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Status: 04/14/2022 2:26 p.m
The possible loss of the flagship hits Russia hard. Over the centuries, its Black Sea Fleet has gone from being a prestige object to a national legend. In the Ukraine war, she brings little reputation.
“Geography wanted Russia to be a continental power, but the strategic claim of its rulers was persistently aimed at overcoming this dilemma”: This is how the Russian-Norwegian political scientist Pavel Baev launched an analysis of the Russian Navy’s rearmament plans in 2019 – and commented at the same time her eternal sore point. For all its gigantic landmass, Russia has always expended tremendous effort to be a respected naval force. The linchpin of this self-image has always been the Black Sea Fleet, although it is the smallest of the four Russian fleets.
Founded by Tsarina Catherine II, it has been transformed over the centuries from a proud showpiece to a national myth. Moscow played a part in the exaggeration by always stylizing even the smallest defeats of the Black Sea Fleet as a “threat to national security and sovereignty” – until today, when the Russian leadership is openly showing that the Kremlin is once again thinking imperially and in centuries. Military setbacks by the fleet were always closely linked to shaming Moscow in front of the world public and provided the impetus for far-reaching changes in domestic and foreign policy.
From the Crimean War to the Crimean Annexation
Already at the end of the Crimean War, which was ruinous for Russia, the Russian Navy itself sank the ships remaining in the port of the fallen Sevastopol Fortress in order not to let them fall into the hands of the Allied powers. The defeat in 1856 made Tsarist Russia aware of its technological backwardness – Tsar Alexander II had to become a reformer and, in addition to abolishing serfdom, also set about building the rail network, which is now known in the West as the “Trans-Siberian Railway”.
After the October Revolution, it was not until 1920 that the Red Army seized the Crimean Peninsula from the hands of the White Army; the Black Sea fleet stationed there was extensively rebuilt and repaired and played an important role in the fight against National Socialist Germany in World War II. The victory over fascism in the “Great Patriotic War” formed an important cornerstone for the Soviet Union’s self-image as a country with the “strongest army in the world” throughout its existence. After the collapse in 1991, Russia found that its hegemony in the region had been severely pushed back – because Turkey, a powerful Black Sea riparian state, had joined NATO and the Black Sea fleet was stationed on Ukrainian national territory.
Gradually the fleet was divided between Ukraine and Russia in the 1990s and the port of Sevastopol with its military infrastructure was first shared and then leased from Russia. While Kyiv saw itself cheated by the gradual sale of its shares to Russia, Moscow’s incomplete control over the Black Sea Fleet was always a thorn in its side – a situation that Russia reversed in violation of international law by annexing Crimea in 2014.
Elaborate upgrade plans since 2014
Today the Russian Black Sea Fleet numbers about 25,000 men. Officially, it is not armed with nuclear weapons – but has launch silos for nuclear-capable missiles. Whether such were stored in Crimea after 2014 cannot be independently verified. In addition to the cruiser “Moskva” (in German: “Moscow”), the fleet also includes seven dock landing ships, six submarines, five corvettes, three frigates and six patrol ships, missile boats, anti-submarine boats and coastal and offshore minesweepers.
The fact that the Moskva was badly damaged in the war against Ukraine and, according to Ukrainian information, has already sunk is “a serious loss of prestige for the Russian Navy,” said military expert Gustav Gressel from the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR). tagesschau24: “It is the flagship, also the largest ship in the whole Black Sea.”
conflicting parties as a source
Information on the course of the war, shelling and casualties provided by official bodies of the Russian and Ukrainian conflict parties cannot be directly checked by an independent body in the current situation.
How powerful the Black Sea Fleet currently is militarily is unclear – in his analysis from 2019, expert Pavel Baev highlighted budget cuts that would conflict with the ambitious modernization goals after 2014. An assessment shared by other analysts at the time.
In the current war, the at least temporary loss of the “Moskva” does bring Russia military disadvantages, according to ECFR expert Gressel Landing of naval forces in the port of Odessa, which turned out to be a ruse at the beginning of the war. “Now Russia will consider whether they will do it again,” says Gressel – because the damage to the “Moskva” showed what could happen if Ukrainian missiles hit a Russian troop carrier, for example.
“Russian ship, go to hell!”
With the destruction of the “Moskva” the Ukraine can now claim a respectable victory against the Black Sea Fleet. Russian President Vladimir Putin is probably spitting blood with anger, wrote Ukrainian military journalist Illia Ponomarenko after the news.
After all, it’s not the first time that the cruiser with the capital in its name has been used to seriously insult the Kremlin – and give Ukrainian propaganda a point victory: when on February 24 the Serpent Island in the Black Sea was conquered by Russian forces, Ukrainian soldiers stationed there are said to have responded to calls for surrender by radio: “Russian warship, go to hell!” A slogan that many Ukrainians and supporters took up in the first days of the war – and which is said to have gone to the “Moskva” of all people.