Greece and Nuclear Weapons: An Assessment

This paper tries to answer the question on whether the acquisition of nuclear capabilities will serve the interest of the Greek state. The issue is approached by the exploration of Greek strategic constraints in correlation with the properties of nuclear weapons and the indexing and examination of the most important incentives and disincentives that influence a state’s decision to develop nuclear capabilities. Then, the Greek case is analyzed through the theoretical framework that was presented by Nuno P. Monteiro & Alexandre Debs in 2014, in order to examine if the process of developing weapons is a worthwhile endeavor based on its effects on Greek security. It is concluded that the development of nuclear weapons would serve the Greek interests, but there are practical reasons that render it nearly impossible for the foreseeable future.


Introduction
Turkish aggression since 1973 constitutes a constantly present challenge for Greek strategic thinkers.
However, Turkey's great nuclear program coupled with the development of limited accuracy medium range missiles, only suitable for delivering WMD, create the fear of nuclear blackmail to Greece and thus advance the threat to an even higher level. This development of a Turkey with nuclear capabilities generates a great opportunity to discuss a possible Greek development of nuclear weapons as a reaction to Turkey or even as a remedy for the recurring Greek strategic problems.
The following paper tries to answer the question on whether the acquisition of nuclear capabilities will serve the interest of the Greek state. 3 In the first section some general observations on Greek strategic constraints are formulated; then, in the second section, the subject is approached based on the literature of international relations, by the examination of the most important incentives and disincentives that influence a state's decision to develop nuclear capabilities. In the final section the Greek case is researched through the method that was presented by Monteiro & Debs (2014). With Turkish revisionism constantly unravelling for decades, the Turkish aims to advance in a global power status through a strategy which contains the use of coercive diplomacy to challenge the status quo in land, air and sea, the Greek state is facing two options of grand strategy: appeasement and balancing. The option of appeasement is rejected, since Turkey does not have limited aims and will interpret any concessions as weakness. When these concessions finally stop, war will follow. As a result, balancing is a one-way street (Platias, 1995). The basic component of this strategy is, as Platias (1995: 49) highlights, the "adoption of credible deterrence, that makes the cost of possible extension of Turkey against Greece higher than the expected benefit". The Turkish aspirations will not be bent overnight and success lies on the credible demonstration that Greece is capable of surviving a protracted exhaustive competition until Turkey realizes that the cost of its strategy surpasses the benefit and then cooperation will follow.

General observations on Greek strategy and its constraints in correlation with the Greco-
The balance of power between the two states is worrying for Greek strategic thinkers since they face important constraints. Some of these constraints concern the population, the geography and the economic resources. The Turkish economy is one of the biggest 20 of the globe with 1.28 trillion dollars GDP while Greece has 231.21 billion dollars GDP (World Bank, 2021;OECD, 2021). As a by-product of the Greek economic crisis the balance of power has worsened against Greece, thus reducing its deterrence capability since it refrained from armaments for almost a decade. The growing power gap between the two states is evident in the figures 1 and 2.  1970 1972 1974 1976 1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000  2002  2004  2006  2008  2010  2012  2014  2016  2018  2020 Greece Turkey

Population
In addition, in the distribution of power one should take into consideration the demographic data where Turkey prevails over Greece with a 1:8 ratio which is projected to deteriorate even more, considering the ageing Greek population, the low birth rate in Greece in contrast to the younger Turkish population and its rising birth rate.
The above picture is reflected clearly in the armed forces. The almost 1:5 ratio in armed forces personnel (excluding the Turkish paramilitary forces) makes Greece vulnerable to surprise attacks and extended strategies of attrition (Platias, 1991

Geography
The Hellenic space (Greece and Cyprus) is a hard one to defend and creates a problem in all theaters of war with Turkey (Platias, 1991: 96). The Aegean islands are located very close to Turkey. As  1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008   Conventional arm races also, become pointless because a conventional victory is irrelevant when nuclear forces are in play (Waltz 2002).
The Greek state would have solved its greatest security problem, since it would have achieved to cancel the Turkish strategy whether this is war against Greece or as Ifestos (1992: 122) puts it "the fulfillment of interim aims, the total cumulative result of which will be equivalent to Greece losing the war." In the first case, war is out of the picture since any benefit obtained from a Turkish attack would not be enough to outweigh the cost of the nuclear destruction. In the second case one might argue that the low-level threats cannot be countered with nuclear weapons and a conventional and more flexible response is needed and as result high conventional expenditure should be maintained.
Such a policy is harmful because it shifts the reliance from deterrence to conventional forces making war more possible. On the contrary, the more credible a picture of annihilation is, the more the attacker gets deterred from executing its plans. This includes also the low-level threats because the opposing side will be convinced that after such action, escalation will follow, which of course leads us to the first case mechanism (Ifestos, 1992).
As Waltz (1981: 4-5) puts it "dissuasion by deterrence operates by frightening a state out of attacking, not because of the difficulty of launching an attack and carrying it home, but because the expected reaction of the attacked will result in one's own severe punishment". In this way the whole Turkish strategy would be canceled and all differences would be solved on the basis of international law and not by bilateral political negotiations with Ankara finding itself in a beneficial power position. In this event the Greek interest would have been served. However, returning to reality, one can observe that Greece does not have the capability to proceed in the most favorable for its interests, since Turkey knows that time is on its side, is convinced that it will not act (Ifestos, 1992) and feels comfortable with its superiority in the conventional setting. In other words, the cost that Greek threats bear is not dissuasive enough. The process of developing nuclear weapons is a difficult one and in the next two sections the existence or absence of the incentives and disincentives that influence a decision of nuclearization will be examined.

Encouraging Factors -Incentives
The literature of International Relations contains a series of incentives that positively affect the decision of a state to proceed in the development of nuclear weapons. 4 The most significant are the following: 1. Nuclear Threat from rival country Theoretically, Greece -like every other member of NATO -finds itself facing the possibility of involvement in a nuclear war between the alliance and Russia. The above does not constitute an excuse for the creation of independent nuclear deterrence since Greece finds itself under the American "nuclear umbrella".

Developing nuclear threat
There is a consensus that Turkey holds a medium nuclear predisposition and that it creates an option for the future in case of a change in the security environment (Dokos, 2001;Platias, 1986;Kibaroglu, 2014). Although Kibaroglu (2014) claims that unless Iran proliferates nuclearization could come in the next generation, the Turkish nuclear program worries the United States, with clauses in the agreements signed by Turkey enabling Uranium enrichment and Plutonium production through reprocessing coupled with the development of medium range missiles of low accuracy only suitable for WMD (Oikonomou, 2017). Such a development would make Greece hostage to Turkish nuclear blackmail.
5. Important regional power status aspirations It is estimated that there is no such aspiration from the Greek side. The aims of Greece are only limited to protection from Turkish revisionism and the protection of the security of the Hellenic population.
6. Pursuit of military superiority and 7. Blackmail of (non-nuclear) rival country The military superiority deriving from nuclear weapons would armor Greece and allow for the exercise of all rights deriving from international law leaving only the dispute regarding the delimitation of EEZ and continental shelf to be pending. Probably a blackmail for military solution of the Cyprus issue could be feasible but we do not think that Greece would opt for it.

Geographical proximity with a region characterized by nuclear proliferation tendencies
Greece is neighboring with the Middle East where nuclear proliferation is present (Israel, Pakistan, Iran intention). It constitutes an incentive because alliances are not stable in the international system and the proliferation may affect the structure of the regional strategic environment (Platias, 1986).
9. Improvement of bargaining position in a defensive alliance The Greek state does not aspire to affect the grand strategy of NATO since it only wishes to protect the security of the Greek nation.

Pursuit of independence
A state that relies upon its own power (internal balancing) rather than that of its allies (external balancing) (Waltz,1981) becomes politically and militarily more independent. The limitation of dependence is a constant aim for Greek foreign policy (Platias, 1991

Pursuit of international recognition
Greece already possesses enough due to its contribution to global civilization. Nuclearization would not offer anything more.
12. and 13. Morale boosting and modernization demonstration Nuclearization could boost Greeks' morale but this does not constitute a serious reason for entanglement in such a demanding endeavor.
14. Reduction of (conventional) defense expenditures Given the condition of the Greek economy a reduction in the defense budget would be desirable.
However, until nuclear weapons become operationally ready not only the conventional expenditure should remain in the current levels, but they must rise because when the Greek nuclear aspiration would be revealed the threat of possible sudden preventive strike must be deterred (Platias, 1986). In essence it is about an investment that dictates a large short-term expenditure over a future drastic reduction. Regardless of the economic feasibility there is a great desirability. In table 1 it is observed that the Greek state has the second, third and fourth -in order of importance -nuclearization incentives in addition to three of medium importance and one of low. Based on the above it can be said that Greece has a high nuclearization predisposition.

Discouraging Factors -Disincentives
There are, of course, important disincentives that have to also be considered. Theoretical and empirical studies have referred to the following deterring factors: 5

Alliance with a nuclear power
The Greek state is allied to the USA and France. This alliance operates as a deterrent for two reasons.
Given the intention of the nuclear club members to prevent horizontal proliferation, the obstacle that Greece (as well as Turkey) should overcome is important. There are two possibilities: increase of the political, military and economic cost of nuclearization (Platias, 1986) and withdrawal of the nuclear and any conventional coverage from Greece (Platias, 1986;Monteiro & Debs, 2014).

Possible nuclearization of the opponent
It is almost certain that if Greece manages to nuclearize first, Turkey will follow. This does not constitute a problem since the present situation finds Turkey in a position of power with a prospect of that deviation broadening in the long term. With the nuclearization of the two states, war will bring about mutually unacceptable costs and the need for a modus operandi will arise with international law becoming the primary tool since balance of power will be present.

International legal obligations
Greece is a member of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. On the one hand, each member state can legally withdraw from the treaty, under the "supreme national interest" clause, if it gives three months' notice (Sagan, 1996). On the other hand, this does not stop other nuclear states from delivering an embargo on goods, arms and on nuclear fuel and technology. The arms embargo will deteriorate the Greek conventional capabilities. This embargo could also be paralyzingly costly for the nuclear program unless Greece possesses uranium under its soil (Tsipis, 1986). The economic cost of sanctions shall also be taken into consideration since Greece is fairly integrated into the global economy (Singh &Way,2004;Bleek 2010)  shares no sovereignty with the member states regarding Nuclear Weapons Greece will be infringing Article 3 of TEU if the Security Council deems its nuclear program threating to international peace.
As a result, Greece should at least face financial fines under the processes described in Articles 258 and 260 of TFEU regarding the infringement of the treaty. Nevertheless, due the importance of the issue, and the sanctions imposed against North Korea and Iran from the EU, the member states will probably move to further action. However, Greece can temporarily avoid being affected by simply developing 'a latent nuclear capability' that brings the state closer to nuclear weapons without having to bear the cost of full nuclearization (Platias, 1986). In case of change in the security environment (Turkey's nuclearization), Greece might be more willing to bear that cost. It must be also noted that sanctions rarely have a deterring importance and usually do not restore the status quo ante (Platias, 1986;Doxey, 1971;Galtung, 1967;Wallensteen, 1968;Adler-Karlsson, 1968).

Possibility of sudden preemptive strike
The possibility of such an attack on Greek nuclear facilities from Turkey is of course very high, since Greek nuclearization eliminates Turkey's conventional superiority and cancels its revisionist strategy.
As a result, the decision must be taken considering the capabilities of the country to deter or even withstand such an attack. Due to the growing imbalance of power between the two states this factor has crucial influence.

Reputation of peaceful country
Greece seeks such a reputation and the possession of nuclear weapons is incompatible with this reputation. (Platias, 1986).

Internal opposition
In Greece opposition by some parties and actors shall be expected. If those come from pressure groups with strong reach on the government they might lead to a negative decision (Platias, 1986). However public discussion about nuclear weapons and not energy could cause dangerous international reactions. (Tsipis, 1986). It must be considered that in Greece albeit the political divisions, parties tend to formulate a consensus over issues regarding national security.

Economic and technological incapability
Tsipis (1986) claims that if Greece decided to create a nuclear arsenal would be in a position to do so. The economic cost would indeed be high with the direct cost for human resources, infrastructure and development of weapons nearing 1 billion dollars and the opportunity cost for the Greek conventional capabilities will be much higher. Greece is a country in large debt and under fiscal vol. 2 | no. 2 | December 2021 182 scrutiny. The ideal scenario would be to spend enough on conventional forces to deter a Turkish preventive war while devoting the required resources to the nuclear program. However, resources are limited and conventional deterrence capability is a prerequisite. The opportunity cost corresponds to the deprivation of resources from the defense industry which is needed to limit the dependence on foreign suppliers (Platias, 1992) and thus preserving the conventional deterrence capability by providing resilience to an arms embargo. The defense industry will also enhance the conventional deterrence capability by mobilising all the available war material, by producing armaments based on the Greek operational needs and by saving generous amounts that would otherwise go to imports of expired spare parts (Platias, 1992). As shown by table 2 and the above analysis, a factor of high and two factors of medium importance exist. The problem is that the sanctions of the allies, apart from the restriction in the access of goods, will most importantly destroy the network of external balancing that Greece has built. They will stop the supply of nuclear fuel (Tsipis 1986) and the access to armaments of which Greece is almost totally dependent since it has a weak defense industry. As a result, the Greek state would be vulnerable to a preemptive strike or even war which Turkey does not hesitate to declare that will wage for the issue of the territorial waters which is of a relatively less importance. Albeit the great nuclear predisposition that Greece presents, the current balance of incentives and disincentives shows that the development of nuclear weapons would not benefit Greece. For the endeavor to be fruitful the cost of factor 1,3 and 4 should be mitigated. Level of security threat: is the likelihood of future conflict between a country and its adversaries, as evaluated by a country's decision makers.

Security benefit of proliferation:
refers to the magnitude of the shift in the distribution of capabilities that nuclear acquisition would produce vis-à-vis the state's adversaries.

Nuclear status
2 Proliferator's relative power reflects the balance of military power vis-à-vis its adversaries.
Cost of preventive war corresponds to the value of the total resources destroyed by both sides in a preventive war. 3 Cost of a nuclear program corresponds to the value of the material resources necessary to develop nuclear weapons 4 Level of an ally's commitment to the state's defense: first measures whether a powerful state is allied to the potential proliferator (either formally or informally) and, if such an alliance exists, tries. to capture the reliability of its commitment to the defense of the proliferator.
Starting with the independent variables (1) the level of security threat is extremely high taking into consideration that (2) Greece has relatively less power than Turkey. (3) The economic cost, as presented in the previous section, is very heavy but not unaffordable in comparison with the expected benefit for Greece's security through the acquisition of nuclear weapons. (4) As mentioned above and also claimed by the writers of the theory indicating that when the protected ally, Greece in particular, is less powerful than its adversaries then it will suffer the threat of the withdrawal of any support for its nuclearization to be prevented (Monteiro & Debs, 2014). Moving to the intervening variables, for nuclearization to be achieved the security benefits of proliferation must exceed the cost of preventive war. At the moment this does not happen as it was foretold. The larger the imbalance of power the larger the threat to the security and consequently the benefit of nuclearization. However, a greater imbalance of power reduces the cost of preventive war for the adversary. As Monteiro & Debs (2014: 26) state "Nuclear weapons are the weapons of the weak but the weak cannot get them". Through this theoretical framework the results of our first analysis are confirmed. Greece cannot develop nuclear weapons unless it first makes the cost of preventive war unbearable and thus dissuasive for Turkey.

Conclusions
Based on the above analysis it can be concluded that the acquisition of nuclear weapons would serve the Greek interests, since it would provide the undisputed and utmost deterrence capability thus resolving the security problems that Turkish revisionism with its coercive strategy creates. Despite this fact, Greek nuclearization is hindered by the opposition of its allies and the cost of a Turkish preventive war. To overcome this obstacle the cost of preventive war must be made unacceptable for Turkey using only conventional means and after their development, nuclear weapons will seal the Greek deterrence capability. This poses a great challenge since an enormous investment is needed in advance both for conventional armaments and the nuclear program before one can enjoy the fruits of nuclearization. The Greek state operates in a context of limited resources and a nuclear program corresponds to a great opportunity cost for the Greek defense industry. The path towards nuclearization runs through the Greek defense industry which, when developed, will enhance the conventional deterrence by making it independent of allied support, providing systems based on Greek operational needs and save resources that allow the secure nuclearization. In conclusion, Turkey seems to be developing a latent nuclear capability. Greece should follow suit in order to avoid becoming hostage to the Turkish nuclear threat, in case of a change in the environment regarding the horizontal proliferation of nuclear weapons. The creation of latent nuclear capability would make the benefits more tangible without the consequences of full nuclearization (Platias, 1986).