Tanagra lies in Boeotia, north-west of Athens, close to the Athens–Lamia motorway. Before the jet age it was, in Wikipedia’s words, “a complementary airfield”, used as such from the Second World War into the early 1950s. With NATO assistance it was then rebuilt as a main base, and the Hellenic Air Force dates 114 Combat Wing to 22 August 1956, when it was formed there with the 341, 342 and 343 Interception Squadrons flying the F-86E Sabre.

The Sabres did not stay long. The Air Force’s own chronology shows 343 Squadron moving to 111 Combat Wing at Nea Anchialos on 24 May 1958, 341 following on 14 January 1960 and 342 in June 1962. While 341 was still at Tanagra it supplied the aircraft for Greece’s second aerobatic team: the Air Force records that the “Hellenic Flame” was raised in August 1957 with F-86Es of No 341. Between November 1959 and May 1960, 361 Squadron was also deployed here with T-33A trainers.

In their place came fighter-bombers. 335 Squadron arrived on 18 May 1960 with Republic F-84F Thunderstreaks, and in April 1964 it received the first Greek F-104G and TF-104G Starfighters. 336 Squadron joined it with F-104Gs in January 1965, and in April 1966 a F-104G flight simulator became operational at the wing before 336 left for Araxos on 16 December 1966. For a few years Tanagra was the Starfighter centre of the Hellenic Air Force.

The official HAF wing chronology and the Air Force’s own first-generation history do not tell the Starfighter story in quite the same words: the first says F-104Gs were accepted by 335 Squadron in April 1964, the second that the new 335 Squadron was “formed with the Starfighters” that month. Both place the aircraft at 114 Combat Wing, and both agree on the date.

Tanagra became an all-weather interceptor base with the return of 342 Squadron, renamed 342 All Weather Squadron and equipped with the Convair F-102A and TF-102A Delta Dagger. The date is not settled: the 114 Combat Wing page gives 16 February 1967, while the Air Force’s first-generation history and the English Wikipedia both place the delivery of the Delta Daggers in 1969. Wikipedia gives 24 aircraft, 19 single-seat F-102As and five TF-102As, all for 342 Squadron at Tanagra.

A French fighter came next: Wikipedia records that Greece first ordered the Mirage F1CG in 1974. The Air Force records that on 4 August 1975 the first two Mirage F1CGs landed at 114 Combat Wing, going first to 342 Squadron; 334 All Weather Squadron was formed with the type in May 1977, and the last F-102As were retired early that year. Greece bought 40 F1CGs, and Wikipedia notes they carried up to four AIM-9P Sidewinders rather than the French R.550 Magic.

Meanwhile 335 Squadron left for Araxos on 30 June 1977, and a training flight, 366, operated T-33As at Tanagra from September 1976. With 334 and 342 Squadrons both on the F1CG, the wing was a pure air-defence unit, and the Mirage F1CG spent the next quarter-century in the Aegean interception business, in which two of its pilots’ encounters with Turkish fighters, in 1992 and 1995, ended in the sea.

The type retired on 30 June 2003 after 28 years of service. Wikipedia gives the remaining fleet as 27 aircraft and the fleet total as 160,000 flying hours; 342 Squadron was suspended on the same day. At least four F1CGs, serials 115, 124, 129 and 140, are preserved at the base. A fifth, serial 134, is kept by the Air Force History Department at Delta Falirou, according to the same article.

Greece signed for 40 Mirage 2000s, 36 single-seat EGs and four two-seat BGs, in 1985 under a programme the Air Force itself calls the “controversially purchased” Talos contract. Wikipedia’s two relevant articles disagree on the month, March or July 1985, and give the value as $1.38 billion including offsets that let Hellenic Aerospace Industry build the M53-P2 engine.

The Air Force records that the first Mirage 2000EG/BGs landed at 114 Combat Wing in April 1988. 331 All Weather Squadron was formed with them on 18 April 1988 and 332 on 11 August 1989. The official call signs are “Thiseas” (Theseus) for 331 and “Geraki” (hawk) for 332. In the 1990s the aircraft were modernised as EGM/BGMs with a better radar and the ability to fire the Super 530D and the AM39 Exocet anti-ship missile.

In 2000 Greece ordered 15 new Mirage 2000-5 Mk2s and the upgrade of ten existing aircraft to the same standard, delivered in 2004–2005 according to Wikipedia. The Air Force’s own page describes a fleet of 25: fifteen obtained from France and ten Greek aircraft upgraded by Hellenic Aerospace Industry, with the RDY-2 radar, a glass cockpit and a TOTEM 3000 laser-gyro navigation system; Wikipedia adds the SCALP cruise missile and both versions of the MICA. Wikipedia dates 331 Squadron’s conversion to the 2000-5 to 2007.

The older EGM/BGMs of 332 Squadron were retired when the Rafale arrived in January 2022. The 2000-5 has an uncertain future: on 27 March 2024 the defence minister, Nikos Dendias, said it must be sold, and in October 2025 Zona Militar, citing Greek media, reported 25 aircraft, a stalled sale to India, talks on a transfer to Ukraine via France, and the end of official support in 2027. No sale had been announced by September 2026.

Because the Mirage F1CG and later the Mirage 2000 were Tanagra aircraft, the base’s squadrons were at the centre of many Greek interceptions of Turkish aircraft in the disputed Aegean airspace. Wikipedia’s Mirage F1 article records mock dogfights with the Turkish Air Force as early as 1987. The two governments disagree on where Greek airspace ends, and each describes these encounters in its own terms; what follows attributes each account to its source.

On 18 June 1992 a Mirage F1CG crashed near Agios Efstratios in the northern Aegean during a low-altitude dogfight with two Turkish F-16s, and its pilot, Nikolaos Sialmas, was killed. On 8 February 1995 a Turkish F-16C went into the sea after being intercepted by a Mirage F1CG; its pilot ejected. Wikipedia also records that a Turkish RF-4E lost on 20 October 1995 is “often attributed” to a dogfight with the F1, and that a further Greek F1 crash in similar circumstances is claimed for 4 September 1995.

The most serious was on 8 October 1996, near Chios, when two Greek Mirage 2000s intercepted two Turkish F-16s. One, an F-16D, went down; its pilot, Captain Nail Erdoğan, was killed and the back-seater ejected. Greece denied a shootdown, and both Mirage pilots reported that the F-16 caught fire. In 2012 the Turkish defence minister, İsmet Yılmaz, stated that it had been shot down by a Mirage 2000 with a Magic II missile.

The Aegean claimed a Tanagra pilot again on 12 April 2018, when a Mirage 2000-5 scrambled to intercept two Turkish F-16s crashed into the sea north of Skyros. Captain Giorgos Baltadoros, 33, was killed. Wikipedia’s Mirage 2000 article attributes the crash to Saharan dust and poor visibility at low level. It was the second Tanagra fighter pilot killed in these encounters recorded by Wikipedia since 1992.

On 19 January 2022 the first six Dassault Rafales landed at Tanagra for 332 Squadron, and the Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, came to the base for the reception ceremony. The Air Force lists them as Rafale F3Rs. According to the Prime Minister’s office, he described the jets as a force multiplier that upgrades the country “operationally, technologically, but also geopolitically”, and told the audience that six more would follow in 2022, six by mid-2023 and a final six after that.

Wikipedia records an initial order for 18 aircraft, raised to 24 after an announcement on 11 September 2021; the first aircraft was handed over in France in July 2021. The Prime Minister’s office records that he put the time from order to arrival at 16 months, and that the squadron receiving them was the “Falcon” squadron, the English rendering of 332’s call sign Geraki.

The Rafale made 332 Squadron, the old “Geraki”, the spearhead of the Hellenic Air Force, alongside 331 Squadron’s Mirage 2000-5s. Dendias said in March 2024 that the Rafale fleet should grow: “we’ve ordered 24, it would be good to reach 30,” as quoted by To Vima. Zona Militar reported in October 2025 speculation about 6–12 more. As of September 2026 no further order had been signed.

Tanagra is also Greece’s biggest aerospace factory site. Hellenic Aerospace Industry, established in 1975 and describing itself as the country’s largest aeronautical and defence company, works next to the base. Its biggest current programme, run with Lockheed Martin under a 2018 contract, rebuilds 84 F-16C/D Block 52+ aircraft to the F-16V Viper standard with APG-83 AESA radar. The 42nd was delivered on 23 September 2025 and the 60th at Tanagra on 17 September 2026, with deliveries continuing into 2027.

The Air Force also keeps logistics units here. Wikipedia’s structure list places the Main Repairable Materials Supply Depot and an Air Force agency at Hellenic Aerospace Industry at Tanagra, as well as the 26th Guided Missile Squadron with Patriot PAC-3 and Crotale NG/GR; these entries have not been confirmed against the current haf.gr pages. In the 1980s a civil terminal was considered to make Tanagra a second Athens airport, an idea dropped when the new airport was sited at Spata.

Since 2017 the base has hosted Athens Flying Week each September. On Saturday 5 September 2026, around 14:55, an F-4E AUP Phantom, serial 01504, of 338 Squadron from Andravida crashed during its display about three nautical miles south-east of the airfield, killing both crew. The Air Force appointed a committee to investigate; the fire it started needed 115 firefighters, nine aircraft and four helicopters, and the rest of the show was cancelled. The loss left 16 Phantoms in Greek service.