The Naval Forces of Ukraine (Naval Forces) celebrated their 18th anniversary this year. Age of majority. However, their real transformation into a more or less full-fledged type of armed forces took place not by the decree of President Leonid Kravchuk of April 5, 1992, but after the partition of the former Black Sea Fleet of the USSR. Then, in 1997, the former Soviet republic received 138 of its ships and vessels, a significant number of coastal infrastructure facilities. Alas, it was not possible to preserve all this wealth: the country's economy was unable to “pull” such a vast and complex economy. For example, all three patrol ships of the Burevestnik class were decommissioned, the Navy and unique small amphibious assault ships on an air cushion of the Zubr type were deprived.
However, the formation of the Naval Forces of Ukraine took place. They exist, have combat-ready ships, aircraft and ground weapons and are a factor of strength in the Black Sea. True, not too powerful - in the line of foreign navies in this theater, the Ukrainian fleet is in the same positions with the Bulgarian Navy, inferior to the Romanian, not to mention the Turkish. The latter are today superior in all respects to the Russian Black Sea Fleet (not taking into account its nuclear potential). And this despite the fact that after the collapse of the USSR, Ukraine got first-class shipyards, where you can build ships of any class, up to aircraft carriers.
WHAT IS AHEAD?
In general, observing the officers and sailors of the Naval Forces of Ukraine speaking in Russian (they are distinguished from our Black Sea sailors only by the sleeve patches with the blue cross of the naval flag of Ukraine), communicating with them, you do not feel any mutual alienation. By the way, it should be noted the tradition, forgotten in Russia (by the way, back in the USSR), but revived in the Ukrainian navy, the tradition of putting the names of warships on the ribbons of the cap. So if, walking around Sevastopol (more reminiscent today of Green's Zurbagan than a formidable naval base), you see a sailor with the proud inscription “Locked” on a ribbon, you should know: in front of you is not just anyone, but a submariner with the only one in the Navy and quite an epic submarine “Zaporizhzhia ". Epic because from the moment it was handed over to the Ukrainian Naval Forces, it is still being "put into operation."
Addressing on July 4, the Day of the Ukrainian Fleet, to the personnel of the Ukrainian Navy, the new commander-in-chief Viktor Yanukovych, who was on board the flagship frigate Hetman Sagaidachny, said that the development of the fleet is a priority of the state power and of him personally as the country's president.
What this development will be is not yet quite clear. In any case, the Ukrainian defense industry and shipbuilding have not yet shown themselves in any way, except for small boats for maritime border guards. It is known about the intentions to start building new 1200-ton corvettes for the Navy, but there is little specificity here. And the fleet is content with what it has. The problems that beset him are evidenced, for example, by the fact that, to participate in the July 4 parade, the Whirlwind missile boats arrived in the Sevastopol Bay in tow - a crisis, however. Solarium is expensive today.
Today, about 15 thousand people serve in the Naval Forces of Ukraine. Organizationally, the military fleet of Ukraine consists of a naval operations center with subordinate forces, South and Western naval bases, a brigade of river ships on the Dnieper (training boats, base - Kiev), a naval aviation brigade, a coastal defense center, service and support formations. The Naval Forces of Ukraine also includes a special purpose marine radio engineering detachment (its radars can be observed on the picturesque Mount Ai-Petri) and the State Oceanarium of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine research center. The fleet is based in Sevastopol, Balaklava, Novoozernoye (on Lake Donuzlav), Evpatoria, Kerch, Nikolaev, Ochakov, Odessa, Black Sea and Feodosia.
The training of officers is carried out at the PS Nakhimov Academy of the Navy (formerly the Sevastopol Naval Institute, and before that - the Black Sea Higher Naval School of the USSR Navy). It also has a naval college for foremen.
COUNTING THE PENNANTS …
The Naval Operations Center is the main part of the Ukrainian fleet. Its main unit is a squadron of heterogeneous forces. The large diesel submarine Zaporozhye of Project 641 and the reserve command ship Donbass, reclassified from the floating workshop, are directly subordinate to its command. The core of the compound is a brigade of surface ships (Kurinaya Bay of Sevastopol), which includes the flagship frigate Hetman Sagaidachny of project 1135.1, command ship Slavutich of project 12884, large landing ship Konstantin Olshansky of project 775, medium landing ship Kirovograd of project 773 and anti-sabotage boats "Feodosia" and "Golaya Pristan".
The core is the core, but the main striking force of the country's fleet is the missile boat brigade, which is part of the squadron and based in Streletskaya Bay, consisting of the Pridneprovye and Kremenchug RCs of project 1241.1 (of the Molniya type), as well as Priluki and Kakhovka "project 206МР (type" Whirlwind "). The boats of the "Lightning" type are classified by the Ukrainian Navy as corvettes - to make them sound more solid. All of them are armed with Termit anti-ship missiles with a range of 80 km. The last time shooting practice "Termit" took place two years ago. This is an expensive pleasure.
The brigade of ships for the protection of the water area, which is part of the squadron, settled in the Southern Naval Base on Lake Donuzlav. There are small anti-submarine ships (aka corvettes) of project 1124M of the Albatross type - Lutsk and Ternopil, project 1241.2 - Uzhgorod and Khmelnitsky, project 1124P - Vinnitsa, sea minesweepers of project 266M - Chernigov "And" Cherkassy ". The combat effectiveness of "Uzhgorod", "Khmelnitsky" and "Vinnitsa" is extremely doubtful. As for the "Lutsk" and "Ternopil", completed from the Soviet reserve at the Kiev "Leninskaya Kuznitsa", respectively, in 1994 and 2006, these are the newest military units of the Ukrainian Navy. By the way, in a high degree of readiness at the Feodosiya shipbuilding plant "More" there are small anti-submarine ships (corvettes) on hydrofoils "Lvov" and "Lugansk" of project 1145.1 - the same as the only one in the Black Sea Fleet of Russia "Vladimir", which can be seen at the pier in the South Bay of Sevastopol. But it is not known whether they will be included in the combat strength of the Naval Forces of Ukraine.
By the way, the minesweeper "Chernigov" until 2004 was called "Yellow Waters", about which the Russian sailors joked: "Yellow Waters" entered the Black Sea. " Now the reason for the witticisms remained with their Ukrainian colleagues, since only Mineralnye Vody now go out into the bluest sea in the world - that is how someone managed to call one of the basic minesweepers of the Black Sea Fleet.
In addition to the squadron, the Naval Operations Center of the Naval Forces of Ukraine has separate divisions of ships to guard the water area. In Odessa, such a division includes the Project 1258 Genichesk raid minesweeper (mine-sweeping boat according to the Ukrainian classification) and the Pivdenny artillery boat - a training Polish project 772, on which a 14.5-mm anti-aircraft machine-gun twin was installed. There are also a couple of multipurpose boats of the Yaroslavets type with machine guns. In the Donuzlavskiy separate division of the OVR, the base minesweeper "Melitopol" of project 1265 is listed.
The most secret part of the Naval Forces of Ukraine can be considered the center of naval special operations - this is the former special purpose brigade of the Soviet Black Sea Fleet. Ukrainian combat swimmers are stationed in Ochakov and on the island of Pervomaisky. The center includes detachments of underwater mining, underwater demining and breaking through antiamphibious obstacles, reconnaissance and anti-sabotage. A project 1400M Skadovsk patrol boat and Svatove and Bryanka self-propelled amphibious assault boats based in Ochakov were assigned to it.
Auxiliary vessels and basic floating assets of the fleet were brought together in the center of search and rescue operations and divisions of support vessels based in Sevastopol, Donuzlav and Odessa.
THERE ARE WINGS AND SPECIAL FORCES
The Naval Air Brigade of the Naval Forces of Ukraine settled at the airfield in the vicinity of the resort town of Saki. It includes aviation and helicopter squadrons. The first has four Be-12 amphibious seaplanes designed to solve anti-submarine defense and search and rescue missions, a pair of light military transport aircraft An-26 and an An-2 biplane, which is attached to the center of maritime special operations and provides parachute training for its personnel. in Ochakov. The helicopter squadron includes eight Ka-27 anti-submarine and search and rescue shipborne Ka-27 and Mi-14 amphibians, several Ka-29 shipborne transport and combat rotorcraft and conventional Mi-8 amphibious transport aircraft. One of the Ka-27 helicopters is based on board the Hetman Sagaidachny frigate.
The Coastal Defense Center is what happened as a result of organizational and staff measures to which the 32nd Army Corps and the 10th Separate Marine Brigade, as well as the units of the coastal missile and artillery forces of the Black Sea Fleet that were transferred to the Ukrainian Navy, were subjected to. Today, the center includes a separate coastal defense brigade with headquarters in Simferopol, a separate marine battalion in Feodosia and a separate coastal missile division. A separate coastal defense brigade has a tank battalion scattered across the Crimea, equipped with MBT T-64, three mechanized battalions, a brigade artillery group with 122-mm self-propelled ("Gvozdika") and towed (D-30) howitzers, as well as multiple launch rocket systems Grad, anti-tank artillery battalion with 100-mm Rapira cannons and self-propelled anti-tank missile systems Konkurs, anti-aircraft missile and artillery battalion with self-propelled anti-aircraft guns “Shilka” and self-propelled air defense systems “Strela-10”, marine engineering battalion, company electronic warfare and support units.
A separate coastal missile division includes two mobile coastal missile systems "Rubezh" with boat missiles "Termit". In addition, during the division of the Black Sea Fleet, Ukraine received a long-range operational-tactical stationary coastal missile system "Utes" near Balaklava ("object 100"). Today, what are left of him are, as they say, horns and legs. By the way, this object is known to everyone who has seen the film "Solitary Voyage" - in it he "played" for the Americans, who really had nothing of the kind.
The State Aquarium of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine is located in the Cossack Bay and on Cape Fiolent. There are carried out research related to aquanautics and, presumably, the experiments with dolphins carried out in the Soviet era in the interests of the fleet have been revived. Two vessels are assigned to the aquarium - the diving "Pochaev" and the experimental "Kamenka", at the disposal of its employees are also underwater vehicles - the manned "Rif", "Langust", "Sever-2" and remote-controlled.
FRONTIERS UNDER SEA PROTECTION
In a broad sense, the sea guard units of the State Border Service of the country are a constituent element of the military fleet of Ukraine. In terms of their composition, they are not inferior to the Azov-Black Sea coast guard units of the Border Guard Service of the FSB of Russia.
The Ukrainian Maritime Guard consists of Izmail (river, on the Danube), Odessa, Sevastopol (in Balaklava), Yalta and Kerch detachments, Mariupol separate division and the Dnieper river group. It has border patrol ships (actually small anti-submarine ships) of project 1241.2 - "Grigory Kuropyatnikov", "Poltava" and "Grigory Gnatenko", project 205P - "Volyn", "Nikolaev", "Heroes of Kerch", "Bukovina", "Donbass", "Odessa", "Transcarpathia" and "Pavel Derzhavin", river armored boats of project 1204 - "Izmail", "Lubny", "Nizhyn" and "Kanev", 12 patrol boats of project 1400M, about 70 small boats of the new Ukrainian projects "Kalkan "," Katran "," Galleon-280 "," Galia-640 "," Khvilya ", UMS-600, project 14670 messenger boats" Lviv "and" Kryvyi Rih "and other plavydinitsy.
Until recently, the border guards also had a high-speed gas turbine patrol boat on hydrofoils of the "Galicia" type "Antares" (project 133), but, as it became known, it had already served its purpose. The Yalta-based presidential pleasure yacht Crimea of project 1360 is also sailing under the border flag - the sister of the Russian presidential yacht Kavkaz, assigned to Sochi (both, by the way, before Roman Abramovich's Eclipse, as Oka to Bentley ").
The Maritime Guard operates the oldest warship in Ukraine, the headquarters Danube, as part of the Izmail detachment. This is the former German Navy minesweeper "Grafenau", built in the 40s and captured by the Red Army as a trophy.
According to the plans published by the White Papers on the defense policy of Ukraine for the coming years, the Naval Forces will have 15 warships, not counting boats, 4 anti-submarine aircraft, 10 anti-submarine helicopters, in the coastal defense forces - 39 main battle tanks, 65-66 artillery systems of caliber more than 100 mm and 91 armored combat vehicles while maintaining the existing organizational structure. And this means that no special development of the Naval Forces of Ukraine in the foreseeable future seems to be visible. However, it should be borne in mind that these are plans from the presidency of Viktor Yushchenko. To the same period, there are also conversations about the intention to receive, in the order of rendering military assistance, some ships from the United States that are unnecessary for the American fleet.
Conversations, however, remained conversations. The future will show whether the naval priorities of the new president of Ukraine will be implemented and to what extent. By the way, in that festive address to the Ukrainian sailors (sounded in Russian) Viktor Yanukovych also noted the intensification of cooperation with Russia, which could hardly have been expected from his predecessor.
However, Kiev is clearly not going to curtail cooperation with NATO in the naval area. This is evidenced by the multilateral "anti-piracy" exercises Sea Breeze 2010, which took place in July on the Black Sea, in which, along with the ships of Ukraine, the American frigate Taylor and the Turkish Yavuz took part. In addition to Ukrainian aviation, the base patrol aircraft P-3 "Orion" of the USA and the German transport aircraft C-160 "Transal", which dropped Ukrainian troops on the Shirokiy Lan training ground in the Nikolaev region, helped the fight against mock pirates from the air. Georgian and Moldovan infantrymen were also involved in the maneuvers.
However, the Russian Navy is periodically practicing all kinds of counter-terrorism and search and rescue injections in joint exercises with the North Atlantic Alliance. Therefore, it is not excluded that ships of the Russian fleet will appear on the Sea Breeze.
