The ante is being upped down there...
First, Im'ma just throw a few pieces in here, and hope these stick. ;)
‘They know how it’s done’: Turkey violated Greek airspace 2,244 times in 2014 alone
"Turkish claims that the downed Russian Su-24 jet “violated” its airspace have sparked outrage among Greeks, who took to social media to say it is a clear-cut case of double standards as Turkish jets breached Greek airspace 2,244 times in 2014 alone. They wondered what would happen if Greece had authorized engagement of Turkish aircraft, which breach the country’s borders on a regular basis."
Greek PM goads Turkish PM on Twitter over downing of Russian jet
"The official English-speaking account of Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras posted four tweets addressed to his Turkish counterpart Ahmet Davutoglu on Sunday, goading him about Turkey’s downing of a Russian jet and Turkey’s violations of Greek airspace. “To Prime Minister Davutoglu: Fortunately our pilots are not mercurial as yours against the Russians #EuTurkey” Tsipras tweeted."
(He subsequently deleted his tweets, after Davutoglu had tweeted back that he'd rather stick to "constructive" exchanges).
Turkey stopped violating Greek airspace after Russian Su-24 downing - Athens source
"Turkish warplanes abruptly ceased violating Greek airspace after downing a Russian Sukhoi Su-24 bomber on November 24. Previously, air intrusions made by Turkish fighter jets took place on a daily basis and amounted to thousands a year."
But...
6 Turkish fighter jets violate Greek airspace
"Six Turkish F-16s flew over four Greek islands on Tuesday, violating the country’s airspace, the country’s Hellenic National Defence General Staff said in a press release."
Seems like our south-eastern neighbors have been quite busy lately, eh? Curiously, there's a conspiracy theory circulating around these latitudes (because conspiracy theories tend to thrive in these parts of the world), some supported with very logical technical arguments from people who are well-versed in military matters, positing that the Russians knew full well the Turks were going to blink first. They knew the Turks had been preparing to ambush the very next Russian bomber who dared approach Turkish airspace, and indeed as the timing and the details of the attack suggest, it *was* an ambush, which the Russian pilots had no chance of evading.
But that's exactly the point. The Russians knew they were going to be ambushed at some point, and they still did approach. As the conspiracy theory goes, they did sacrifice their bomber in order to get a pretext for dislocating their S-400 anti-air missile, and essentially seal the whole space over the Syrian territory. Now that the precedent has been in place, and the row between Russia and Turkey is a fact, the Turks will be very cautious about doing anything stupid. All the while, Russia controlling all air actions in a region that's seen a lot of activity from pro-Turkish, anti-Assad Turkmen militia. Now Erdogan will either have to up the ante and risk full-out confrontation with the Russkies if he truly wants to keep supporting his proxies in North Syria, or he'll just have to back off and feel the butthurt.
Obviously, NATO is not going to do anything in Turkey's defense, because that'd mean a direct clash with the Russians. It's a high-stake game that very much reminds of some unpleasant moments from the Cold War, when that war threatened to become a hot war between superpowers with nuclear weapons. I'm not seeing that happening any time soon, but the South-East European region already is feeling the consequences of the increased tension between these two former pals. We're already hearing of incidents in the Bosphorus, involving Turkish U-boats getting in the way of Russian ships, etc. This is obviously going nowhere a nice place.
That said, Tsipras is damn right this time. Erdogan is being one hypocritical son of a bitch.
‘They know how it’s done’: Turkey violated Greek airspace 2,244 times in 2014 alone
"Turkish claims that the downed Russian Su-24 jet “violated” its airspace have sparked outrage among Greeks, who took to social media to say it is a clear-cut case of double standards as Turkish jets breached Greek airspace 2,244 times in 2014 alone. They wondered what would happen if Greece had authorized engagement of Turkish aircraft, which breach the country’s borders on a regular basis."
Greek PM goads Turkish PM on Twitter over downing of Russian jet
"The official English-speaking account of Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras posted four tweets addressed to his Turkish counterpart Ahmet Davutoglu on Sunday, goading him about Turkey’s downing of a Russian jet and Turkey’s violations of Greek airspace. “To Prime Minister Davutoglu: Fortunately our pilots are not mercurial as yours against the Russians #EuTurkey” Tsipras tweeted."
(He subsequently deleted his tweets, after Davutoglu had tweeted back that he'd rather stick to "constructive" exchanges).
Turkey stopped violating Greek airspace after Russian Su-24 downing - Athens source
"Turkish warplanes abruptly ceased violating Greek airspace after downing a Russian Sukhoi Su-24 bomber on November 24. Previously, air intrusions made by Turkish fighter jets took place on a daily basis and amounted to thousands a year."
But...
6 Turkish fighter jets violate Greek airspace
"Six Turkish F-16s flew over four Greek islands on Tuesday, violating the country’s airspace, the country’s Hellenic National Defence General Staff said in a press release."
Seems like our south-eastern neighbors have been quite busy lately, eh? Curiously, there's a conspiracy theory circulating around these latitudes (because conspiracy theories tend to thrive in these parts of the world), some supported with very logical technical arguments from people who are well-versed in military matters, positing that the Russians knew full well the Turks were going to blink first. They knew the Turks had been preparing to ambush the very next Russian bomber who dared approach Turkish airspace, and indeed as the timing and the details of the attack suggest, it *was* an ambush, which the Russian pilots had no chance of evading.
But that's exactly the point. The Russians knew they were going to be ambushed at some point, and they still did approach. As the conspiracy theory goes, they did sacrifice their bomber in order to get a pretext for dislocating their S-400 anti-air missile, and essentially seal the whole space over the Syrian territory. Now that the precedent has been in place, and the row between Russia and Turkey is a fact, the Turks will be very cautious about doing anything stupid. All the while, Russia controlling all air actions in a region that's seen a lot of activity from pro-Turkish, anti-Assad Turkmen militia. Now Erdogan will either have to up the ante and risk full-out confrontation with the Russkies if he truly wants to keep supporting his proxies in North Syria, or he'll just have to back off and feel the butthurt.
Obviously, NATO is not going to do anything in Turkey's defense, because that'd mean a direct clash with the Russians. It's a high-stake game that very much reminds of some unpleasant moments from the Cold War, when that war threatened to become a hot war between superpowers with nuclear weapons. I'm not seeing that happening any time soon, but the South-East European region already is feeling the consequences of the increased tension between these two former pals. We're already hearing of incidents in the Bosphorus, involving Turkish U-boats getting in the way of Russian ships, etc. This is obviously going nowhere a nice place.
That said, Tsipras is damn right this time. Erdogan is being one hypocritical son of a bitch.