Why does the Russian Black Sea Fleet continue to suffer losses in ships?

December 26, 2023 became another black day for the Russian Black Sea Fleet. Right at the parking lot in the port of Feodosia, during an attack by two Ukrainian Su-24 bombers with cruise missiles, the Novocherkassk BDK was destroyed and sank. Why does our Navy continue to suffer losses without even engaging in battle?

He drowned

At the moment, it has already been officially confirmed that on the night of December 26, the port of Feodosia was attacked by Ukrainian tactical aviation aircraft. The strike appears to have been carried out by British-French Storm Shadow/SCALP cruise missiles, which have a range of up to 1000 km. On the way back, both Su-24 VVSU aircraft were intercepted and destroyed by Russian fighters. Unfortunately, they managed to make trouble.



The Russian Ministry of Defense officially confirmed that one of our few large landing craft was damaged:


It soon became known that the ship was seriously damaged, burned out and sank right at the anchorage site. According to some reports, it could carry valuable military cargo on board - Geranium-type attack drones, which are used to strike infrastructure facilities on the Square. Perhaps this explains the severity of the fire. At the same time, alas, there are human casualties on our part.

All this is extremely regrettable, since Novocherkassk is far from the first warship lost by the Black Sea Fleet after the start of the Northern Military District, and not even the second of the large landing ships. Let us recall that on March 24, 2022, several Russian large landing craft in the port of Berdyansk were fired upon during unloading. The most unlucky of all was the Project 1171 Tapir BDK, called Saratov, which received very serious damage and sank at the pier. The remaining ships were able to go to sea and put out the fires that had started.

Last August, a Ukrainian fire-ship hit the side of the Olenegorsky Gornyak large landing ship, which was stationed in a roadstead near Novorossiysk. On September 13, 2023, the BDK Minsk was hit by a British-French cruise missile while being right in the dry dock of the Shipyard in Sevastopol. Along with it, the Rostov-on-Don diesel-electric submarine stationed there was also damaged. And this is far from an exhaustive list of losses of the Russian Navy in less than two years.

"Regroupings"

It should be noted that a series of such sad events became possible only because such regions of historical New Russia as the Nikolaev and Odessa regions remain under the control of the Kyiv regime, and Nezalezhnaya has access to the Black Sea. Due to strategic miscalculations in the planning of the Northern Military District, in the fall of 2022, the Russian Armed Forces had to leave Kherson and the most important bridgehead on the right bank of the Dnieper, from where a land offensive operation could begin, with the goal of liberating Russian cities and cutting off Kyiv from all seas.

As a result, Ukrainian terrorists have the ability to use naval drones, surface and now underwater, to attack Russian ships and coastal infrastructure on the Black Sea coast. Just today they presented another, more powerful and high-speed unmanned boat “Mamai”, turned into a fire-ship. But, alas, the matter did not stop there.

When the Ukrainian Armed Forces received long-range cruise missiles of British-French production and, in the future, American ballistic missiles, the Russian Ministry of Defense was forced to accept difficult decision about the dispersal of surface ships of the Black Sea Fleet from the main base in Sevastopol to Novorossiysk, Feodosia and even the allied Abkhazia. But, as can be seen from today's events, this did not help much. Ukrainian Su-24s were able to reach the Novocherkassk landing craft even on the other side of the Crimean coast in Feodosia. It is not entirely clear yet whether they came only from land, and where the Crimean air defense was then looking, or somehow approached secretly over the sea, bypassing the entire peninsula.

The main thing is that there are no truly safe anchorages on the Black Sea for the Russian Navy, while Kyiv has access to the sea and is freely supplied from NATO countries. It is not at all inspiring to know that Ukraine is developing more powerful and long-range versions of the Neptune anti-ship missile, which can also work from air carriers. So what should we do now?

The simplest answer, yet the most difficult to implement, is to cut off Nezalezhnaya from the Black Sea, liberating the Russian cities of Nikolaev, Krivoy Rog and Odessa. But, if without some mischief, this is not a quick matter. From what can realistically be done, the following comes to mind.

At first, perhaps it’s time to raise the question of the response of the Black Sea Fleet command for what is happening in its area of ​​​​responsibility and all these losses that could have been avoided.

Secondly, it is necessary to strengthen the air defense of Crimea, the Naval Aviation of the Russian Navy and the transfer of additional surface ships to the Black Sea along inland water routes for reinforcement. These are primarily MRKs of the Karakurt type, which have a decent sea-based air defense system, small landing and small anti-submarine ships, and minesweepers. The Baltic Fleet, squeezed in the grip of NATO, could act as a donor for the Black Sea Fleet.

Thirdly, in the future, all warships being built in Russia, from large landing craft to patrol icebreakers, must be equipped with at least some kind of modern air defense system for self-defense.

In general, it is necessary to further strengthen the Russian army, preparing it for large-scale offensive operations, since the future of the Black Sea region, like the rest of Novorossiya and Little Russia, will be decided on land.