Once again Greece and Turkey are on the verge of full military conflict, and this time, it’s not about a few rocky islands, but about oil and gas worth billions of dollars. Both sides claim that international law is on their side. Greece claims, that the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea gives them rights to the continental shelf uniting the Greek islands of Crete, Karpathos, Rhodes and the tiny inhabited island of Kastelorizo; certainly UN continental shelf maps support this claim. Turkey complains that a small island like Kastelorizo (ten square kms) shouldn’t control over 40,000 square kms of continental shelf. The two sides aren’t backing down and Turkey has sent its exploratory ship the Oruc Reis within Greece’s claimed continental shelf. Usually when the two sides are close to military conflict, the US steps in, but no one is expecting Trump to take time off from his golfing to intervene. The EU is clearly on Greece’s side as it too is eyeing these vast reserves to free them from dependence on Russian gas. Turkey is flexing its military muscles but with a collapsing economy and currency and over-extension in Libya and Syria — is in no position to invade any Greek islands. Both sides want to sit at the negotiating table, but Greece refuses until Turkey pulls all its military vessels and the Oruc Reis from its waters. Turkey refuses to do so. Is this the time when the two NATO “allies” go to full military conflagration?