First sinking of a military ship since the Belgrano in the falklands war

I think the key here really is targeting, the Ukrainians were obviously given very accurate targeting information.

A friend of a friend did his full 25 years in the Navy and actually visited several Russian warships during the 90's, when we were all friends...

His verdict, absolute death traps and a total horror show. He's the guy who alerted me to big holes cut through bulkheads with cables loosely fed through, virtually no firefighting equipment etc...

That was over 20 years ago, so you can imagine how bad it is now!

As I believe the Turks have closed off the entrance to the Black Sea to Russian Warships, the Russians can't replace her with a replacement Maritime C4 asset either.

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Originally Posted by mrclark303

I think the key here really is targeting, the Ukrainians were obviously given very accurate targeting information.

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Very likely.

If they are still in the system from the '70s, their conscripts are in for two years. As I understand it, they were grouped in "classes" for the four half-years of their service. They got a really quick military indoctrination and went right out to the fleet, where they begin on-the-job training for their specialty. By that system they didn't have a cadre' of retained petty officers so the oldest class at any moment served as their enlisted leaders.

Bob

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Originally Posted by mrclark303

A friend of a friend did his full 25 years in the Navy and actually visited several Russian warships during the 90's, when we were all friends...

His verdict, absolute death traps and a total horror show. He's the guy who alerted me to big holes cut through bulkheads with cables loosely fed through, virtually no firefighting equipment etc...

That was over 20 years ago, so you can imagine how bad it is now!

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It was an old ship as well, from launch date to sinking, it was only 1 year younger than the Belgrano was at the time of its sinking in the Falklands War....:eek:

Although the Moskva spent nearly 8 years (1990-1998) undergoing a refit in the Ukraine shipyard she had been built at.

There are now photos and a short video clip - not much doubt of the cause.

If it has been plastering innocent areas in the cities of Odesa and Mariopol on the south side of Ukraine with its varied weaponry, it deserves to be at the bottom of the sea IMHO.

Nothing worse than shelling civilian areas with nothing to do with defence and a complete waste of life.

On top of all this their tally of Generals being taken out is unbelievable.
Today yet another top Commander Colonel Ivan Grishin of Russia's 49th Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade, is reported to have been the latest high-ranking officer to have been killed in a massive blow to Moscow on the 16th. He is said to have been killed in the Russian border town of Smolensk on Saturday.

If this keeps up, he'll need to sit down and talk peace with compromise on land, which is what he has always wanted, in a corridor down the south east side of Ukraine with access to his own yacht in the Black Sea. Soon he will have no experienced leaders left.

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Originally Posted by GeeRam

It was an old ship

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Yes, an old ship will always be an old ship no matter how many refits it's had and how much new kit has been put on it. The Russian navy could have replaced it with a new ship years ago that was more efficient, needed less crew and perhaps had greater fire power.

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Originally Posted by Gil Boyd

If it has been plastering innocent areas in the cities of Odesa and Mariopol on the south side of Ukraine with its varied weaponry, it deserves to be at the bottom of the sea IMHO.
...snip...

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My understanding is that Moskva was air defence for the ballistic and cruise missile armed ships, and command and control with it's sensor suite.

Having said that Russia has run thru all of it's available modern missiles, and probably won't have the ability to produce sufficient restock to engage
in offensive opperations for several years.

When Russia accepted 91 of their latest ship launched missiles in 2019 at the height of their re armament campaign - and they've launched some 1500+ of them at $800,000 each....

Even I can do that math...

Looking at the news this morning, the Russians are going all out to grab as much of the east as they can.

They will probably want to declare Operations over on May 9th and declare a Victory, so we can expect Putin to pull every possible brutal means out of the box as the clocks ticking....

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Originally Posted by mrclark303

Looking at the news this morning, the Russians are going all out to grab as much of the east as they can.

They will probably want to declare Operations over on May 9th and declare a Victory, so we can expect Putin to pull every possible brutal means out of the box as the clocks ticking....

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Back in beginning of Feb on another forum, I posted this map, which I said I think this is probably their target to occupy. I thought they would strike a pincer from Crimea in the south and up the east side of the River Dnipro to Dnipro, and down from the north around Kharkiv and cut off the Ukraine forces in the east and Donbas......

Attachment 125656

After they bizarre false start and push on Kyiv etc as well as stalled effort in the south, I think they will now consolidate and do close to this prediction now.
If the Russians have dropped the bridges over the Dnipro early, it will be difficult for the Ukrainians to reinforce and supply their forces in the east, and avoid them getting cut-off.