On December 11, 1991, the President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk declared himself Commander-in-chief of all the Armed Forces of the disbanded Soviet Union on his territory. The troops of all three military districts (Carpathian, Odessa and Kiev), as well as the sailors-border guards of the Balaklava and Odessa brigades obediently swore to Ukraine. The Novorossiysk border brigade, in turn, withdrew to Russia.
But the Black Sea Fleet, now based in Sevastopol, Ukraine, refused to swear an oath to Ukraine. This was done, despite strong pressure from Kiev, only by individual officers and sailors, who immediately turned into outcasts in the fleet.
Moscow decided, since this is the case, not to give up the fleet. As a result, the position of the Black Sea Fleet has become very ambiguous and legally uncertain.
A lonely submarineMeanwhile, quite dangerous attempts to capture individual ships by Ukraine began to be repeated.
So, on March 13, 1992, part of the crew of the most modern submarine in the fleet, B-871, under the leadership of its deputy commander, took the Ukrainian oath. However, two sailors locked themselves in the battery compartment and said they would blow up the boat if they did not get in touch with the commander. As a result, the event on the "privatization" of the best submarine of the fleet failed.
But another event succeeded. On July 21, 1992, a SKR-112 patrol car escaped from Donuzlav to Odessa, which became part of the Naval Forces of Ukraine (they were formally formed on April 5) under the number U132.
However, unlike the newest B-871, the SKR-112 was so old that it did not represent any combat value and was already disposed of in 1994.
All these episodes show that Ukraine immediately began to behave towards the Russian Federation as a hostile state. But both sides were not ready for a direct armed confrontation at that time. Therefore, we still had to look for some compromises.
On August 3, 1992, the Presidents of Russia and Ukraine signed an agreement on the joint use of the basing system and logistics of the Black Sea Fleet for the period up to 1995. The ships remained "common" and sailed under the flag of the USSR Navy – although the rest of the fleets and the Caspian Flotilla of the Russian Navy raised St. Andrew's flags back in 1992. The final agreement on the division of the Black Sea Fleet was signed on May 28, 1997.
Even before the start of the division, the Ukrainian Navy acquired a number of warships and boats (not counting the "rebellious" TFR-112), which were either taken unfinished at shipyards or received from the aforementioned border brigades. The Navy received three former border patrol ships: "Hetman Sagaidachny" ave. 1135P (later classified as a frigate) and two ships of project 1124P ("Chernivtsi" and "Dnepr", later renamed "Vinnitsa", classified as corvettes).
Also at the shipyards in Kiev, two almost completed small anti-submarine ships (MPC) of the 1124M project, named "Lutsk" and "Ternopil", were captured. At the shipyard in Feodosia there is an amphibious hovercraft of project 12322, named "Donetsk". Three border ships of Project 1241P ("Grigory Kuropyatnikov", "Grigory Gnatenko" and PSKR-813, later renamed "Poltava") and border boats became part of the Coast Guard of Ukraine. Moreover, there were quite a lot of boats: four armored boats of the 1204 project, four hydrofoils of the 133 project, 17 boats of the 205P project and 32 of the 1400 project (part is in an unfinished state in Feodosia). One of the boats of the 1400 project was later transferred to the Navy under the name "Skadovsk". Finally, the amphibious boat of project 1176 D-305 (renamed "Vol", then "Svatovo") was included in the Ukrainian Navy.
FRATERNAL DIVISIONAccording to the 1997 agreement, it was implied that the Black Sea Fleet would be divided in half – but at the same time, however, Russia has the right to buy some of the ships and boats departing Ukraine.
The overall result of this process turned out to be very peculiar.
Of the three submarines – the modern B-871 of project 877 (mentioned above), the old B-380 of project 641B and the very old B-435 of project 641 – Ukraine got only the last one (called "Zaporozhye").
Of the four large surface ships – the missile cruiser "Moscow" project 1164 and three large anti-submarine ships (BOD) project 1134B ("Ochakov", "Kerch", "Azov") – Russia got all four.
Of the five patrol ships of projects 1135 and 1135M, Russia got "Ladny" ave. 1135 and "Inquisitive" ave. 1135M, both were built in the 1980s and are still part of the Black Sea Fleet.
Ukraine received "Immaculate" (renamed "Nikolaev") and "Selfless" ("Dnepropetrovsk") ave. 1135 and "Striking" ("Sevastopol") ave. 1135M. All these ships were built in the 1970s. "Nikolaev" was disposed of already in 2001, the decommissioned "Dnepropetrovsk" sank in 2005, "Sevastopol" in 2004 was sold to Turkey as a floating target.
Of the two IPCs of Project 1145, five relatively new IPCs of Project 1124M and five old IPCs of Project 1124, Ukraine received only two ships of the latest project: IPC-43 (renamed Sumy) and MPK-52 ("Kherson"). By the end of the 1990s, both of them were disposed of. However, Ukraine got two more MPCs of project 1241P (similar to the above-mentioned border ships): MPC-93 (renamed "Uzhgorod") and MPC-116 ("Khmelnitsky").
Of the four small missile ships (MRCS) – the modern Bora of project 1239 and three not new, but combat–ready projects 1234 - Russia took all four.
Of the seven modern missile boats at that time, Russia took all four boats of the 12411 Ave., equipped with very powerful supersonic anti-ship missiles (anti-ship missiles) "Mosquito" (the same are installed on the project 1239 MRC), as well as the project 12417 boat with the old subsonic Termite anti-ship missiles, but with a new anti-aircraft missile and cannon complex "Cutlass". Ukraine got only two boats of the 1241T project with "Termites": P-54 (renamed "Nikopol", then "Dnieper") and P-63 ("Kremenchuk").
But of the six old hydrofoil missile boats of the 206MR project, Russia took only one, re-equipped with modern Uranus missile defense systems. The remaining five boats with ancient "Termites" were left to Ukraine. Of these, only R-262 (renamed Priluki) and R-265 (Kakhovka) entered the Ukrainian fleet. R-251 ("Tsyurupinsk") and R-260 ("Uman") went for disposal, R-15 ("Konotop") It was transferred to the Georgian Navy under the name "Tbilisi" and in August 2008 was blown up by Russian paratroopers in Poti ("War 08.08.08 – afterword", "HBO" from 03.08.18).
Ukraine also received three old raid boats of the 376U project, which were listed as auxiliary in the Black Sea Fleet. In the Ukrainian Navy, they were armed with machine guns and called "artillery boats".
The Black Sea minesweepers were divided "almost in half". Of course, Russia has taken the newest sea minesweeper project 12660. And also received four naval minesweepers of project 266M, two base minesweepers of project 1265 and two raid minesweepers (one each of 1258 Ave. and 12592 ave.). Ukraine got two minesweepers of project 266M ("Anti-aircraft gunner", renamed "Yellow Waters", then "Chernihiv", and "Scout", which became "Cherkassy"), two projects 1265 (BT-79 ("Melitopol") and BT-126 ("Mariupol"), one project 1258 (RT-214, renamed "Genichesk").
Of the nine large amphibious assault ships (BDK) (four old 1171 Ave., five modern 775 Ave.), Ukraine got the Ilya Azarov project 1171 and Konstantin Olshansky Project 775. The old medium landing ships (KFOR) of Project 773 (one each) and small landing ships (MDK) on the hovercraft of project 12322 (three each) were equally divided. Ukraine received the SDK-137 (renamed Kirovograd), MDK-57 (became Kramatorsk), MDK-93 (Gorlovka), MDK-123 (Artemevsk). Moreover, Kramatorsk and Artemyevsk were never commissioned and disposed of in 1998-2000.
As a result, Russia received almost all the ships and boats of the Black Sea Fleet that represented at least some combat value, leaving Ukraine almost exclusively scrap metal (with the exception of "Olshansky").
In Ukraine, however, no one was particularly outraged by this. And in Russia at that time, the "free and independent" media and opposition parties were hysterical about the very fact of the division of the fleet, without understanding its essence (many have not understood it yet).
INDEPENDENT EXISTENCEThe resulting fleet actually created only problems for Ukraine.
As it was shown above, a significant part of the ships and boats were sent for disposal without ever entering service. In addition, in 2004 BDK "Rivne" became a civilian cargo ship.
In 2001, the project 12322 Ivan Bogun hovercraft, which was located at the shipyard in Feodosia, was completed and immediately sold to Greece along with Gorlovka, and Donetsk was disposed of in 2008. In 2005, he drowned during the disassembly of the MPC "Chernivtsi" project 1124P.
In 2012, the MPK Uzhgorod of project 1241P, the Kremenchug missile boats of project 1241 and Kakhovka of project 206MR, both minesweepers of Project 1265 (Melitopol and Mariupol) were decommissioned and left in the sediment in Sevastopol.
All four boats of Project 133, 12 of Project 205P, and eight of Project 1400 were disposed of or sold from the Coast Guard. However, the construction of new border boats has begun: one each of the Katran and Orlan types, 21 of the Kalkan type, 12 of the UMS1000 type (American project). But all these boats were either armed only with machine guns, or did not carry any onboard weapons at all.
It was obvious that there was a need to build "normal" ships and boats for the Navy, especially since Ukraine got huge shipbuilding capacities from the USSR. The first of these ships were to be the corvettes of project 58250. By the mid-2020s, it was supposed to build 10-12 corvettes with the delivery of the main one in 2012.
The corvettes were supposed to carry foreign weapons, including the French Exocet anti-aircraft missile system and Aster anti-aircraft guided missiles (SAM). The lead corvette "Vladimir the Great" was laid down in May 2011. It was never even launched, remaining less than 50% ready at the shipyard, while the shipyard that built it went bankrupt and was liquidated. The following ships of this project were not laid.
In 2012, the construction of small armored boats of the project 58155 "Gyurza-M", armed with 30 mm guns, and theoretically anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs) began "Barrier" (in fact, they were not installed). According to their combat potential, these boats are able to effectively fight only with "their own kind", that is, with small displacement boats (less than 100 tons). In total, seven boats of the 58155 project were commissioned (after 2014): Akkerman, Berdyansk, Nikopol, Kremenchuk, Lubny, Vyshgorod, Kostopol. The eighth boat was launched, but never joined the Navy.
In such a very strange state, the Ukrainian navy approached the criminal-oligarchic coup of 2014, also known as the "revolution of dignity". His further fate deserves a separate description.
Alexander KhramchikhinAlexander Anatolyevich Khramchikhin is an independent military expert.
