It was an odd piece that covered the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for the Pentagon (Gen. Joseph Dunford). He was off on a visit to the Med and stopped in Greece. Basically, he laid out some strategy with some particular wording....to suggest that his visit to Greece might be geared to expand US relations and military 'cooperation')....then kinda hinged it to Libya and Syria.
Some political folks in Greece kinda hinted that they'd be open to this renewed situation.
So, you go back to the 1970s and 1980s, and look at what happened to the US-Greece military cooperation that dissolved.
Politically, the socialist agenda arrived in the 1960s and 1970s in Greece, with various episodes of turmoil. Most US military sites closed down, with the exception of the Crete Naval Base. For the past two decades, the Greeks have moved on and found newer and more significant things to worry about.
To reopen some site? I think the blunt statement to Turkey is that the US military might shut down Incirlik and just walk out.
What might be the US site? I might select the Rhodes Air Base site, which is near 8,000 ft in length, and a Greek military site for over thirty years. But to be honest, it'd need a ton of work done. And if you did move some US unit in....what? I can't see an entire fighter wing being put there. Being twenty kilometers away from Turkey? It's just inviting trouble.
The other site might be the old military airport at Larissa, which is a fairly rural area and far enough away from Turkey not to be considered hostile. Course, the same issue applies.....lots of funding to bring the site to some usable state.
The old Greek socialist agenda accepting of Americans? Well...I think the general public went through the economic crisis and now looks over the socialist agenda as a joke. So the Americans might be able to walk in.....make some positive steps, and find friendly Greeks.
To have suggested a decade ago that this might develop into what is discussed today? No. Things have changed around the Med, and some folks are in a evolutionary state of mind.
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