Russia is a huge player in Arctic and Soviet/Russia's history there is one of incredible scientific effort, resilience, courage and of very real economics. Moreover, Russian fleet of icebreakers, both conventional and nuclear, is simply without rivals. In May 2016 Russian Navy ordered two Arctic patrol ice-breakers ("corvettes") of Project 23550. Today, the first of them, Ivan Papanin, was laid down at Admiralty Wharf in St. Petersburg. These ships will have a bizarre weapons' suite. In a classic Russian tradition of "you can not spoil the porridge with butter" (kashu maslom ne isportish), new ice-breakers will have 76-mm gun, machine guns and, of course, and you may have guessed it--they will be able to carry a notorious Kalibr complex, possibly both with land-attack and anti-shipping configuration.
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| These will displace 6000+ tons. |
The struggle for Arctic resources and the importance of Northern Sea Route will continue to grow and appearance of these ships seems to be a good response to a very dynamic situation. It will get interesting there in coming decades, especially with a development of Arctic Continental Shelf. If the experience of Cod Wars is any indicator (and it is) things may get nasty pretty fast even between allies, as HMS Diomede found out the hard-way when was rammed by Iceland's cannon boat Baldur.
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| HMS Diomede |
Hopefully, things may get sorted out in a much more civilized manner, but it is always good to have a good anti-shipping missile complex just in case. Especially when one has to guard things of this nature:
In the end, there is always a threat of a Social Justice Warriors, aka Green Peace.
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