Black Sea Naval Actions

[Raellus]

Fire For Ground-Effect!

Great suggestion. I'm a big fan of Soviet ground-effect aircraft. There was just something about them that I found scary, as a late Cold War kid. I'll definitely include mention in my write up of Black Sea naval actions.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

I didn't hear much about the Soviet ekranoplans until the the mid-1990s and the lack of information made them very mysterious which just served to make them seem very exotic.
It'll be great to see something that makes use of them and taps into the mystery surrounding them (when something gets called the "Caspian Sea Monster", it practically begs to be used in a scenario or two!).

That'll be a nice counter to the handful of people who talk about them as failures because it's a "plane that can't fly properly" (yes I have seen this type of comment on some videos, they described ekranoplans as failures because they could only fly a few metres above the ground - missing the entire point of a ground effect vehicle).

[RN7]

The narrow strait called the Bosporus and Dardanelles that links Europe with Asia, and the Black Sea with the Mediterranean Sea, is under the complete control of Turkey and NATO.

It is very hard to force the Bosporus/Dardanelles. The Byzantines held it for centuries until the Turks captured Constantinople (modern Istanbul) which straddles both sides of the Bosporus in the late 15th Century that led to the formation of the modern nation of Turkey and the Ottoman Empire. The Russian have wanted to control the Dardanelles ever since but have never been able to capture it. The British Empire tried to capture it in the First World War. It led to the disaster known as the Gallipoli Campaign. Australia and New Zealand still shake their heads in dismay at the number of casualties it cost.

The Black Sea is also quite small in area compared with the Mediterranean. It can easily be dominated by airpower. The southern shore is under NATO control, the northern shore is under Soviet/Russian control. Any large naval force than enters the Black Sea would be quickly taken apart by land based air forces, but there could be some smaller naval actions with patrol boats and fast attack craft along the coasts of Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey and maybe the Ukraine, Russia and Georgia.

[Raellus]

Speak of the Devil

I didn't hear much about the Soviet ekranoplans until the the mid-1990s and the lack of information made them very mysterious which just served to make them seem very exotic.
It'll be great to see something that makes use of them and taps into the mystery surrounding them (when something gets called the "Caspian Sea Monster", it practically begs to be used in a scenario or two!).

That'll be a nice counter to the handful of people who talk about them as failures because it's a "plane that can't fly properly" (yes I have seen this type of comment on some videos, they described ekranoplans as failures because they could only fly a few metres above the ground - missing the entire point of a ground effect vehicle).

Hot off the digital press:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/35267/the-only-missile-toting-ekranoplan-russia-ever-built-just-took-its-last-trip-on-the-caspian

And I included one in my current T2k-related project.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

Nice!
For myself, once information began appearing on the internet about ekranoplans I went on a mad spree looking up everything I could find about them. This lead to wandering through a whole field of Wing In Ground-effect vehicles. While we typically hear about the Soviet WIG vehicles, there's a slew of designs in the civilian world that we rarely hear about.

China has also experimented with wing in ground effect craft but on the civilian front (some designs are however, offered for police or military maritime operations).
Where it gets interesting for us as gamers though, is that Germany also designed some small WIG craft for civilian use. The first design was produced in 1970 and the second design in 1977. Further developments were pursued up to the early 2000s but some of those designs were produced in the 1980s and early 1990s. The company behind all this, Fischer Flugmechanik, was located in Mnchengladbach in West Germany and as far as I have checked, they were still in business after 2011.

These smaller WIG craft make for some unusual vehicles for the PCs for a particular adventure or as something a little strange for the PCs to stumble across.
Some links for those who want to find out more or want to convert some of these smaller WIG types to game stats (although the early designs were typically two or four place only, they could carry approximately 200kg of cargo): -
Fischer Flugmechanik

http://fischer-flugmechanik.com/site/index.phpmenu=background

https://sites.google.com/site/hoverwingwigcraft/Home

Data sheets

https://archive.is/20130927225354/http://hoverwing.webs.com/datasheets.htm

[Raellus]

A Little Help, Please

Do any of our naval experts here happen to have a list of Soviet Black Sea Fleet vessels c. 1988 (i.e. late Cold War) I've done a bit of internet sleuthing and haven't had much luck. Any assistance you can provide will be greatly appreciated.

And I'm just going to repost this here, as the Hurricane was, at one time, based in the Black Sea:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/41048/the-soviet-era-hurricane-high-speed-missile-boat-had-absolutely-gargantuan-hydrofoils

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[Ursus Maior]

Do any of our naval experts here happen to have a list of Soviet Black Sea Fleet vessels c. 1988 (i.e. late Cold War)

I got a copy of IISS: The Military Balance (1989) here and it lists the following (I kept the original format, put the cited text in italics, with brackets and regular text used for my notes).

BLACK SEA FLEET: (HQ Sevastopol): (97,000). [The number seems to give total personnel]
BASES: Sevastopol, Balaclava, Poti, Odessa.
SUBMARINES: 28: tactical 26: 2 SSG, 24 SS; other
roles: 2.
PRINCIPAL SURFACE COMBATANTS: 65: 10 cruisers,
18 destroyers, 37 frigates.
OTHER SURFACE SHIPS: 80 patrol and coastal
combatants, 63 mine warfare, 15 amph, some
I 50 spt and misc. ["spt" stands for support here.]
NAVAL AVIATION:
105 cbt ac; 80 cbt hel. ["cbt ac" for combat aircraft, "cbt hel" for combat helicopters.]
BOMBERS: 80: 2 regt with 40 Tu-26; I with 25
Tu-16; I with 15 Tu-22.
ASW:
AIRCRAFT: 25 Be-l2.
HELICOPTERS: 80: Ka-25, Ka-27, Mi-14.
MR/EW:
AIRCRAFT: 40: 25 Tu-I6, 10 Tu-22, 5 An-12;
HELICOPTERS: 5 Ka-25.
MCM: 5 Mi-14 hel.
TANKERS: 5 Tu-I 6.
NAVAL INFANTRY:
I bde: 5 bn: 3,000.["bde" stands for brigade, "bn" for battalion, the number is again for total personnel.]

I also have the 1990 issue, but not 1988. Unfortunately cruisers, destroyers and frigates were not differentiated. You could check for the Russian and Ukrainian Black Sea Fleet on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sea_Fleet and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_Navy) and deduce from there. The Ukrainians didn't build anything major since then and the article on the Russians has dates of commission listed. The old types today were the newish types back then. But that's as accurate as I can give you.

[Raellus]

Thanks, Ursus. That's a helpful start. I'd like to get a ship class (eg Krivak, Udaloy, etc.) breakdown, if possible. Actual ship names would be ideal, but that might be asking a bit much.

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[Mahatatain]

This may not be particularly relevant for this discussion but, regarding Turkish naval forces in the Black Sea, are you aware of Bartin Naval Base

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bart%C4%B1n_Naval_Base

I suspect that any subs based there wouldn't have lasted very long against the Soviet Black Sea Fleet though.....

[Raellus]

Nice Find

Thanks, Mahatatain. I did not know about that place. The v1 timeline has Turkey attack the Warsaw Pact (Bulgaria) first, so it's likely the Turkish Navy sortied all of their operational subs first, but I imagine the Soviets would go after that sub base sooner or later. I wonder how they'd try to take it out. Earth penetrator bombs Nuclear torpedo AFAIK, there's no canonical nuclear target list for Turkey.

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[Mahatatain]

Thanks, Mahatatain. I did not know about that place. The v1 timeline has Turkey attack the Warsaw Pact (Bulgaria) first, so it's likely the Turkish Navy sortied all of their operational subs first, but I imagine the Soviets would go after that sub base sooner or later. I wonder how they'd try to take it out. Earth penetrator bombs Nuclear torpedo AFAIK, there's no canonical nuclear target list for Turkey.

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It's quite a small base I think so my guess is that the Soviets wouldn't waste large munitions on it. I think that the Soviet military would be able to destroy any Turkish subs before they returned to that base to rearm after completing their pre-emptive missions. Essentially I see Turkish subs in the Black Sea as having a short lifespan so once they are destroyed why bother to knock out their base

[Ursus Maior]

Back in the day, every military base was worth a nuke or two, at least air-delivered tactical nukes or by cruise missile. The amount of warheads available was insanely high, so usage was practically mandatory according to the aphorism "use it or loose it".

[Ursus Maior]

Thanks, Ursus. That's a helpful start. I'd like to get a ship class (eg Krivak, Udaloy, etc.) breakdown, if possible. Actual ship names would be ideal, but that might be asking a bit much.

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Wikipedia is a good place for research here as all Soviet/Russian types of destroyers have a total list of produced ships with names and yards available. Yards almost ever give away the fleet, it's noted if otherwise. So for 1988-1990 timeframe we have:

Destroyers

• Kotlin-class: Byvalvyy, Besslednyy, Burlivyy, Blagorodnyy, Blestyashchyy, Plammeny, Naporystyy (all ASW-variant), Bravyy (SAM-variant Type 56K, not the the Type 56A SAM variant, not sure what's the difference, though).
• Kashin-class: Komsomolets Ukrainy, Soobrazitelnyy, Provornyy, Krasny Kavkaz, Reshitelnyy, Strogiy, Smetlivy, Krasny Krym, Sposobnyy, Skoryy (all baseline Project 61; note: Orel, later Otvazhny sank in 1974 after a missile fire accident), Stroynyy (decommissioned in 1990), Smyshlenyy (both Project 61MP; note: Smelyy was leased in 1988 to Poland, becoming ORP Warszawa), plus Sderzhanny (Project 61M).
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanin-...stroyer-class: Gnevnyy, Upornyy, Boykiy. The latter two were decommissioned in 1987 and 1988 respectively.

Not totally sure if the count adds up with that of Military Balance, though. There might be a difference there of 1-2 vessels.

Frigates

I presume Military Balance lists corvettes as frigates, at least when it comes to the Soviet Union. Denominations vary a lot in navies. The problem is, the USSR built a lot of ship types and often several iterations of the same type for different tasks. Also, they built stuff that looks funky to Western analysts or gamers like me, e. g. a hover craft corvette, which might qualify as a coastal combatant, but at 1,000+ tons might also be to large for that. So, I cannot really tell you what Military Balance counts as what. Wikipedia has a nice list of ship types however.

• Project 1135 (Krivak I): 7 ships, names as per link.
• Project 11351 Nerey (Krivak III): 9 ships, names as per link above.
• Bora-class hovercraft: the aforementioned fast-attack hover corvette; 1 commissioned in 1989, 1 to follow in 1992.
• Grisha-class corvette: At least 3 were in service in the Russian navy after 2000 and they were of the Grisha I and III classes. Probably more were built for the Black Sea Fleet.

The lack of modern Udaloys and Sovremenny destroyers is immediately noted, but can be explained by the disadvantageous position of the Black Sea Fleet, which indeed has everything to do with the Black Sea itself. It's a marginal sea that locks the USSR from accessing the Mediterranean Sea, which itself is marginal as well, but of course of huge strategical importance. Also, the Montreux Convention Regarding the Regime of the Straits governs access to and from the Black Sea and puts limits on what the Soviets could transit to and from the Black Sea without infringing upon the sovereignty of Turkey. Turkey itself had a Black Sea presence, but was hardly in a position to attack the USSR by amphibian operations. So, the Black Sea Fleet became somewhat of a stepchild of USSR naval plannings.

[Raellus]

Thanks so much, Ursus. I really appreciate you going to all that trouble.

I went through my copy of Encyclopedia of Warships (Robert Jackson, 2006) last night and found references to the following vessels also being part of the Black Sea Fleet during the late Cold War period.

2 Sverdlov class gun cruisers: Admiral Ushakov,
1 Kynda class rocket cruister: Admiral Golovko
2 Slava class guided missile cruisers: Marshal Ustinov*, Admiral Lobov**

X Mirka I & II class FFLs (apparently all of them served in the Black Sea)

2 Alligator Class landing ships

For submarines, I found a Tango prototype, a Whiskey 'Twin Cylinder', and a Kilo fitted with pumpjet propulsion. I doubt that's it. I'll have to poke around some more on Wikipedia and see what else I can dig up.

*According to Wikipedia, the Marshal Ustinov is part of the Northern Fleet and the Moskva is part of the Black Sea Fleet, but that is current operational status.

**This vessel was ceded to Ukraine upon dissolution of the USSR (where it is known as the Ukrayina)- I'm assuming that the Soviets would have held on to it had the USSR not dissolved.

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[Ursus Maior]

Thanks so much, Ursus. I really appreciate you going to all that trouble.

I went through my copy of Encyclopedia of Warships (Robert Jackson, 2006) last night and found references to the following vessels also being part of the Black Sea Fleet during the late Cold War period.

2 Sverdlov class gun cruisers: Admiral Ushakov,
1 Kynda class rocket cruister: Admiral Golovko
2 Slava class guided missile cruisers: Marshal Ustinov*, Admiral Lobov**

X Mirka I & II class FFLs (apparently all of them served in the Black Sea)

2 Alligator Class landing ships

For submarines, I found a Tango prototype, a Whiskey 'Twin Cylinder', and a Kilo fitted with pumpjet propulsion. I doubt that's it. I'll have to poke around some more on Wikipedia and see what else I can dig up.

*According to Wikipedia, the Marshal Ustinov is part of the Northern Fleet and the Moskva is part of the Black Sea Fleet, but that is current operational status.

**This vessel was ceded to Ukraine upon dissolution of the USSR (where it is known as the Ukrayina)- I'm assuming that the Soviets would have held on to it had the USSR not dissolved.

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The Marshal Ustinov was pretty certainly not part of the Black Sea Fleet as the local shipyard there had built Dzerzhinsky, Admiral Nakhimov, Mikhail Kutuzov and started Admiral Kornilov (never finished). The three Sverdlovs of the Black Sea Fleet had mixed service lives. Kutuzov was - officially - only decommissioned in 2000, but I don't know in what state. Certainly she had no battle value by then. Dzerzhinsky was decommissioned in 1989. That's about as long as I could imagine for a gun cruiser. Actually, it's 25 year to much...

There could have been a couple of Mirka-class frigates in the Black Sea by then, but I have nearly not info on that class. Also, it's funny they would be classed as frigates. At under 1,200 tons fully loaded, it's hardly in the ball park of even contemporary frigates. But hey, they got a radar, a HMS, a dipper, torpedoes, RBUs and four (!) 76 mm guns. So I guess they count. Mirkas were exclusively built in Kaliningrad, though. So, I don't know if any made the transfer.

The other cruisers were the Admiral Golovko (Kynda), the flagship fleet of the Black Sea Fleet back then. Then the Moskva (Slava), which is still in service today. The main force in the Black Sea Fleet were three of the seven Kara-class guided-missile cruisers, Nikolayev, Ochakov, Kerch and Azov. The other three went to the Pacific fleet. The Karas were essentially enlarged Kresta II-class cruisers and at 8,000-10,000 tons they packed quite a punch.

Submarines: I have no clue as my data is sparse there. But they built Tangos in that lake and I know of some Kilos. So my bet is on those plus Foxtrots and Whiskeys, because there were 250+ Whiskeys built by the USSR and I'll be damned if none made it to the Black Sea.