The last major war the Navy fought in was World War II. Neither the Germans nor the Japanese used any significant naval forces against the Soviet Navy. This created the conditions under which the weak and small navy was able to carry out dozens of landing operations, some of which had a decisive influence on the course of the war as a whole, and we owe the Kuril operation now that the shelf of the Sea of Okhotsk went to Russia, and it itself, together with Primorye, "fenced off" from the ocean and any enemy in it by a defensive chain of islands.
The Great Patriotic War and the war with Japan gave both the Navy and the country a very important lesson. It consists of the following: landing from the sea, landed at the right time in the right place, has an impact on the enemy that is disproportionately large in comparison with its numbers.
If a brigade of marines had not landed in the lip of Zapadnaya Litsa at the beginning of 1941, and it is not known how the German offensive on Murmansk would have ended. Murmansk would have fallen, and the USSR would not have received, for example, half of aviation gasoline, every tenth tank, a quarter of all gunpowder, almost all aluminum, from which aircraft engines and diesel engines for the T-34 were made in the most difficult period of the war, and much more …
And if it had not been for the Kerch-Feodosiya landing operation, and it is not known from what positions the Germans in 1942 would then begin to attack the Caucasus, and where this offensive would end in the end, it is not known in which sector of the front at the beginning of 1942 11- I am Manstein's army, and where it would become the very "straw that broke the spine." But it would be absolutely certain.
Landings of sea and river assault forces became the basis of the Navy's activities, even despite its absolute unpreparedness for this type of combat operations. The marines had to be recruited from the crew, there were no special amphibious ships, there was no amphibious equipment, the troops did not have any special amphibious training or experience, but even under these conditions, the Soviet landings caused colossal damage to the Wehrmacht, having a strategic (in general) influence and greatly facilitated the Red Army's waging war on land.
Material and technical means to support landing operations should be prepared in advance Is the second important lesson from past experience. Otherwise, the victory begins to cost too many human lives - those who drowned on the way to the shore due to inability to swim or because of the wrong choice of the landing site, who died from frostbite, walking up to their neck in icy water, before going out on the captured coast, those who were forced to attack the enemy without artillery support from the sea, because enemy aircraft did not allow large surface ships to operate, and small ships with artillery were not in the required number.
It makes sense to consider to what extent the Navy is now ready to help the ground forces if it is needed again.
Currently, the Russian Federation has a well-trained and motivated marines. With all the skepticism that can be caused by elite troops manned by conscripts, it must be admitted that the MP are very combat-ready troops with, among other things, high morale, which any enemy who does not have an overwhelming numerical or firepower superiority will be able to cope with extremely difficult, if not impossible. The Marines live up to the reputation that their wartime predecessors earned with blood. There are various drawbacks to the Marine Corps, but who doesn't?
However, all of this applies to a situation where the marines are already on the ground. However, it is called "sea" because first it needs to land on land from the sea. And this is where the questions begin.
To understand the current situation, it is necessary to turn to the practice of using amphibious assault forces in modern warfare.
During World War II, the main method of the amphibious assault operation was the landing of amphibious troops from small ships and boats. If the Americans had special landing boats, then, for example, the USSR had mostly mobilized ships, but the principle was the same - landing units on small ships and boats approach the coast and land the first echelon on the coastal strip accessible to the infantry, here and further we will call it for brevity the non-military word "beach". In the future, the landing of the second echelons took place in different ways. The USSR had to unload transport somewhere, as a rule, this required the seizure of berths. Which could be approached by large ships. The United States had several hundred tank landing ships LST (Landing ship, tank) from which they could land mechanized troops, both directly from ship to shore and from ship to shore via a pontoon bridge unloaded from the ship itself.
If the landing ports were far from the landing zone, then the practice was to transfer paratroopers from large transports (in the USSR Navy - from warships) to small landing craft directly at sea. The Americans, in addition, used special tracked amphibious transporters LVT (Landing vehicle, tracked), their armored and armed versions, wheeled amphibious trucks, and LSI (Landing ship, infantry) infantry landing ships. The USSR occasionally practiced a combination of parachute and amphibious assault. Also, the USSR successfully practiced landings in the port, in contrast to the Anglo-Americans, who considered landings in the port unjustified.
After WWII, the airborne formations of developed countries experienced a crisis caused by the emergence of nuclear weapons. In the USSR, the Marines were disbanded, in the United States, Truman did not have enough to do the same, but there the Marines were saved by the War in Korea. By the time it began, the Marine Corps was in a dire state of underfunding and general disregard for its existence, but after the war, the question of eliminating the Marine Corps never arose.
Since the 50s - 60s, a revolution has been taking place in the practice of amphibious assault. Landing helicopters and landing helicopter carriers appear, and such a method of landing as "vertical coverage" is born, when airborne assault forces, usually helicopter landing, land in the rear of the troops defending the coast, and a large sea assault on the beach. In the United States, from the mid-50s, the LVTP-5 transporter began to enter service with the landing units, a very ugly vehicle, which nevertheless gave the marines the opportunity to go ashore under the protection of armor and immediately pass through the coastal zone under fire. Amphibious tanks appear in different countries.
The USSR took part in this revolution. The Marine Corps has been recreated. Many small, medium and large landing ships were built for the landing of numerous landing units. To give the Marine Corps high mobility and the ability to operate in shallow water, small amphibious assault ships on an air cushion began to arrive in the Navy since 1970. The situation was worse with the air component - there were no helicopter carriers in the USSR, and the airborne assault had to be landed in the rear of the enemy from An-26 aircraft by parachute method. Parachute training was and remains a kind of "visiting card" of the Soviet and Russian marines.
This method of landing has a number of disadvantages compared to helicopter landing. The plane flies higher, and for this reason, it is significantly more vulnerable to the fire of enemy air defense systems. The evacuation of the wounded is extremely difficult without helicopters. Supplies can only be delivered by parachute. And in the event of the defeat and evacuation of the landing, the airborne detachment is most likely doomed to death - it is almost impossible to take it out of the enemy's rear without helicopters.
However, it was a working way.
But the USSR missed the second revolution.
Since 1965, the US Navy began to get involved in the Vietnam War. In our country, it is known for anything but amphibious assault forces, but in reality, during this war, as many as sixty-nine were landed. Of course, the Americans did not find fame - the enemy was too weak to be able to beat himself in the chest. However, Americans would not be Americans if they did not use the accumulated statistics effectively.
By that time, the US Navy was still armed with LSTs during the war, and large transport from which it was necessary to transfer soldiers to landing boats, there were tank landing ships of the new generation of the Newport class, with an extravagant folding bridge instead of bow gates, were relatively newfangled dock-ships LSD (Landing ship, dock). The pinnacle of amphibious capabilities were amphibious helicopter carriers - both converted WWII Essexes and specially built Iwo Jima-class ships.
Landing vehicles were also less diverse - there were mainly landing boats, technically similar to those used in World War II, LVTP-5 transporters and helicopters.
An analysis of the American marines' landings carried out during the war showed an unpleasant thing: although all the landings were successful, the tactics and equipment used would not have allowed such operations to be carried out against a full-fledged enemy.
By that time, the infantry of developed countries already had recoilless cannons, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, and small quantities of ATGMs, reliable radio communications and the ability to direct artillery fire from afar, MLRS fire, and a lot of other things that a landing ship would not have survived near the coast, and the dismounted infantry would have had a very bad time. The firepower of potential opponents would prevent crowds of marines from running along the beach in the style of landing on Iwo Jima and in general could make amphibious operations impossible, and for tank landing ships and units that they delivered, they would also be fraught with huge losses, including ships.
This challenge had to be answered, and such an answer was given.
From the first half of the seventies, the US Navy and the Marine Corps began a transition to a new method of landing. This is an over-the-horizon landing in its modern sense. Now the forward echelon of the amphibious assault was to go out on the water at a safe distance from the coast, where the enemy could neither see the landing ship visually, nor shoot at it with weapons available to the ground forces. The landing force had to go out on the water directly in their combat vehicles, be able to go to the shore on them even with significant waves, be able to maneuver along the water's edge, and go ashore even on "weak" ground. The composition of the airborne detachment had to be homogeneous - the same combat vehicles, with the same speed and range on the water. The landing of the second echelons with tanks was supposed to be a task for the tank landing ships, but they were supposed to approach the coast when the air and sea landing detachments, with the support of aviation from the ships, had already cleaned the coast to a sufficient depth.
For this, special equipment was needed, and in 1971 the first UDC in the world was laid down - the Tarava universal landing ship. The ship had a huge landing deck for armored vehicles, which could go out from it into the water through a docking camera in the stern. In turn, landing boats were located in the docking chamber, which were now intended for the landing of rear units with their equipment. The huge ship also carried helicopters, in an amount sufficient for "vertical coverage", later they were added to the shock "Cobras", and after a while - VTOL "Harrier" in their American version.
The bulky and clumsy LVTP-5 was not suitable for such tasks, and in 1972 the military rolled out the first LVTP-7, a vehicle that was to become a landmark in terms of its influence on the tactics of amphibious assault.
The new transporter with aluminum armor was superior in security to any of the Soviet armored personnel carriers, and in many respects the BMP-1. The machine gun of 12.7 mm caliber was weaker than that of Soviet armored vehicles, but at a distance of visual detection it could effectively hit them. The armored personnel carrier could pass through water up to twenty nautical miles at a speed of up to 13 kilometers per hour, and carried up to three squads of soldiers. The car could move along a wave of up to three points, and retained its buoyancy and stability even at five.
The new method was "tested" in the exercises and it immediately showed that it justifies itself. The length of the coastline available for a tracked all-terrain vehicle is much greater than the available coastline for the approach of a tank landing ship, which means that it is more difficult for the enemy to build up a defense. In addition, the presence of seaworthy vehicles made it possible to carry out maneuvers on the water, aimed at misleading the enemy. The appearance on board the UDC of strike aircraft helped to level the lack of firepower of the landing force. Old ships were also adapted to the new method. Armored personnel carriers could go to the water and from the "Newports" through the aft gate, and from the ships of the docks.
The only unresolved issue was the line of dismounting. Two points of view fought. According to the first, the marines crowded "like sardines in a bank" in large and noticeable armored vehicles were an excellent target for heavy weapons, therefore, immediately after passing the coastline, the troops had to dismount and attack on foot, with the support of the onboard weapons of armored vehicles. According to the second point of view, heavy machine guns, the massive proliferation of automatic weapons in the infantry, automatic grenade launchers and mortars would destroy the dismounted Marines faster than if they were inside armored vehicles.
By the mid-eighties, according to the results of the exercises, the Americans came to the conclusion that the supporters of the second point of view are right, and the passage of the beach on tracks at the fastest possible pace is more correct than deploying into rifle chains immediately after going ashore. Although this is not a dogma, and commanders can, if necessary, act according to the situation.
In the 1980s, the United States perfected tactics even further. Armored vehicles and soldiers received night vision devices and the ability to land at night. Hovercraft LCAC (Landing craft air cushion) appeared. Having a pass-through deck through which vehicles could move from one boat to the dock chamber to another, they allowed the first wave of landing to take with them tanks, up to four units, or heavy engineering vehicles for obstacles. This made it possible to resolve the issue of the landing of tanks after the decommissioning of the Newports. New landing ships have appeared - landing helicopter-carrying dock ships LPD (Landing platform dock), carrying less troops than UDC and up to six helicopters, and new UDC class "Wasp", more efficient than "Tarava", and already capable of performing without discounts as a command and logistic center of an amphibious operation, where a rear battalion is deployed, a stock of equipment and supplies for four days of hostilities, an operating room for six places, a powerful command center, an air group of any composition. The US Navy's amphibious assault ships gave the Marine Corps the flexibility it needed - now it could be landed from the same ship as a mechanized battalion group, with tanks, cannons, and support for attack helicopters and aircraft, and as an airborne formation up to a regiment, fighting on foot after disembarkation, and simply carry out a military transport from port to port.
It makes no sense to consider the theories and concepts that the United States generated after the end of the Cold War - they are untenable against a strong enemy and now the United States is abandoning them, regaining its previously lost skills of over-the-horizon landing with vertical coverage.
In the USSR, everything remained as in the 60s. New landing ships appeared, which conceptually repeated the old ones and required the same approach to the coast for the landing of troops. The same armored personnel carriers served as armored vehicles, only not -60, but -70. Project 11780 - the Soviet UDC, cynically nicknamed "Ivan Tarava" by contemporaries, did not go beyond the scope of modeling - it simply turned out to be nowhere to build, the plant in Nikolaev was loaded with aircraft carriers. And it turned out to be not very successful.
And this is in conditions when the British in the Falklands have shown all the viciousness of the concept of a tank landing ship in modern warfare. Of the five ships of this type used in the operation, the Royal Navy lost two, and this in conditions when there was not a single Argentine soldier on the coast at all. It is unlikely that anyone's ships of this type, including the Soviet BDK, could have performed better, especially against a stronger enemy than the Argentines. But the USSR had no alternative. And then he himself was gone.
The collapse of the fleet that followed the collapse of the vast country also affected the landing ships. Their number was reduced, “Jeyrans” on an air cushion were massively decommissioned, and were not replaced by anything, the KFOR left - medium landing ships, there were no ineffective and ugly “Rhino” - Project 1174 BDK, the result of a ridiculous attempt to cross a tank landing ship with a ship dock and DVKD … And naturally, no seaworthy armored vehicle for the marines appeared. Well, then the wars began in the Caucasus, and everyone was suddenly not up to the landings at all …
Let us briefly list what is necessary for a successful landing from the sea in modern warfare.
1. The landing party must go to the water in armored vehicles, at a safe distance from the coast for ships.
2. By the time of reaching the range of visual visibility of the ground, the landing force must form in battle formation - still on the water.
3. It must be possible to land a part of the landing force from the air to intercept the communications of the enemy defending the coast and isolate it from reserves; It is necessary to be able to land from the air about a third of the forces allocated to participate in the first wave of the landing.
4. Helicopter is the preferred means of airborne assault.
5. Also, combat aircraft and helicopters are the preferred means of fire support for the landing force at the stage of its approach to the water's edge, going ashore and attacking the first echelon of enemy forces defending the coast.
6. The first wave of the landing should include tanks, demining and defensive vehicles.
7. A quick landing of the second echelons with heavy weapons and rear services should be ensured as soon as the first wave of the landing is successful.
8. Uninterrupted delivery of supplies is necessary even in the face of enemy opposition.
Of course, all this refers to a kind of "average" operation, in fact, each operation will have to be planned based on the real situation, but without the capabilities listed above, landing operations will be extremely difficult, and even if successful, it will be accompanied by heavy losses.
Let us now consider what resources the Navy can allocate for amphibious operations, and how they correspond to the requirements listed above.
Currently, the Navy has the following ships classified as "landing": fifteen Project 775 ships of Polish construction of various series, four old "Tapir" of project 1171, and one new large landing craft "Ivan Gren" of project 11711.
Of this number, five ships are part of the Northern Fleet, four are part of the Pacific, four more are in the Baltic and seven are in the Black Sea.
Also at the disposal of the Black Sea Fleet is the Ukrainian large landing craft "Konstantin Olshansky", which in a hypothetical emergency situation brings the total number of large landing ships to twenty one. The sister ship of "Ivan Gren" - "Pyotr Morgunov" is under construction.
Is it a lot or a little?
There are calculations thathow many Soviet long-range missile ships are needed to transfer a given number of troops.
Thus, four Project 775 BDKs can land one Marine battalion, without reinforcement, without additional attached units and rear services. Instead, you can use a pair of ships of the project 1171.
From this, the ultimate capabilities of the fleets follow: the Northern one can land one battalion, reinforced by a subunit numbering about a company - any. His landing can be supported by a pair of helicopters from the "Ivan Gren". One battalion can be landed by the Pacific and Baltic fleets. And up to two - Black Sea. Of course, boats have not been counted, but the fact is that they have a very low carrying capacity and an even shorter cruising range. In addition, there are also few of them - for example, all boats of the Baltic Fleet can land less than one battalion if it comes to landing with equipment and weapons. If you land purely foot soldiers, then another battalion. The Black Sea Fleet boats will not be enough even for a full company with equipment, as well as the boats of the Northern Fleet. There will be enough Pacific Fleet boats for a company, but not more. And a little more companies can land the boats of the Caspian Flotilla.
Thus, it is obvious that none of the fleets except the Black Sea can use their marines on a scale larger than a reinforced battalion, in principle. The Black Sea Fleet can land two, and even with some reinforcement.
But maybe some of the forces will be landed by parachute? Without discussing the likelihood of a successful parachute landing against an enemy with full-fledged air defense systems, nevertheless, we will count the aircraft that the Navy can use for such an operation.
The Navy has the following aircraft capable of parachuting marines: two An-12BK, twenty-four An-26 and six An-72. In total, all these aircraft make it possible to throw out about a thousand hundred soldiers. But, of course, without military equipment and heavy weapons (delivery by parachute method of 82-mm mortars, automatic grenade launchers, NSV machine guns of 12, 7 mm caliber, portable anti-tank systems, MANPADS is possible - due to the reduction in the number of troops). It is easy to see that, firstly, between how many troops any of the fleets can land from the sea and how many naval aviation can land from the air, there is a large disproportion, it is also obvious that still none of the fleets can enter into battle all his marines at the same time, and even half can not either.
If we assume a hypothetical offensive "expeditionary" operation of the Marine Corps, then the amphibious capabilities of the Navy make it possible to land approximately one brigade tactical group, numbering just over four battalions.
Now let's return to the requirements that the amphibious forces must meet in order to be able to recapture the coast from a more or less serious enemy, at least on a small scale corresponding to the presence of ships.
It is easy to see that the capabilities of the Navy and the Marine Corps do not correspond to a single point. There is no seaworthy armored vehicles, there is no possibility to use helicopters outside the combat radius of ground aircraft, similarly there is no way to deliver tanks to the shore except by bringing the ship close to it, which with a high probability means a repetition of the British "success" in the Falklands. The Navy does not have sufficient means of fast delivery to an unequipped coast of the second echelons, reserves, and logistics equipment.
Thus, The Navy does not possess the capabilities of full-fledged amphibious assault operations. This is an important point, if only because in some cases, the task of amphibious assault landing will be assigned to the fleet. And, as was the case during the Great Patriotic War, the fleet will have to carry out it with obviously unsuitable means, paying for the fulfillment of the combat mission with unnecessary and absolutely unnecessary losses in the marines and risking defeat.
Today, the Navy is able to successfully land a very small tactical assault force only in conditions of complete, absolute absence of enemy opposition in the landing zone
Fans of the mantra about the fact that we are a peaceful people and do not need overseas landings should remember dozens of amphibious operations during a completely defensive World War II, one of which, for example, exceeded Operation Torch in terms of the forces deployed on the ground - the landing of the allies in North Africa, and in terms of the number of the first wave of the landing, although slightly, it surpassed that on Iwo Jima.
What terms necessary for carrying out amphibious landing operations are not available at the disposal of the Russian Navy?
First, there are not enough ships. If we proceed from the fact that the number of marines in each of the fleets is justified from an operational point of view, then it is necessary to have a sufficient number of ships so that each of the fleets could land its entire marines.
The idea of using mobilized civilian ships as landing craft no longer works in our time. Modern amphibious assault units require too much heavy military equipment, it is impossible to ensure its combat use from a merchant ship, in the case of mobilized ships, we can only talk about military transport.
Secondly, there is not enough air component - helicopters are needed sufficient for the landing of that very one third of the forces from the air, and combat helicopters capable of supporting the landing. In extreme cases, it is necessary to have at least as many helicopters as is needed to evacuate the wounded, and to deliver ammunition and weapons to paratroopers, as well as a minimum of attack helicopters.
Thirdly, in order to deliver helicopters to the landing site, ships are needed that can carry them.
Fourthly, it is necessary to have floating rear vessels capable of organizing the delivery of goods to an unequipped coast.
Fifth, it is necessary to have seaworthy marine combat vehicles (BMMP), or at least seaworthy armored personnel carriers, specially built for movement in rough conditions.
Sixth, all this must not strain the budget.
It is fair to say that the Navy and the defense industry have tried to do something.
Everyone remembers the epic with the "Mistrals", however, the meaning of the purchase eluded the mass of observers who were incompetent in matters of conducting amphibious operations. Moreover, stupid debates on this topic continue to this day.
Meanwhile, "Mistral" is the possibility of over-the-horizon landing of at least one fully equipped Marine battalion, with the landing of at least a company from its composition in the form of an airborne assault force, with the allocation of a separate helicopter unit for fire support, with an operating and command post on board. These ships closed the very gap in Russian amphibious capabilities, described above. The Mistrals needed only BMMPs to land troops in one wave, and not in small detachments on landing boats. And then the domestic BDK would have turned into what they may well be - carriers of BMMP of the first echelon and units of the second. For this, the Mistral was supposed to buy the ships, and anyone who disputes the decision taken then, or, as they say, “not in the subject”, or is trying to propagate knowingly false attitudes.
Can the domestic industry create "on the fly", without experience, a worthy ship of this class? Doubtful. The example of the UDC Avalanche project, which has become public, can be seen just fine.
It's hard to find an equally crazy project. For some reason, this ship has a gate in the bow, although it is quite obvious that it cannot approach the shallow shore because of the large draft (apparently the authors want the gate to be knocked out by a wave when slamming), it has an extremely irrational shape of the flight deck, having performed it in a rectangular plan could get one more launch position for the helicopter - and their number in an amphibious operation is critical. The real horror is the location of the landing chamber floor on the same level with the dock chamber floor - this means either the flooding of the landing deck together with the dock camera every time it is used, or the presence of a giant insulating pressurized door between the dock chamber and the deck, which prevents the landing of the landing on the water otherwise than on boats standing in the docking chamber. Or use the gates in the bow, which for such a ship smacks of madness. There are other, less significant disadvantages.
Obviously, the project is stillborn.
More interesting are the prospects for another project - the Priboi DVD. Unfortunately, apart from the silhouette and design characteristics, there is no information about this ship, but it is difficult to imagine that it is worse than the Avalanche.
One way or another, the industry did not show itself ready to independently design analogues of the French Mistral, even if we assume that under the conditions of sanctions it is possible to produce all the necessary components for it. Perhaps something will come out of "Surf", but so far we can only hope for it.
A great success was the creation of the Ka-52K Katran combat helicopter, the carrier of which was planned to be the Mistral. This machine has great potential, and may well become the main attack helicopter in the naval aviation of the Russian Federation, one of the "pillars" of the amphibious assault forces of the future. Unfortunately, this is the only relatively completed project in our fleet that can be useful in building an effective amphibious force.
And, finally, one cannot fail to note the project of the Marine Corps Fighting Vehicle - BMMP.
Omsktransmash project considered in the article by Kirill Ryabov, those interested should study it, and this is exactly what the Marines should ideally be armed with. Unfortunately, it is very far from the realization of the project "in metal", and in the light of the new economic realities it is not at all a fact that it will be given a go. Nevertheless, there are chances to implement the project.
At present, Russia economically, as they say, "will not pull" the creation of a modern amphibious fleet. At the same time, the requirements for amphibious forces used near their territory, or, as during the Second World War, on it, are seriously different from those that will be presented for expeditionary operations - and the situation may require fighting both near home and somewhere far away From him. At the same time, it is also impossible to leave the situation "as it is" - large landing ships are extremely intensively consuming resources in the "Syrian Express", and the repair of ships built in Poland is currently difficult. Soon you will have to change these ships, and for this you need to understand why. All this is superimposed on the apparent lack of the concept of amphibious operations of the future at the command of the Navy and the Marine Corps.
This can be seen even in the exercises, where armored vehicles leave the ships ashore, where the roads for them have been paved by bulldozers, and the airborne assault force looks like three or four fighters landed right on the water's edge from an anti-submarine helicopter (which looks very strange in reality). As a result, today Russia is inferior in its landing capabilities even to small countries, for example, in terms of its landing ships, the Pacific Fleet of the Russian Federation is inferior even to Singapore, and there is no need to mention the larger countries.
The continuation of the existing trends will lead to a complete loss of amphibious capabilities - this moment is not far off. And the economy will not be able to reverse the tendencies "head-on" by building everything necessary. Such is the dilemma.
So is there a way out? Surprisingly, there is. However, it will require non-standard approaches on the one hand and competent concepts on the other. Innovation, such as we have not yet resorted, and a thoughtful comprehension of tradition. Thorough analysis of modernity and deep understanding of history. A level of planning and understanding of the issues will be required that is somewhat higher than it is generally accepted in Russia to demonstrate. But this is not impossible, and more on that in the next article.
