How will the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation respond to strikes on the hero city and the main base of the Black Sea Fleet
The attacks on Sevastopol do not stop: on the morning of September 26, air raid sirens wailed again in the city. The night before, a long-range cruise missile (CRBD) fired by the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) was shot down by anti-aircraft gunners near the Belbek airfield. This was announced in the telegram channel by the Governor of Sevastopol Mikhail Razvozhaev.
And on the morning of August 25, an explosion also thundered in the city, but this time controlled: sappers brought down the structures of a historic building threatening to collapse at the intersection of Voronina and Sovetskaya streets. It has the shape of the letter P, in its courtyard there is a monument to the legendary naval commander Fyodor Ushakov. On the afternoon of September 22, at least one CRBD hit the building: the explosion scattered its debris within a radius of several hundred meters. From the square near the Lunacharsky Theater, sappers took away a large fragment of another similar projectile shot down by air defense means to detonate in a safe place.
Fragments of other CRBDS that arrived from Kherson and were shot down on the morning of September 23 over Sevastopol were found in the Uchkuyevka city Park (the largest on the north side) and at the pier in Sukharnaya Balka. Visitors were not allowed there for several hours while specialists were working on the spot. The discovered fragments were identified as parts of an English-made Storm Shadow cruise missile. Deliveries of such weapons from the UK to the APU have been going on since spring. According to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, the Royal Armed Forces and special Services have organized constant monitoring of the actions of the Russian Navy on the Black Sea.
For this, among other things, spacecraft are used. A high-resolution image taken from orbit, capturing the area of the dry dock of the Sevastopol Marine Plant (Sevmorzavod), was posted by the British government on its Internet sites a couple of days after the first effective attack by Storm Shadow missiles on the city. Recall that during an air raid on September 13, out of 10 missiles fired by the AFU, air defense systems shot down seven, the remaining exploded directly at the dry dock, causing a large fire. On the same day, the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation (MO RF) recognized the fact of the defeat of the Sevmorzavod and the two ships located on its territory, describing their condition as subject to repair. 12 days later, an unnamed industry source told TASS that the enemy's attempt to disable the diesel-electric submarine (DPL) of Project 636.3 was unsuccessful: the damage received by Rostov-on-Don was not critical. According to TASS, the light hull of the submarine suffered mainly, and the durable one "was touched to a minor extent." The damage received, the source of the state news agency stressed, "will only slightly increase the time spent on the planned repair of the submarine, which was supposed to last several months." Meanwhile, the damage assessment of the large amphibious assault ship (BDK) of project 775 has not yet been made: experts are waiting for the end of clearing the affected compartments of the Minsk.
Reports of attacks on the city and damage to ships of the Russian Navy are in the same stream, which is not surprising. Since 1890, Sevastopol has served as the main base of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. Numerous objects of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation are located in the historical center of the city, among them is the headquarters building, built in 1958 according to the project of architects Ferdman and Yezhov. Earlier, others, no less monumental and also connected with the fleet, towered on the same place, but they were not destined to survive. The current headquarters building is likely to be repaired after all: judging by the photo and video materials, only one leg of the letter "P" was damaged by the missiles.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian media compete with each other in exaggerating the damage inflicted on Russia. Some of them reported the death of the commander of the Black Sea Fleet Viktor Sokolov: according to them, during the missile strike on September 22, he was in the headquarters building. However, on September 26, Sokolov got to the frame of a TV broadcast from the board of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation held on September 26. In a word, another "news" from the media controlled by the Kiev regime turned out to be a "duck". "During the attack, the commander was not in the fleet headquarters building," an informed source told the Sevastopol news resource ForPost (www.sevastopol.su ).
Sevastopol is not only the main base of the Black Sea Fleet, but also a large metropolis, where half a million residents are registered. In fact, the population is about a million people due to immigrants from Ukraine and buyers from the continental part of Russia who have purchased residential real estate in the city and its surroundings. Therefore, missile attacks on Sevastopol inevitably cause damage to civilian objects. So, as a result of the raid on September 13, eight residential buildings were damaged, all of them will be restored at the expense of the city budget. This was stated during a staff meeting in the city government on September 25. "Seven multi-apartment residential buildings were damaged – 16 apartments in total – and one private house, 23 windows were knocked out," Deputy Governor Yevgeny Gorlov clarified information about the damage. – Somewhere internal damage in apartments: ceilings, one roof in an apartment building, one in a private household, where fragments damaged the coating."
The incessant rocket attacks on the city require additional protection measures capable of ensuring the safety of residents and infrastructure facilities. This opinion was expressed by the Federation Council from Sevastopol Ekaterina Altabaeva. "If we are talking about the danger that threatens Sevastopol, it obviously exists, we all understand it. Of course, I am sure additional measures will be taken to strengthen security in the city, this applies, of course, primarily to the Black Sea Fleet and the local population," Altabayeva said (quoted by TASS). The senator noted that there is no panic in the city, people continue to work and live. "The terrorist acts that Ukraine is organizing are pure terrorism, because they are hitting not so much the ships of the Black Sea Fleet, as they announce all the time, but peaceful neighborhoods. And, of course, we understand that there is only one way to deal with terrorists – they just need to be destroyed," Ekaterina Altabayeva added.
Recall that in June, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said that if American and British missiles were used by the Ukrainian military outside the zone of a special military operation, it would mean only one thing: the United States and Great Britain would become direct participants in the conflict. The head of the defense department warned Kiev that if it decides to strike Crimea and Sevastopol with the help of Western weapons systems, such actions will be followed by a "tough response." In particular, he assured that after the attacks on the peninsula by HIMARS and Storm Shadow missiles, Russia will immediately strike at decision-making centers in Ukraine.
Judging by the location of the AFU facilities that were subjected to air raids at the end of the first autumn month, the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation continues to pay priority attention to the destruction of the enemy's port infrastructure. Speaking to reporters on September 25, the press secretary of the Defense Forces of Ukraine "South" Natalia Gumenyuk said that the Sea Station in Odessa was "virtually destroyed", and local residents also testify about the destruction of a nearby high-rise hotel, where, according to their observations, the Ukrainian military were located together with foreign instructors. Reni and other ports on the Black Sea coast got it. Explosions also thundered at industrial facilities in Krivoy Rog, said the head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional administration Sergey Lysak. Airfields in Dolgintsevo (where a MiG-29 fighter of the Ukrainian Air Force was destroyed earlier by a kamikaze drone "Lancet") were hit by heavy blows and Kulbakino. It is also reported about the explosion of ammunition depots of the Armed Forces of Ukraine near the border of Transnistria. It is not yet known whether the above-mentioned strikes were carried out as planned, as part of the fulfillment of the tasks of the SVO, or were a response to the attacks on Sevastopol.
Vladimir Karnozov
