KYIV — Ukraine on Thursday confirmed it wrecked a Russian submarine with British weapons, during a missile attack on the Black Sea port of Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea.
The Russian cruise missile carrier — the Rostov-on-Don — was significantly damaged in the massive Ukrainian strike, as was Kremlin warship the Minsk.
A senior Ukrainian military official confirmed to POLITICO that Ukrainian pilots used the British cruise missile Storm Shadow for the attack.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said Ukraine launched 10 cruise missiles on the Sevastopol shipyard on Wednesday, but only three hit their targets, damaging two military vessels. Unusually, on Thursday morning Ukraine’s army claimed the attack and said Russia would not be able to repair the ships in the near future.
“The large Russian landing ship Minsk and the submarine Rostov-on-Don, which were hit during the night attack in Sevastopol, most likely cannot be restored,” Andriy Yusov, a representative of Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense, said on Ukrainian TV. Russian Telegram channels confirmed the names and types of vessels.
Natalia Humeniuk of Ukraine’s Army Operational Command South added that the military ships were most likely damaged beyond repair for the Russians, as the only place to carry out repairs was the shipyard which was razed in the attack.
Ukrainian Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk hinted publicly that the Ukrainian Air Force was behind the Sevastopol attack and used British Storm Shadow missiles for the attack.
“While the occupiers are still recovering from a storm in Sevastopol, I would like to thank the pilots of the Air Force for their excellent combat work! To be continued … ” Oleshchuk said in a pointed statement.
The operation happened a few days after Ukraine seized control of four oil and gas drilling platforms in the Black Sea near the shores of Crimea and deactivated Russian radar monitoring all movement in that part of the sea.
“Ukrainian forces used a rare opportunity to target a submarine while it was on the surface of the sea. It was the first time air-to-air missiles were successfully used against a submarine,” Ukrainian military expert and former military officer Roman Svitan told POLITICO. He compared the significance of the operation to last year’s sinking of Moskva cruiser in the Black Sea: “I would say this is an even bigger success.”
Invading Russian forces have frequently launched cruise missiles against сities and towns in the west of Ukraine from submarines in the Black Sea, as Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war continues.
Hey Russian Warship. Go fuck yourself.
He compared the significance of the operation to last year’s sinking of Moskva cruiser in the Black Sea: “I would say this is an even bigger success.”
The destruction of the ships themselves aside, I would guess that Russia’s going to have to pull their warships out of Sevastopol as being too risky to use after this. If so, that has benefits to Ukraine in that it provides more warning if the Russian Navy intends to use its ships against Ukraine.
The article said that of ten Storm Shadows fired, three hit their target. If Russian air defenses shot down the seven that did not hit their targets – the article does not elaborate – it means that Russia has the ability to stop at least some low-observability cruise missiles.
I had heard they the shot just the 3 storm shadows and the other 7 were launched a bit earlier and were the modified ground to ground s200s. of course without any official full details its all hearsay.
Interesting point regardless, though – the article doesn’t actually say that the 7 missiles that didn’t strike their target were Storm Shadows, so they could have been another type of cruise missiles, at least based on the text in this article.
Russia has the ability to stop at least some low-observability cruise missiles.
Maybe not now that Ukraine destroyed their $1,300,000,000 S-400 system.
I’m actually not sure that an S-400 – a long-range system, where you probably don’t have a lot of warning with Storm Shadows – is what one would use for that. I’d think that it’d be a point-defense system, like a Pantsir or something.
Thanks to @MicroWave for the link.
Wouldja look at that, @cre0 is a Russian plant…
Suchomimus channel in YT was on the right track when he made the video about this attack:
