What is the Moskva, the Russian Flagship Sunk By Ukraine? – Russia’s flagship cruiser in the Black Sea was destroyed by Ukrainian missiles on April 14, prompting the Kremlin to claim that the ship sank as a result of a fire that started inside of the ship. The Kremlin claims that the fire caused a munitions explosion inside the ship.
Claims that the Moskva sank as a result of the fire were criticized by the father of one missing sailor. The father told CNN that the assertion was a “blatant and cynical lie.” Other relatives of missing Moskva sailors say are also calling for answers.
According to Lithuania’s defense minister, there was 485 crew onboard board the ship, including 66 officers, at the time it was struck and began to capsize. Ukraine took credit for the sinking, describing how two Neptune anti-ship missiles were used to sink the flagship.
What’s the History of the Moskva?
The Moskva Russian cruiser was considered the country’s most powerful warship in the Black Sea.
It has been deployed in the 2014 annexation of Crimea, in Syria in 2015, and in Georgia in 2008. It was deployed in February of this year to lead the naval assault on Ukraine, but sank on April, 14, after being hit by Ukrainian Neptune missiles.
Commissioned in 1983, the Moskva started its life as the Slava. As a Slava class Soviet cruiser, first designed in the late 1960s, the ship was first intended to be a less expensive alternative to the nuclear-powered Kirov class cruisers. The Slava class cruisers quickly became the flagships for several Russian task forces.
After undergoing a refit, the ship was renamed the Moskva in 1995. After renovations, the ship was recommissioned in April of 2000. The ship has engaged in exercises in the Indian Ocean, visited the Grand Harbor of Malta in 2004, and took part in naval drills in the Mediterranean in 2008 and 2009.
At the end of 2009, the ship was fitted went undergo more major repairs and improvements, before being deployed once again to the Mediterranean Sea in 2013. The ship has spent most of its time in the Black Sea in recent years and underwent further maintenance and repairs in July of 2020 in preparation for keeping the ship in service until 2040.
The ship carried 16 Vulkan missile launchers, had a crew of 510, and was widely considered to be one of the most valuable ships in the Russian Navy.
Neptune Anti-Ship Missile. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
In 2016, the well-known cruiser was awarded the naval Order of Nakhimov in July of 2016, a military decoration of the Russian Federation typically awarded to naval officers for their military leadership.
The sinking of the ship is significant not just symbolically, but strategically. Russia no longer has its most powerful ship in the Black Sea at a time when Ukrainian fighters are increasingly using Western-supplied heavy artillery to destroy Russian military vehicles and ships. The last time a ship of this size sank was the Argentine General Belgrano cruiser that was sunk by Britain’s nuclear-powered HMS Conqueror submarine in 1982.
Moskva Cruiser. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
Jack Buckby is a British author, counter-extremism researcher, and journalist based in New York. Reporting on the U.K., Europe, and the U.S., he works to analyze and understand left-wing and right-wing radicalization, and reports on Western governments’ approaches to the pressing issues of today. His books and research papers explore these themes and propose pragmatic solutions to our increasingly polarized society.
Alex
April 21, 2022 at 11:27 pm
As I wrote earlier, this cruiser could be sunk by missiles using guidance from the American Orion satellite, as a respected American military expert says. But on the other hand, he also says that this is not the only version, but the fact that now the propaganda media of Ukraine and the United States and Britain will shout for a long time that it was precisely the missiles and the Bandera Nazis did everything themselves is undoubtedly. The spirit of the Armed Forces of Ukraine is so low that they surrender by the thousands, and by the case of desertion – by the thousands. However, even a huge number of articles about the “victory” over the cruiser could not achieve an effect: the remnants of the military of the Armed Forces of Ukraine surrender and run away from the army. That’s all the facts.
CK
April 26, 2022 at 11:00 am
Yes, and Soros and Elon Musk were flying on the wingtip, using their magic to put the crew to sleep. Then the fairy godmother came and threw some waves at the Moskva too… utter delusion man.
Fact is – Moskva is at the bottom of the sea. GJ!
Alex
April 29, 2022 at 9:30 am
If someone wants to know the truth about the civil war in the Donbass, about all the atrocities of the Bandera clean-ups and why Russia was forced to intervene, then it is better to watch films by independent journalists. There are already many such journalists who fight for truth and freedom. For example, a documentary by the German journalist Wilhelm Domcke-Schulz.
A documentary film about the war crimes of the Bandera Nazis during the period of Russia’s special military operation to denazify and demilitarize Ukraine is in production. It will be a real information bomb, where the war crimes of Bandera Nazis will be shown and proved.
The documentary “Remember Odessa” tells how the Bandera Nazis burned Ukrainians alive and other heinous war crimes.
The documentary “To Live and Die in Donbass” tries to fill this gaping information gap in the West. He looks into the tormented soul of the inhabitants of Donbass, who really want only one thing – to live self-determining according to their own rules and values. Not submitting to foreign forces and ideologies.
In the east of Ukraine, in the Donbass, a war has been raging since the beginning of 2014. A civil war that claimed more than 15,000 lives over the years, including several hundred children. They had to die, because the national-fascist coup government in Kyiv, funded by the West, trained and militarily heavily armed, would not tolerate any resistance to their illegitimate rule, no matter the cost.
Therefore, in April 2014, the putschists deployed the Ukrainian army, supported by dozens of right-wing extremist volunteer battalions, and have since bombed city centers, residential areas, schools, hospitals and infrastructure, killing civilians.
This perennial crime has gone completely unnoticed by the Western public. Politicians and the media avoid this topic and reports about how the devil pours holy water. Because a public discussion about the crimes of the Ukrainian regime would reveal only one thing – with what mass murderers and terrorists the so-called “west of values” in Ukraine has a common language, if only to defend their goals and interests.
Lend-lease is a commodity loan, and not cheap: for all the ammunition, equipment and food supplied by the United States, many future generations of Ukrainian citizens will pay. Zelensky is driving the country into a debt hole.
CK
April 29, 2022 at 2:14 pm
Ah, I see your tactic. You add a little shitty first paragraph so it doesn’t detect your duplicate post. Is this what it has come to now, you just posting the same exact post 2, 3, 4, 5 times per article?
Wow, did they run out of paper in Russia, Alex? You guys can’t print new material? Literally using the same lines, over and over again, and now in duplicate in every post!
Are you so defeated you can’t even come up with anything new? How sad. Now the idiot is talking about lend-lease at the end of his post, because he literally just copy + pasted it from another thread, with zero relevance to this one.
Here’s a reminder:
If someone wanted to know the truth about anything in Ukraine Alex, the last person they would go to is you.
Paragraphs and paragraphs of bollocks, dubious claims about “independent journalists”, random documentarians, conspiracy theorists, deluded claims that of course, have no backup, lie after lie after lie.
Classical Kremlin troll approach. Just flood the internet, the comments, the media, with tosh, doesn’t matter what it is, just make sure you write some old nonsense. Make sure to say the claim is supported by some dude in Germany, France, the states. If it’s a “documentary” (usually from youtube) then the better.
Anything that victimises Russia, always the victim, always the bullied, never the problem. It’s always the Nazis. It’s always some pseudo-historical point.
Anyone that has had the misfortune to study your “tactics” sees the forest for the trees, the pattern of lies, disinformation, blanketing of random claims, deflection, obfuscation, and other words beyond your vocabulary.
It’s hopeless Alex. Your lies are as short as your intellect. What a pathetic job, to sit in your government shed, spreading your pathetic, government lies.
A pathetic job for a truly pathetic man. A better match could not be made in heaven.