Russia developing new aircraft carrier

Interfax ^ | 05/15/05

[Bull Man]

Without support escorts and the latest tracking technology protecting an aircraft carrier is next to impossible...in effect, they become one great big floating target saying - sink me! Let 'em build it and when necessary we will easily sink it along with all the rubbles they put into it. Besides, when oil prices collapse so again will the soviet - oh sorry, Russian - economy. At least the Czars dressed better than Putin...

[struwwelpeter]

Here is a post I made when 'Varyag' transitted the Bosphorus in November of 2001. There are some nice pictures from Sevastopol there, too ;-)

The article stated that 'Varyag' was a Kuzhetsov-class and purchased for $20 million, while the 'Kiev' article states 'Kiev' cost $8-16 million.

I'll bet they are the same vessel, just some renaming went on somewhere.

[toddlintown]

Are they going to offer rides to Americans with too much cash on their hands to finance the deal?

[TigerLikesRooster]

Re #43

Yeah, maybe they would. Sail out to the Arctic Ocean, and dump him under floating ice, and takes his money. It is a warship. Dangerous things can happen.:-)

[Brofholdonow]

THe T-34 couldn't of been if it weren't for the Christie tanks they bought. And at least the first twenty years of the Mig series were only made possible by the British who sold them the Rolls Royce turbojet..and we could go on to almost every other weapons system.

[sukhoi-30mki]

Nope!!The PRC had purchased 3 ex Soviet carriers-the Kiev,the Minsk & the Varyag in addition to the world war 2 era Aussie carrier,Melbourne.The Kiev & Minsk will in most probability have little use other than for scrap in addition to what the article says given their age.The Kiev & Minsk are members of the USSR's first dedicated carrier class.They are considerably smaller(at around 45,000 T) than the Varyag(over 60,000T) which is much younger & could deploy Conventional jets like the SU-33.The Admiral Gorshkov,which Russia is modifying for the Indian navy is the last member of the Kiev Family.

[Oztrich Boy]

They often lacked skilled technicians to maintain their ships, which is why they had totally redundant systems on most of them, 2 surface search radars, 2 air search radars etc...

Which in itself is not a bad thing. Under combat conditions even a perfectly maintained single system may become unavailable when you most need it.

[struwwelpeter]

Wow, thanks for the info. I couldn't square away the articles without your help.

Glad someone is able to connect the dots.

[Radioactive]

No it was the B-29. Stalin wanted the B-29 so bad that they did anything possible to get one.

They got one after it crashed in a Soviet controlled area and made an exact copy of it.

[ProudVet77]

You make a reasonable point, but the truth is that antennas take up a lot of space, and they themselves are great radar reflectors. The more stuff you have higher up on a ship the further away the enemy can see you. Also back in those days an air search radar took up a space about 12x24 feet, which reduces space for other things.
Jeff, while these features might sound appealing the key to ship defense is that your battle group is spread out over a wide area. Figure anywhere between 5 to 15 miles from the carrier. This increases your radar horizon, so you really want the Aegis on the outermost ships. Putting cruise missiles on a carrier has merits, the only problem is if you put a decent number of them you lose space for other things, like more planes. The Soviets used to believe in the "lone wolf" strategy for their ships. They used to have enough fuel for 30,000 miles, no need for oilers etc. Just a Kresta or Krivak cruiser plying the oceans. Sounds like they wanted to do that with their carrier.

[sukhoi-30mki]

There is a good chance that this planned carrier will be more along the lines of the 'multi-role' carriers that countries like Italy & Spain are working on than a dedicated flattop.For one,the Russian navy has moved away from building big surface combatants & is concentrating on primarily 2 projects-a new class of stealthy corvettes & a class of multi-role frigates in addition to new D/E & Nuclear attack submarines.

[ProudVet77]

Just curious, are the covettes and frigates for coastal defense?

[sukhoi-30mki]

They are planning subvariants of both classes for patrol as well as blue water variants to cut costs in addition to dedicated patrol craft .Some some corvettes will be armed with nothing more than a 76 mm gun while others will come with the 300 Km range Yakhont cruise missile.You can google 'Gepard' or 'Novik' class to see more.

[Tommyjo]

The Russians already developed the Yak-141 STOVL aircraft. This is where Lockheed Martin went to on their engine nozzle/swiveling rear exaust for the F-35B. Lockheed purchased the design data from Yakovlev.

[duckln]

Everything the Russkies ever built was a copy of what someone else built first.

Like the Periodic Table or the AK47?

Or like the 13% flat tax?

[duckln]

I think the fact that they didn't build a fleet says volumes about their evil corrupt state and it's true condition.

Do you think that not having a suitable warm water port has any thing to do with it?

Do you think their Judicial Branch is more 'corrupt' than ours? Or their Duma more 'corrupt' than our Congress?

It's a new Russia IMHO and we need a fresh look and might I add honest look.

[A. Pole]

Let 'em build it and when necessary we will easily sink it along with all the rubbles they put into it.

Aircraft carrier are not built to fight great powers. One tactical nuke a mile away and they are gone.

Aircraft carrier are to project power into local conflicts ie to bully or protect small countries. Having such card facilitates the big game. Possibly if Russia had more hardware in the Adriatic the NATO would not attack Serbs.

[Jeff Head]

Oh, agreed as regards battle group philosophy and the placement of Aegis on both inner and outer ring escorts.

Another thing the Ruskies and all others (outside of the French) are lacking is the E2-C Hawkeye type aircraft...talk about a force multiplyer on both defense and offense. But we cannot underestimate our enemies. They know ehat they have to do to wrest control of the seas from us and they are bending their every effort towards it.

[Jeff Head]

Carriers will work against large powers too...particularly of they are carrying nukes themselves...and particularly if the country having the carriers has a more accurate, better maintained, and more capable nuclear force than the enemy.

If they do...the enemy will not dare open that pandora's box. So it is with America yet to this day. Even the bigger powers know if they use nukes first...there nation will not survive it.

[MudSlide]

Yep somebody made that point earlier