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The small Greek port of Alexandroupoli has been bustling with activity for several months. The reason: the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine. The city lies at a geostrategic junction and at the intersection of several important energy pipelines. A visit to the port city.
“Send them to Alexandroupoli” was a common saying in Greece in the 1960s when people wanted to send unwelcome officials from Athens into professional exile. The small town in the very north of Greece on the Thracian Sea, only 40 kilometers from the Turkish border, was the (career) end of Greece, so to speak. But today the small port city is at a geostrategic hotspot.
Bosphorus closed
The reason is that the Bosphorus and the Black Sea are effectively inaccessible to foreign warships because of the Ukraine war.
Legend:
US troops unload battle tanks in Alexandroupoli. From there, the war material is distributed to all NATO bases in Eastern Europe.
Evros News
Alexandroupoli is 300 kilometers west of Istanbul and has therefore become a NATO hub. At regular intervals, say every one to two months, huge NATO ships, especially the US Navy, dock and unload war equipment: “These are tanks, dismantled Apache helicopters that are still assembled in the port, all sorts of things Vehicles, and while unloading, two Apache helicopters circle over the harbor – a huge spectacle,” says Georgios Mavrommatis, professor at the nearby Democritus University.
Legend:
Various pipelines also intersect in Alexandroupoli.
SRF
“Because the Bosporus is closed, the port of Alexandroupoli is NATO’s new interface between southern and eastern Europe,” analyzes Ino Afentouli, who worked for NATO for 20 years and now heads the Institute of International Relations in Athens.
Connection to Tallinn
The director of the port of Alexandroupoli, Konstantinos Chatzimichail explains: “NATO, primarily the USA, transports its war material from Alexandroupoli to all bases in Eastern Europe. The transports go to Bulgaria, Romania, Poland, the Baltic States and as far as Tallinn on the Gulf of Finland.»
Legend:
The entire port of the Greek city is full of war equipment. For NATO, Alexandroupoli is the interface between southern and eastern Europe.
U.S. Army
Because the US troops in particular change regularly, war equipment is unloaded in Alexandroupoli and transported to Eastern Europe, and tanks and vehicles are shipped from Alexandroupoli back to the USA.
Hatzimichail categorically denies media reports that war material is also being transported to Ukraine via Alexandroupoli. That cannot be checked.
Legend:
When no US transport ships dock, the port of Alexandroupoli is eerily empty.
SRF/Peter Voegeli
There is also a connection from Alexandroupoli to the Romanian Black Sea port of Constanta, which in the past served as a makeshift transshipment port for grain shipments from Ukraine. Alexandroupoli as a replacement for Odessa or Constanta? That would be an enticing prospect for Chatzimichail. However, the different track gauges of the railways between Western Europe and the former Soviet Union cause problems.
LNG terminal
Another project does not cause any problems: Konstantinos Chatzimichail proudly shows the ship “Castoro 10”, which is currently in the port of Alexandroupoli. “This ship is laying the pipelines from the LNG terminal off Alexandroupoli to the existing gas network on land.” From 2024, liquid gas from the USA or Qatar, for example, is to be fed into the pipeline network.
Legend:
The “Castoro 10” is laying a pipeline from an LNG terminal to the gas network on the mainland.
SRF/Peter Voegeli
So Alexandroupoli is not just a military hub. Above all, important natural gas pipelines converge in the region. Gas from Ukraine and Azerbaijan is routed to Italy or Southeast Europe via Turkey and Greece. The IGB gas pipeline between Greece and Bulgaria has also been operational since last October, supplying natural gas to the northern neighbor after Russia halted supplies.
Legend:
The lighthouse is the symbol of Alexandroupoli. The Greek port city has always been at a strategic crossroads.
SRF/Peter Voegeli
Actually, the port should have been privatized, but given its strategic importance, the Greek government backed down in 2022.
crossroads of history
Alexandroupoli has always been at a geostrategic crossroads of history. The city by the sea was founded in 1870 when a branch line of the Orient Express from Paris to Constantinople was connected to the coast, i.e. to Alexadroupoli. The French built the lighthouse in the harbor, the symbol of the city, and the Russians built the beautiful boulevards.
The city benefits from the US Navy, NATO and its importance as an energy hub. The bars are full in the evenings. Many wealthy Bulgarians buy real estate in Alexandroupoli, many rich people from Istanbul make a detour to the Greek port city at the weekend to celebrate undisturbed. For this they accept a 300 kilometer drive and a visa application. Everyone is drawn to Alexandroupoli.