By Lens Legends @Adobe Stock
David Axe of Forbes reports that Russia’s Black Sea Fleet could cease to function in two years amid drone and missile strikes. Urkaine has been hitting Russia’s fleet with drone boats as well as Storm Shadow and SCALP-EG cruise missiles, decimating their ships in the Black Sea. He writes:
The Ukrainian missile raid on the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s anchorage in Sevastopol, in occupied Crimea, didn’t hit two Russian warships.
No, according to an update from Ukrainian authorities, the Sunday raid—involving either air-launched Storm Shadow and SCALP-EG cruise missiles or ground-launched Neptunes or a mix of all three—struck four Russian ships. […]
Satellite images of all four project 775 ropucha-class landing ships in Sevastopol.
Near one of the ships, a trace of an impact on the pier is visible. Another ship is being towed into the dry dock. But on the satellite images provided, no significant damage to the ships is… https://t.co/wBcb5yWhJb pic.twitter.com/ThIJI1Fwvj— Special Kherson Cat (@bayraktar_1love) March 24, 2024
At this rate, the Black Sea Fleet could cease to function in another 18 months or two years. And there’s not much the wider Russian navy can do to halt this steady degradation, as it can’t reinforce the Black Sea Fleet with large ships.
Bigger vessels that can’t move by land or river must pass through the Bosporus Strait to enter the Black Sea. Turkey controls the strait and doesn’t allow combatants to transit during wartime.
Read more here.
Turkey Straits Closed to Warships – February 2022
Since Turkey closed its Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits to warships in Feb 2022, Russia will not be able to resupply its fleet. Heather Mongilio of USNI News tells her readers that the decision to restrict warships, a power given to Turkey by the Montreux Convention of 1936, will likely limit Russia’s ability to move ships from its other fleets to the Black Sea. She writes:
Turkey has closed off the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits to warships from any country, whether or not they border the Black Sea, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The strait closures will still allow warships through if they are returning to a home base in the Black Sea, according to reporting from Naval News. This would include Russian ships in the country’s Black Sea Fleet.
However, the decision to restrict warships, a power given to Turkey by the Montreux Convention of 1936, will likely limit Russia’s ability to move ships from its other fleets to the Black Sea.
Read more here.
