The only reason Turkey would want a carrier would be to have the ability to strike at Greece from the Western side. But she can do that even now with the Air refueling assets that she has, without putting a truckload of money on a swimming target.

Greece with 2300 islands and close to 30 of them with their own landing strips, I do not think they need a floating target either. Greece needs the cover of a potential carrier i order to be able to support Cyprus, again the answer is Air Refueling assets, the bases on Crete and conformal tanks on F16s and maybe later EF2000s as well, for extended range.

MiG 29s in James Bond Golden Eye movie
Tiger helicopter in same movie
Vulcan strategic bomber in JB operation Thunderball

[QUOTE=calimero;1081155]Can someone ID the user of this L-39? The marking looks Georgian, but not quite. And also, AFAIK, Georgia doesn’t operate the Albatros.

Is it possible to be a Moldovan L39? Although I never heard of such a purchase….

Can someone provide a brief summary about the problems in Mirage-2000’s?

1.No money in the DoD budget
2.No money in the Goverment budget
3.No money in the state financial register……….

All the rest is BS for the masses…

Some more Greek views:

The Starfighter is often underrated. Still it is a very able aircraft and actually possesses a performance advantage over many aircraft. It is though not agile and cannot turn fast due to restricted wing area and maximum lift coefficient. A well guided Starfighter can easily catch its opponent by surprise and evade any counteraction, at least in a 1960-environment. The North Vietnamese would have been very happy with something like that as they used the MiG-21 mostly for hit and run ambushes.
Compared to the MiG-21 the Starfighter is faster, has more range, can carry more load, but lacks the forgiving handling characteristics of the -21, the better low speed handling and its better field performance.

I agree with the comment on the F104 being underrated. To quote a Greek F104 jokey, ” The Starfighter is one of the best fighters for low level flight (!!!) because when we turn we are not afraid of the wing hitting the ground (!!!).” Mind you that he meant it all the way, in the Hellenic Air Force, a squadron of the F104 had a nuclear strike role inside the NATO retaliation plans. Their role was to fly in single or two airplane flights very low inside the Pindus mountain ravins and over the Aegean Sea in order to stay out of radar detection and thus be able to strike back in case of war with the Soviet pact.

The way this government is reacting (not at all), I wouldn’t be surprise if nothing is bought for the next 2 years (just like nothing is bought for the last 3 years) and parallely trying to get some used ships from the US or Netherlands (or even Germany) introduce the used Marders as new APCs to the public and wait to buy F35s some time in the future. Thus in 4 years of government, they will throw away all the advantages gained over the main local adversary (Turkey)….
Stupidity knows no boundaries.

When you have to blame someone it is the government of Lebanon at first.
It is the responsebility of every government to keep away every harm of own people.
For that a government rules over all armed forces in a country.
The government is responsible for the safety of international borders. That is the task of the related border-guards or regular army.
By the way, the Lebanese goverment is still blamed by the UN not to fullfill that duty.
Let us assume the government of Lebanon was tricked by Hezbollah and be surprised. It is still the duty of that goverment to chase that Hezbollah-squad and free the hostages. At least it is the minimum to inform the UN about that.
Condem that incident in public and show good will to solve that problem.
Not doing the Lebanese had to face the consequences from that, which were known from international diplomatic channels in advance. Just for such case given by Israel to prevent such possible incidence through own military deterrence.
When not of short memory, that was not the first bloody border incident on an international border monitored by the UN.
The press pictures on both sides serve national intrests to strengthen the own role at first. At least that showed, that both sides did not use full force at hand. The damage and losses were/are triggered by Hezbollah and so have to be payed by that. Hezbollah is not a poor organisation, when we keep the money-value for its weaponary and payed personal in mind.
You may help the people in Lebanon or elswhere much more, when you blame the ones responsible for that. In that very case it is the goverment of Lebanon at first. Those are the ones, which sweared to prevent all harm from their people and do all for their well-being.
If the response of the Israeli goverment is a clever one is another question.

Sens, you still see things one way only. The Lebanese government’s duty is to protect the people of Lebanon. This means that if they are to blaim they should be blaimed for not defending lebanon against the Israeli aggression. But the problem is that Lebanon DOESN’T have a military to speak of. It is just a token police force that doesn’t have a chance to stand against Israel.
There is no place in the world where it is acceptable if a citizen of country A kidnaps a soldier of country B, then the military and political forces of country A either arest the kidnaper or allows the military of country B to get inside the borders and destroy the infrastructure and kill civilians of country A. THIS IS ONLY ALLOWED FOR ISRAEL. WHY? Do their lives worth more in the face of God or something? Also don’t youo see the conection with the timing for getting Syria and Iran in the game in order to through the blaim to them? I mean there have been dozens of incidents where israeli civilians got killed by Arab bombs and Israel held its horses and now for a mere kidnapping they let loose with everything they have? PLEASE!