Friday, December 21, 2018

Admiral Kasatanov Is Off To Trials.

Second (first series) frigate of the project 22350 (Admiral Gorshkov-class) Admiral Kasatanov is on its way to trials.

This is a milestone event for Russian Navy when one considers what went into the birth of this class of the ships after decades of gross under-funding and, sometimes, direct sabotage of Russian Navy. These are powerful ships with a state-of-the-art air-defense complex Poliment-Redut and a comprehensive electronics suite. Of course, these handsome ships pack a very serious anti-shipping and land-attack punch, capable to launch both Kalibr family missiles as well as P-800 Oniks. 
Kasatonov Off To Trials
Here is also TV report (in Russian) on this event:

At this stage no one knows if this class will be limited to 6 hulls with much heavier project 22350M "so called" frigates coming after them but, after issues with Poliment-Redut have been sorted out, there is very little doubt that these seem to be very nice and powerful ships. In related news, as CNBC based on their "sources" (Hm!) reports:
I don't know what those CNBC's "sources" are, but there is very little doubt that hyper-sonic missiles of non-Kinzhal aero-ballistic variety are coming very soon to ships and submarines of the Russian Navy. There is absolutely nothing which can defend against salvo of such missiles and that does change, as I wrote for years, the naval combat completely thus overturning many doctrinal assumptions by fervent navalists, especially in relation to aircraft carrier-centricity of the fleets. This was, actually, clear already in 1980s. Will Gorshkov-class be able to carry Zircon (3M22) once it gets procured? Most likely. But even in present configuration of their weapons' suites these ships are truly first post-Soviet Russia's, from scratch, major combatants who outgun any ship in the frigate-class in the world. Not too shabby, if one asks me.   

UPDATE (12/22). Yes, it looks like CNBC got this one right this time, since TASS' sources in military-industrial complex did confirm this: 


The most important in this piece is this:


As was reported earlier, Tsirkon missiles will be launched with the help of the universal shipborne vertical launching systems currently used for Kalibr and Oniks cruise missiles. Such systems are mounted, in particular, on Project 20380 corvettes, Project 22350 frigates and Project 885 Yasen-class submarines.

That pretty much sums up a general direction Russian Navy is taking. Not that we didn't know or justifiably assumed it, but the ability of VLS UKSK to launch 3M22 gives a good grasp of the "weight" of the salvo by Russian fleet.

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