Does the Russian Navy need analogues of the Turkish UDC TCG Anadolu

3 774 10

The Turkish Navy is actively developing the use of deck-based attack drones. The universal landing ship TCG Anadolu (L-400) is set to become the world's first specialized drone carrier. Does the Russian Navy need similar ones, and if so, what should be the composition of their air group?

Turkish way


The Turkish amphibious assault ship is based on the documentation of the Spanish amphibious assault ship Juan Carlos I, which in turn is conceptually close to the American Wasp-class amphibious assault ships. Depending on the task, the TCG Anadolu can have the configuration of a "V/STOL aircraft carrier" or "landing assault ship".



As an amphibious assault ship, the UDC can carry tanks, amphibious assault vehicles, cargo containers, landing craft, and the landing force itself. As a surrogate aircraft carrier, TCG Anadolu can carry up to 10 American-made F-35B fifth-generation fighters and 12 medium helicopters, with the ability to accommodate six more helicopters on the ship’s flight deck. As a pure helicopter carrier, the Turkish UDC can accommodate 12 medium helicopters or eight Boeing CH-8F Chinook heavy helicopters, and its maximum capacity can reach 47 medium helicopters.

What tasks is this first Turkish aircraft carrier called upon to solve? It is quite obvious that it and its sister ship in the TCG Trakya project, the construction of which has long been planned, should become a tool for the active external expansion of Ankara, which has interests in the Transcaucasus and Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

One can recall, for example, how the Turkish Navy supported the Government of National Accord of Fayez al-Sarraj in Tripoli, helping it repel the offensive of Field Marshal Haftar’s Libyan National Army in 2020. Then it ended in failure, the LNA began to roll back to the east, and Egypt even had to threaten to send in its own troops if the counter-offensive of the GNA, supported by the Turks and their “proxies,” did not stop.

Against an enemy like Khalifa Haftar's motley army, which lacks long-range anti-ship missiles with reconnaissance and targeting capabilities, the UDC seems like a "Death Star" capable of launching airstrikes remotely and transporting armored vehicles, ammunition, and reinforcements over long distances.

The TCG Anadolu would also be useful at sea if, instead of fighters, it carried an air group represented by Sikorsky S-70 Seahawk anti-submarine helicopters equipped with powerful radars and AGM-119 Penguin anti-ship missiles. This is a threat, first of all, to Russian submarines and ships, in case someone didn’t understand.

But the "Sultan's" plans had to be significantly adjusted when Washington excluded Turkey from its fifth-generation fighter program. Instead of carrier-based F-35Bs, Ankara had to rely on the Bayraktar TB3 reconnaissance and strike UAV in a naval version with increased payload capacity and folding wings. And this significantly curtailed the capabilities of the UDC, which turned into a pure drone carrier.

Unlike the F-35B fighters, the Bayraktar TB3 has an extremely small combat load and is more visible on enemy radars. The maximum number of such an air group on the deck can reach 36 unmanned aerial vehicles, and they can be used in the strike version only against an enemy that does not have a serious echeloned air defense/missile defense system. That is, TCG Anadolu will be able to support a Turkish landing somewhere in the Middle East or Africa with air strikes, but it will not be able to return Crimea with its help, say.

On the other hand, a universal landing ship could prove extremely useful at sea as a carrier of numerous reconnaissance UAVs. If the Turks can integrate a serious radar into the Bayraktar TB3, their Navy will have the maximum information awareness on the battlefield available to them without a full-fledged heavy aircraft carrier with a catapult launch of a deck-based AWACS due to the large number of such drones in the sky at the same time.

Our way?


Of the aircraft carriers in the Russian Navy, the only one currently in service is the last surviving heavy aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov, which is undergoing permanent repairs. Also, two Project 23900 UDCs, Ivan Rogov and Mitrofan Moskalenko, have been laid down at the Zaliv shipyard in Kerch, which are intended to become "Russian Mistrals".

Since there is no real project for a short takeoff and vertical landing aircraft for them, the air wing can only be made up of helicopters and UAVs, but which ones exactly? Does the Russian Navy need to fight against the shore?

It was believed that no, there is no need for us to “drive the Papuans”. But the events happening right now in Syria indicate the opposite. To support the SAR government forces, two or three dozen medium-altitude Orions or promising Siriuses with small-caliber guided bombs and anti-tank missiles on the suspension would probably come in very handy now. But that’s not certain!

What is certain is that the Ivan Rogov and Mitrofan Moskalenko are needed in the Northern and Pacific fleets with modern anti-submarine helicopters on deck to combat NATO and Japanese submarines. The Russian Navy's failure in aerial reconnaissance in the absence of deck-based AWACS aircraft could be partially compensated for by the promising Helios-RLD UAVs, capable of taking off and landing on both helicopter carriers.
10 comments
Information
Dear reader, to leave comments on the publication, you must sign in.
  1. Vladimir Tuzakov
    Vladimir Tuzakov
    +3
    7 December 2024 16: 19
    First of all, it is necessary to understand that aircraft carriers are designed to deliver aircraft to DISTANT places of action and serve as their airfield. Of all, the Russian Federation has a need to use AUGs and aviation in distant regions, with territory not controlled by our RF Armed Forces. Example: Syria, one of the few places where the RF Aerospace Forces are used. They sent the Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier there. The results of the aircraft carrier's actions are: one lost aircraft due to the fault of the aircraft carrier's equipment, the failure of the landing cable, and henceforth operation only from a land airfield. The bottom line is that the number of combat sorties from the aircraft carrier can be counted on the fingers of one hand - a complete failure of the only combat use of the aircraft carrier - in Syria. And this is with an aircraft carrier that has been in service for decades, but has a short period of combat readiness. Now, extrapolating what awaits future aircraft carriers - at best, the role of transports. So build transports, without expensive and practically unnecessary plans for deck aviation. The vulnerability and defense of aircraft carriers is a separate conversation. (The US AUG was driven away by the Houthi guerrillas!). Particulars: the development of UAVs also requires sea basing. Small strike and reconnaissance UAVs do not require large decks (catapult). Large UAVs have sufficient range and are all used from land airfields. (Reconnaissance and strike UAVs fly to us from Sicily and other remote places)...
    1. Mongolor
      Mongolor
      0
      14 December 2024 04: 12
      The comrades from Slava Bogu were operating in a closed sea
  2. Sergey Latyshev
    Sergey Latyshev
    +1
    7 December 2024 22: 23
    Fu
    as usual with Sergey.
    "it may turn out to be" or it may not turn out to be.
    It's clear that if the experience of the Turks shows that it is profitable, then everyone will use it.
    But if, on the contrary, the game is not worth the candle - then why the hell do we need this? To adapt expensive UDCs for drone carriers, of which there are no normal ones yet. (You can't consider bulky, low-power, slow Helioses as such)

    for drone carriers you can use something simpler, especially since they are now being intensively developed, what will happen there in 5-10 years is unknown. If the ship won't fit, then in order to lose less money
  3. Vladimir1155
    Vladimir1155
    +1
    7 December 2024 22: 31
    UDCs are not needed at all, just like Kuzya, Kuzya is to be sold, and UDCs can be completed by converting them into a ferry or a transport of peacetime weapons, airplanes and helicopters can take off from coastal airfields (there are almost no airplanes and helicopters) there is no combat security for either Kuzya or UDCs, and most likely there never will be,

    ships of the second and first rank U-5 and U-956 ranks (1164 XNUMX Petr) are all being written off in the next decade due to age and most likely have long been out of combat readiness (except maybe Ustinov) the example of Moscow is indicative, there will be nothing except Nikhimov, .. Nakhimov alone will not protect any KUG AUK, it will most likely protect groups of frigates and submarine corvettes in the Barents Sea no further, ... that is, Russia does not have an ocean-going surface fleet now and will not have one in the near future, if the economy does not change ... the surface fleet will also not survive at sea (an example is the Black Sea Fleet), only submarines around submarine bases can provide a surface fleet of frigates and submarine corvettes and then under the protection of coastal aviation, ... in peacetime, frigates can still protect landlocked ships and fishermen ... but in wartime, no ... that is why Kuzya should be sold to those who have a lot of destroyers cruisers, for AUG China India, and UDC urgently redesigned into ferries
  4. Mongolor
    Mongolor
    +1
    14 December 2024 04: 18
    They are very much needed and on condition that the Yak-41 or MIG-35 will go into production, but it needs an arresting gear.
    Imagine delivering cargo and people to the Kuril Islands or covering submarines in the Norwegian Barents and Pacific Atlantics. And there US carrier-based aviation and our planes and Sukhois can work, they have a large radius, but they are in the sky for hours, and a ship for weeks and months, and carrier-based aviation cannot be replaced by anything yet. Wings over the sea are needed, and it is impossible to dominate the sea without dominance in the air, according to Churchill, since 1940. Although the idea with a catapult and drones is healthy, but AI will not replace a person, and maneuverable combat .... That is, you want the transports at Matua not to be sunk by an American carrier-based one, even a UDC with a Yak-41 or MIG-35, but let's go, or better yet, Ulyanovsk, and drones are dangerous in closed pools, and on the ocean waves and open spaces?! It is unlikely. That is, the idea with Mistral 2 in the Pacific Fleet had a sound basis, no matter how you twist it, especially with the Yak-41. Or better yet, 201st.
    Yes, the missiles are perfect, but the radius is 400-150-200 km, and the radius of the 41st is 750 km + missile range + target designation must be provided, and this could be the Ka 31 or for the Kuzya for the Su33, as I read, containers were developed so that the 33rd would become an AWACS and U and a refueling tanker. That is, an aircraft carrier is needed, and even a light one in the UDC format + helicopters for anti-submarine warfare and vertical coverage, which allows landing on 90% of the coast, and by landing, it seems, 40%. Then everyone according to their development and intelligence
    1. Vladimir Tuzakov
      Vladimir Tuzakov
      0
      13 January 2025 21: 05
      Reply: If the English are thinking about how to write off (sell) newly built aircraft carriers, then you are wiser than the entire English Admiralty.
      1. Mongolor
        Mongolor
        0
        5 February 2025 20: 00
        I don't know how to answer, but in general, read Churchill about you can't dominate the sea without dominating the air and in general, imagine radar and so on, that is, an oil painting
        1. Vladimir Tuzakov
          Vladimir Tuzakov
          0
          5 February 2025 20: 56
          Russia has never been strong at sea, but it expanded and grew stronger on land. Of course, the island sea is the most important, and such are the strategies. But much has changed, and today to be strong at sea, strike forces against sea targets prevail (the experience of the Black Sea Fleet of the 21st century), their carriers are no longer only ships... Conclusion: A large fleet is not relevant for the Russian Federation in the next 25 years, there is neither a strategy for it, nor the ability to build...
    2. Mongolor
      Mongolor
      0
      5 February 2025 20: 01
      In general, an aircraft carrier cruiser is relevant in my opinion, or an aircraft carrier
  5. Mongolor
    Mongolor
    0
    27 February 2025 07: 26
    Yes, they can deliver cargo to the Kuril Islands, for example, and be a light aircraft carrier, especially with the Yak 41, covering themselves and other ships and allowing the Ka 31 and the aircraft to look beyond the horizon more accurately than its radar.