A MILITARY helicopter thundered above the scenic harbour, rocking the small wooden fishing boats, as Greek commandos in combat gear landed on the remote Aegean island of Kastellorizo.
The soldiers were sent to the island to defend Greece's most distant outpost against a possible threat from Turkey, a stone's throw away, after a dispute last month between the feuding Nato allies over a deserted islet.
Local residents were busy loading a two metre long swordfish on the boat that brought the soldiers in. Centuries of hardship, marked by war, famine and isolation have made them weary of the threat of military conflict.
"We were a bit worried but time goes by quietly here and we've acquired a kind of immunity. We've had much worse in the past," Papa Giorgis, the island's priest, said.
The latest Greek Turkish crisis over a rocky outcrop near the island of Kalymnos to the north seems to have put the far off, neglected little island back on the map.
Government officials and television channels have rushed to Kastellorizo, along with generous donations, while the military has boosted its thin presence here. But locals, tired of what they say are years of indifference from the state, say they are prepared to defend their homes themselves.
We were concerned when we heard Kastellorizo would be Turkey's first target in case of war," said the mayor, Pavlos Panigyris (40). "But all men here are as signed a rifle and we will use it to defend our homes. We will not surrender."
Hanging off the eastern most edge of Europe, Kastellorizo is four hours by boat from the nearest Greek island of Rhodes and only 10 minutes from the Turkish tourist town of Kas.
Once a flourishing community of worldly sea traders with a population of 17,000, the barren island has dwindled down to about 200 people who survive on fishing and the few tourists that dare to venture this far.
With Turkey three miles across the sea and easily cut off from the Greek mainland by bad weather, Kastellorizo has developed a symbiotic relationship with Kas.
Medical emergencies are sometimes rushed there and islanders often slip by the harbour patrol boat, which tries to stop Kurdish refugees from illegally crossing the water, to smuggle in fresh groceries in the dark.
Kas boat men in turn bring tourists to day trips to the island in the summer and foreigners who need to extend their visas to Turkey in the winter.
A Turkish boat captain, Turcan Guglu, an affable young man popular with the locals, said the recent spat did not affect relations between people in, Kastellorizo and Kas.
Five prostitutes from Georgia stood by his caique while their passports were stamped, eyeing about 20 dishevelled Kurds waiting a few steps away for medical check ups before travelling on to Athens.
"The day after the incident there were Turkish boats in this harbour and there were Greeks in Kas. People here treat me the same. This incident is all due to politics and it's bad for tourism, for the economy, for everything," Mr Guglu said.
His views were echoed by many on Kastellorizo, who feel relieved that Greece reached a compromise during the duel to avoid war.
"What did they want War Don't they stop to think what it would mean for people, for our development?" asked Evangelia Mayafi (60), who as a child witnessed the second World War that almost levelled the Kastellorizians find it difficult to view the Turkish people across the stretch of water separating them as enemies but deeply mistrust the government in Ankara.
"We had hoped that (the Turkish caretaker Prime Minister, Ms Tansu) filler would be more compassionate, being a woman, but she turned out to be a war monger," Ms Mayafi said.
And even Papa Giorgis, who was tried and acquitted in 1981 for illegally rushing a heart attack victim to Kas and who last month took his son in law there after an accident, vows he would take up arms to defend his island.
Shakle Kys, a British yacht repairer who has lived on the island since 1992, says Greeks and Turks get along here but tensions between the two governments were bound to affect them.
"I think the deep, old fear of `the dreaded Turk' is still there," Mr Kys said.
As if to exorcise such fears, the men gathered at the island's taverns for what they now call their "Pentagon" meetings, call each other "general" or "admiral" amid merciless teasing and raucous laughter.
"We started a fond raiser to buy a frigate to patrol the waters here," said the proprietor, Vangelis Mavros. "It costs two billion drachmas (£.2 million) and we've already collected 1,000 We should buy it in two years, tops, Mr Mavros said, and his customers doubled over with laughter.