At the DEFEA 2025 international defense exhibition in Athens, there was broad consensus among industry experts and policymakers: Greece’s ambition to secure at least 25% domestic participation in its €28 billion defense procurement programs by 2037 is a formidable and multifaceted challenge.
While this target has been officially set, the real difficulty lies not in its legal standing but in the scale of systemic change required to achieve it.
Greece is attempting to transform its defense industrial base within just twelve years—an uphill task considering the technological, industrial, and institutional deficits that have built up over decades of limited investment, strategic neglect, and minimal local involvement in major defense programs.
Although the country has recently taken commendable steps to revitalize the sector, including new initiatives and early signs of increased activity, the gap between current capabilities and the 25% goal remains considerable.
This is not merely a technical or funding issue. At its heart, the challenge is structural and institutional. Greece’s defense ecosystem continues to be hindered by a lack of long-term strategic planning, excessive reliance on foreign suppliers, a slow-moving bureaucracy, inconsistent research and development frameworks, and fragmented support for small and medium-sized enterprises. Innovation remains shallow, and the connection between universities and the defense manufacturing sector is still underdeveloped.
Even Greece’s most promising indigenous projects—such as efforts to develop a national naval vessel or military vehicle—are struggling to advance, largely because the country is starting from a near-zero baseline in autonomous design and production.
Participation in collaborative European initiatives like the “Achilles’ Shield” air defense system or domestic drone development offers some hope, but these require long-term political commitment and steady investment.
Without a modern institutional framework that fosters public-private partnerships, significant investment in skilled labor and know-how, and strategic alliances with leading global defense players, Greece’s 25% target risks remaining aspirational.
For international observers, the Greek case serves as a revealing example of how rebuilding sovereign defense capacity is as much about long-term planning and institutional reform as it is about budgets and procurement.
