A Ukrainian commander says Russia has just one “loser” missile ship left in the Black Sea after a series of successful attacks.
“Most of the combat units, if you look at the cruise missile carriers, have actually all been moved, except for one loser who has not yet launched a single missile,” said the captain Dmytro Pletenchuk on Ukrainian television.
He said the only ship remaining in Crimea is the Russian warship Cyclone, a Karakurt-class corvette.
Pletenchuk noted that the Black Sea Fleet was once considered the main Russian force in Crimea, but had almost entirely been driven out and displaced.
A Ukrainian maritime drone collides with a Russian warship in Novorossiysk on August 4, 2023. Pravda Gerachchenko
Ukraine has successfully used missiles and drones to strike ships in Sevastopol, Russia’s main Black Sea port in Crimea.
A senior British Royal Navy officer said last month that 25% of Russian ships in the Black Sea had been sunk or damaged.
Last weekend, Ukraine carried out its latest attacks on the Russian fleet in Sevastopol, bombarding it with missiles that hit four ships.
The Ukrainian navy said it struck two of Russia’s large landing ships, the Yamal and the Azov, as well as the spy ship Ivan Khurs and the large landing ship Konstantin Olshansky.
The latter ship was seized in Ukraine in 2014 when Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula.
Britain’s defense minister said on March 25, after the latest Ukrainian attack, that the Black Sea Fleet was “functionally inactive.”
In another updating information On March 31, the British Ministry of Defense said that four Russian barges had been identified in recent images as being positioned at the entrance to the Black Sea Fleet facility in Novorossiysk.
The department noted that this was an effort to strengthen the port’s defenses against attacks by Ukrainian unmanned surface vessels (USVs), which are remotely operated ships packed with explosives and used to strike ships. Russians.
The British ministry said some of the Black Sea’s most valuable assets had found refuge in the eastern Black Sea port of Novorossiysk after regular attacks on their traditional home port of Sevastopol.
Russian Admiral Viktor Sokolov, former commander of the Black Sea Fleet, has reportedly been fired after a series of successful Ukrainian attacks.
The British Ministry of Defense noted that his successor, Vice Admiral Sergei Pinchuk, probably took preventive measures to improve the chances of survival of Russian ships.
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