NAVY MYTH AND REALITY * ERIC MORRIS THE RUSSIAN NAVY MYTH AND REALITY ERIC MORRIS The modern Russian Navy has come a long way since its humiliating defeat at the hands of Admiral Togo at the Battle of Tsushima during the Russo-Japanese war. Although its naval history dates back to Peter the Great, Russia achieved little at sea in the first half of this cen- tury. The maritime role was subordi- nated by doctrine and circumstances to the needs of land warfare. Since 1945 the Russian navy has be- come an increasingly important instru- ment of Soviet foreign policy. Eric Morris examines this development and shows how Russia, in her dealings with the United States and other powers, has evolved a relationship which has moved away from the propaganda and confron- (Continued on back flap) (^(^ •5 <, p^ 5 £. r oci.' i. e-?^ The Russian Navy: Myth and ReaHty BA REN SEA ARCTIC OCEAN Azores / c >4 T Naval Bases 1 Kola Inlet, Munnansk HQ and main naval 20 Soviet Pacific Fleet HQ at Vladivostok: base for the Soviet Northern Fleet: 160 74 submarines and 57 major surface submarines and 56 major surface warships warships 2 Baltic Fleet based on Kronshtadt and HQ 21 Sovetskaya Gavan at Baltiysk: 12 submarines 47 major and 22 Petropavlovsk surface warships 8 Crimea base complex: Odessa, Nikolayev, Naval base facilities Sevastopol. Black Sea Fleet (including 7 One-time Soviet naval base facilities at Caspian Flotilla and Mediterranean Alexandria and Port Said Squadron): 19 submarines and 59 major 14 Mogadiscio (Somali Republic) surface warships 15 Berbera (Somali Republic) NB All estimated strengths are approximate 16 Mauritius: Aeroflot flies in relief crews Q Main naval bases for Soviet trawlers 1 OVIET UNION ^.'-j;-^^^—-. CASPIAN •S£A Vladivostok. ^ <^ 20 SEA (V OfJAPA N 7 PAC I F I C ^ OCEAN Maldive Is. •4^12 Seychelles ^4-10 , Chagos ^ 11 ''• Archipelago INDIAN CE A N Mauritius '16 ^ 17 Aden: repair facilities 9 Indian Ocean Anchorage 250 miles east of Durban 18 Port Blair, Andaman Islands: Indian naval base used by Soviet Fleet 10 Seychelles 19 Vishakhapatnam 1 Chagos Archipelago 25 Cienfuegos 12 Maldive Islands 13 Soviet tankers refuel warships at anchor Anchorages 4, in the Mozambique channel 3 Melilla Point/Alboran Island 4 Gulf of Hammamet 1 c Anchorage for ^^^^^r t I ^ r Mediterranean 23 Komsomolsk 1 Squadron Shipbuilding yards 6 East of Cyprus J 24 Khabarovsk / By the same Author blockade: BERLIN AND THE COLD WAR The Russian Navy: Myth and Reality ERIC MORRIS Senior Lecturer, Department of War Studies and International Affairs, Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst ^ STEIN AND DAY/?wZ?Zis/2er5/New York First published in the United States 1977 Copyright © 1977 by Eric Morris All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America Stein and Day / Publishers/ Scarhorough House, Briarcliff Manor, N.Y. 10510 Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Morris, Eric, 1940- The Russian Navy. Bibliography p. 145 Includes index. 1. Russia (1923- U.S.S.R.)- Voenno-Morskoi Plot. 2. Russia—Military policy. I. Title. VA573.M67 359.3'0947 77-7122 ISBN 0-8128-2324-9 To Pamela, Christopher and Leah Acknowledgements In the writing of this book I owe a personal debt of gratitude to many people: to Michael McGwire, Professor of Mihtary and Strategic Studies at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia; to the Naval Liaison Officers at Sandhurst, especially Lt. Cdr. Gaythorne Gough and his successor Lt. Cdr. Martin Knapp; to the experts in Soviet Studies, Brian Jones, Peter Vigor and Christopher Donnelly ; and to my colleagues in the Department of War Studies and International Affairs. The manuscript was typed intelligently and with great efficiency by Margaret Boyle, whose husband James played no small part in deciphering my handwriting. The Academy Librarian, Allan Shep- perd, his successor John Hunt and their staff, have been especially helpful and tolerant in following up my many requests. The Inter- national Institute for Strategic Studies in London have allowed me to use their authoritative 'Military Balance' and their hbrarian Mrs Meryl Eady has been most helpful in my research. I am grateful to the editor of 'Janes Fighting Ships' for allowing me to quote the particulars which they publish on individual Soviet ships. The Royal Navy Public Relations Office have provided a wealth of photo- graphic evidence from which we have chosen the jacket to the book; the endpaper map, depicting the Soviet naval bases, was drawn by Patrick Leeson. Christopher Sinclair-Stevenson and John Henderson read the manuscript and have provided constructive criticism and advice in the production of the final text. Michael Wright, the Deputy Librar- ian at RMA Sandhurst, produced the index. Finally, a special thank you to my wife Pamela whose patience and fortitude sustained me throughout the research and writing of this book. Sandhurst 1976 C.E.M. vii . The flag of the Soviet Union flies over the oceans of the world. Sooner or later the United States will have to understand that it no longer has mastery of the seas . Sergei G. Gorshkov Admiral of the Fleet to the Soviet Union 1974 Contents Introduction PART ONE The Russian Maritime Heritage 3 From Peter the Great to the Russo-Japanese War and defeat at the Battle of Tsushima The Red Navy 16 From Imperiahsm to the Bolshevik Revolution and Russian seapower during the Second World War The Soviet Navy and the Cold war 29 Stahn and seapower in the Post-War World. Khrushchev and the Red Navy in the years of Renaissance The Cuban Missile Crisis 40 Confrontation in the Caribbean and the influence of the Cuban episode on the Soviet Navy The Emergence of the Modern Soviet Navy 51 Soviet seapower during the sixties and the emergence of a nuclear navy Mission Strategy and Soviet Foreign 63 Policy in the 1970s The aims and objectives of Soviet seapower: Gorshkov and the new navy and nuclear deterrence at sea ix X Contents PART TWO 7 The Red Navy in the Mediterranean 75 The Montreux Convention and Soviet deployments in the Aegean. Russian foreign policy in the Middle East and maritime deployments. Confrontation with the Sixth Fleet. Soviet perceptions on the Mediterranean 8 Northern Deployments 88 The Northern Fleet and the Kola Base Complex. Soviet maritime interests in the North Atlantic and the North Cape. The Red Navy in the Baltic Sea. The Soviet maritime threat to NATO Northern Flank 9 The Soviet Fleet and the Indian Ocean 103 Early deployments and training cruises. The Russians in search of base facilities. Sino-Indian relations, super pov^'er navies and the Indo-Pakistan War 10 The Pacific Fleet 117 Strategic considerations and super power interests in the Pacific Ocean. The Seventh Fleet and the Asian Balance. Local tensions and conflicts in the South China Sea. The Sino-Soviet dispute and the emergence of the Red Chinese Navy 11 Conclusions. The Soviet Navy: 125 Myth and Reality An analysis of Soviet naval power and capabilities today within the context of contemporary maritime strategy Appendix 1: Soviet naval strengths/deployments 135 Appendix 2 : Soviet naval missiles 137 Appendix 3: Warship classification 140 Appendix 4: The military balance at sea: the United 144 States/Soviet Union Select Bibliography 145 Index Introduction Alfred Thayer Mahan, the American strategist and military philo- sopher whose writing has had a profound influence on naval affairs since the latter part of the nineteenth century, believed seapower to be crucial to a nation's wealth and prestige. Since the Second World War, Britain's status as a great naval power has declined. Russia, meanwhile, has built up a naval capabiUty of awe-inspiring dimensions. It was the Soviet involvement in Angola in November 1975 which marked the real emergence of Russia as a world power, influential well beyond her own military bounds. She will no doubt take further opportunities, where they arise, to demonstrate her influence through her ever-increasing seapower. Since the days of Peter the Great the Russians have proved them- selves to be good shipbuilders, and their latest warships have earned the praise of Western experts; Kiev, for example, which combines beauty with menace, makes the Ark Royal seem positively matronly. Remembering that there could perhaps in time be six warships of this class, each complemented by cruiser and destroyer escorts and supported by a growing afloat support, it is not difficult to imagine such a force posing a real threat in a confrontation with the Free World. Soviet seapower is not, of course, confined to the sea's surface; beneath it lurk the latest Soviet missile-armed nuclear-powered submarines. Ever-increasing numbers of the modern Delta and Yankee class vessels are deployed in support of the Soviet nuclear threat as a counter to the Polaris and Poseidon submarines of the Western navies. The Soviet submarine inventory also includes the xi xii The Russian Navy: Myth and Reality excellent Charlie class hunter-killer with its sophisticated anti-ship missile system. The submarine forces of the confrontation powers are always deployed on a war footing in their operational cruises, and, whether strategic missile or hunter-killer, shadow their oppon- ents in a game of Hfe and death. Closer inshore, spy trawlers probe and monitor our vulnerable coastline, a constant reminder of increasing Soviet inquisitiveness. Finally, the Hammer and Sickle can be seen flying from the sterns of freighters in all the ports of the world, as the Soviet mercantile marine, free from the constraints of the profit motive, competes for the carriage of goods in what many experts see as an incipient form of economic warfare. Outlined thus, Soviet naval power assumes frightening dimensions.