead to the creation of export products and contribute to the remedy of the Greek economy’s timeless failure that consists in the external balance.
Greece has always been exporting less than it imports. That too, its remedy is also a national duty.
I wish you once again every success in your career Ladies and Gentlemen.”
On his part, HCDI’s CEO stated the following:
“It is great honour and pleasure for all of us to be here today and we are also particularly honoured by the presence of the Minister, the Chief HNDGS and other Staff Officers. HCDI constitutes a collective effort that would not exist without the support and inspiration of these people; and we exist for the benefit of our Country, in order to be able to move two steps ahead as a country.
At this point, if you ask me which one is our most important breakthrough, I would say that the most important breakthrough is these young people. And practically this is due to the fact that we had the opportunity to combine the operational knowledge of the Armed Forces’ officers with the fresh scientific knowledge of those people. And this combination has led to amazing results.
I will say one thing only, because everything else is in the newspapers, in the published invitations to tenders, etc.
I will say one thing only: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs approached us with a list of hundreds of people living abroad, specialized in several sectors of diaspora. And we said: how we will be able to evaluate them? To find the most important ones based on the work we are doing here? And then, a colleague appeared – one of those young people – who developed with the help of artificial intelligence – since many people talk about AI, but these people actually use it – a LLM, collected all the CVs of those people, all their papers and publications and came up with this: as regards sensors, those are the experts. For the X thematic area, those are the ones. And this has been an amazing help for us.
What I want to say is that this is a new way of thinking that reshapes the Armed Forces and Minister, thank you for giving us the pleasure to do so”.
