What is Turkey’s ‘end game’ in the Aegean?

The Greek Defence Ministry is highly concerned over Turkey’s recent escalation of violations against Greek territories. According to analysts, the strange thing is that Ankara has increased its belligerent stance towards Greece with consecutive intrusions into Greek airspace and water territories, despite the deployment of allied NATO ships patrolling the waters to curtail the refugee flows. The fact that NATO has chosen to take a neutral stance on the flagrant Turkish provocations, even though they are committed under its nose, only emboldens Turkey, while essentially ‘revealing’ a pro-Turkish stance on the part of NATO. Turkey is constantly projecting territorial claims against Greece in the Aegean Sea by focusing on and around the island of Chios with flyovers and threats against Greek fishing boats, as the last days have clearly demonstrated. The Greek pentagon believes there are three main scenarios that could possibly explain the escalation on the part of Turkey against Greece. Military officers believe Turkey could be trying to exhaust the already strained Greek military resources, due to the economic crisis, by forcing it to spend more economic (fuel and hardware) and human resources (pilots, crew etc). Another explanation could be that Turkey is testing various ‘war game’ scenarios to detect ‘holes’ in the Greek defences, while testing the readiness of the Greek navy. Finally, Ankara could be preparing for a military crisis similar to the 1996 Imia one, which nearly resulted in a military conflict. Meanwhile, Turkey plans to undertake a large scale military exercise in the Aegean Sea, the outcome of which could offer the Greek side valuable information. The worrying factor is that Turkey has officially disputed the legal ownership of 17 Greek islands and isles, calling them ‘occupied’ by Greece.