The (Un)Foreseen Storm-2 – from Crimea to Odesa. Maritime Risks in 2020: The Black Sea

Andrii KLYMENKO,
editor-in-chief of BSNews,
the Head of the Monitoring group of the Institute for Black Sea Strategic Studies.

First published in an abbreviated version in the special project of The Ukrainian Week magazine – World in 2020.

Continued. See the beginning here – The (un)foreseen storm - from Mariupol to the Bosphorus. Maritime risks in 2020: the Sea of Azov

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It is worth reminding that we are considering the maritime risks in the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea, related to possible actions of the Russian Federation, based on the experience of 2014-2019, not only in the Ukrainian-Russian but also in the macro-regional context – the Black Sea-Mediterranean.

We assume that the Russian attack on Georgia in 2008 shook, and the occupation of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014 shifted the long conservation of the entire geopolitical rift – from Gibraltar to Mariupol. 

Such tectonic shifts do not stop on their own. Especially as, according to Vladislav Surkov’s article «Putin’s long state» in the Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper of 11.02.2019, «Putin’s political machine is only gaining momentum and is getting ready for long, difficult, and interesting work. Its operation at full capacity is far ahead, so in many years Russia will still be a Putin’s state».

 

The Sea of Azov export from the Ukrainian ports is only a small part in comparison with the export from the numerous Odesa, Mykolaiv, and Kherson ports. The main export-import routes of Ukraine are in the Black Sea and lead to/from the Bosphorus.

In the Black Sea – near the recommended sea routes from Odesa to the Bosphorus and from Odesa to Batumi and the Turkish Black Sea ports – the Ukrainian offshore oil platforms are situated, which were captured by Russia during the occupation of Crimea (see the map).

Few people pay attention to the fact that the Odesa offshore field – the notorious «Boyko's drilling rigs» – is closer to the coast of Odesa than to occupied Crimea.

The distance from the nearest drilling rig seized by Russia to the coast of the Odesa region is 77.6 km (41.9 miles), to Zmiinyi Island – 50.3 km (27.1 miles), and to Cape Tarkhankut in occupied Crimea – 121.5 km (65.6 miles).

From the coast of the Kherson region, the distance to the nearest seized drilling rig is 52.2 km (28.2 miles).

On every sea platform and every drilling rig, a garrison of Russian special forces or marines has long been deployed, as well as underwater, sea-surface, and air situation surveillance radars. There are about ten such military objects on the Ukrainian shelf (see the details in our colleagues’ material Dual-Purpose Gas Streams).

 

While in the past the areas of ​​the Odesa, Holitsynske, Arkhangelske, and Shtormove offshore fields were patrolled by auxiliary ships of the Russian Federation, since 1 June 2018, the guarding of the captured Ukrainian drilling rigs on the occupied shelf has been officially taken over by the 41st brigade of small-size missile ships of the Black Sea Fleet of the RF.

There is constant rotation, and these are the warships with significant potential.

Therefore, it is logical to imagine the scenario where the RF starts to delay for inspection vessels en route to or from the ports of Chornomorsk, Odesa, Mykolayiv, and Kherson, applying the so-called «Azov technique».

The FSB can easily report that one of the ships plying this route may have a sabotage group aboard that wants to blow up, for example, drilling platforms on the stolen Odesa offshore field (which Russia already considers its own, as well as the whole Ukrainian shelf, where it produces/steals up to 2 billion cubic meters of gas annually).

If they do that once, twice, or three times, we can only imagine what will happen to maritime traffic in the area. This may not happen if appropriate preventive measures are taken, but such a scenario should be «on the table».

Note that the recommended routes of vessels from the Bosphorus to Ukrainian ports go through the narrow gap between Zmiinyi Island and the Ukrainian shelf in the Odesa offshore field occupied by the RF. It's a neck that is only 13.5 miles (25 km) wide – see the map.

Another our forecast, which is also based on the monitoring and analysis of the trends in Russia's «Black Sea experiments» in 2019, is as follows:

In 2020, one of the Russian methods for obstructing navigation in the Black Sea will be the expansion of the practice of closing the western areas of the sea for navigation under the pretext of conducting live-fire exercises, whether real or make-believe….

It is worth reminding that on 1-12 July 2019, during the Ukrainian-American naval exercise Sea Breeze 2019, one of the planned exercise areas in the region of the Black Sea from Ukrainian Zmiinyi Island near the Odesa coast to the Cape Tarkhankut in Crimea, that is, in the area where ​​the occupied shelf with gas fields is situated, was closed.

This was done through the issuance of the international warning of navigational danger by the RF.

And since 24 July 2019, the RF has already closed five areas in the Black Sea, including in the maritime exclusive economic zone of Bulgaria and Romania, and almost entirely the eastern Black Sea from Sochi to Turkey to hamper the Georgian-American exercise Agile Spirit 2019.

The combined area of ​​the Black Sea regions blocked by the Russian Navy in July 2019 alone far exceeded 120,000 square kilometres, or more than ¼ of the total Black Sea area. The goal of these actions is to form a «habitual» perception that the entire Black Sea is Russia’s zone of influence. This is Russia's strategy for driving NATO out of the Black Sea.

Since the first days of 2020, we have already observed a similar pattern – even with some development.

On 2 January 2020, closure of certain Black Sea areas as a result of issuing NAVTEX international maritime hazard warnings about conducting live-fire exercises was as follows:

Closure of areas: in yellow – the Ukrainian Navy, in pink – the Georgian Coast Guard, in red – the Turkish Navy, in turquoise– the Russian Black Sea Fleet.

In the largest of these areas, south and southwest of the occupied Crimean Peninsula, on 9 January 2020, the unprecedentedly large-scale joint missile-firing exercise of the Black Sea and Northern Fleets was conducted with missile launches from the sea, air, and shore.

This exercise deserves special attention.

For the first time since Soviet times (!), we saw such a huge naval group of the Russian Federation at the Black Sea exercise – about 40 ships, a submarine, and over 40 planes and helicopters of different types participated in the exercise:

from the Black Sea Fleet: the new missile frigates Admiral Grigorovich, Admiral Makarov (carriers of Kalibr cruise missiles), the small-size missile ships Orekhovo-Zuevo, Ingushetia, Vyshny Volochek (carriers of Kalibr cruise missiles), the missile boats Naberezhnye Chelny, Ivanovets, Shuya, R-60, the large landing ships Caesar Kunikov, Orsk, Saratov, Novocherkassk, and Azov, the new patrol ships Dmitry Rogachev and Vasily Bykov, the new submarine Kolpino (a carrier of Kalibr cruise missiles), the guided missile air cushion ship Samum, the small antisubmarine ships Kasimov, Muromets, the minesweeper Ivan Antonov, the anti-sabotage boats P-355, Yunarmeets Kryma, P-834, P-835, P-838, P-845, the landing boat D-296, the tanker Ivan Bubnov, the repair ship PM-56, the rescue tugs Sergey Balk, Captain Guryev, SB-739, Epron, PZhS-123. 

From the Northern Fleet: the guided missile cruiser Marshal Ustinov (President Putin, the Defence Minister Shoigu, and the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Navy Yevmenov were aboard this ship, where the headquarters was established), and the large anti-submarine ship Vice-Admiral Kulakov;

the air force: Su-30SM multirole fighters, Su-24M front-line bombers, and Tu-95 strategic heavy bombers and missile carriers, naval helicopters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, unmanned aerial vehicles; the participation in the exercise of the Il-38 anti-submarine warfare aircraft of the Northern Fleet deserves special attention.

Photo: http://kremlin.ru

During the exercise, a pair of MiG-31k fighters fired a Kinzhal aeroballistic (hypersonic) missile at a target on one of the ranges.

The Admiral Grigorovich frigate, the small-size missile ship Orekhovo-Zuevo, and the submarine Kolpino launched Kalibr cruise missiles from surface ships and submarines; the missile boats Ivanovets and Naberezhnye Chelny launched Moskit anti-ship missiles. The Utes silo-based coastal missile system (*) carried out two missile launches at targets that simulated enemy ships.

(*) In November 2016, the Utes silo-based coastal missile system produced in Soviet times was put back in operation after being restored by the Black Sea Fleet of the RF. It is located in the area of ​​Cape Aya (Balaklava district of the city of Sevastopol). Since 2016, it has been regularly firing Progress anti-ship missiles (a modernised version of the Soviet P-35 anti-ship missile). Its range is up to 460 km. It is equipped with a 560-kilogram high-explosive warhead or a nuclear warhead of up to 20 kilotons. In the coming years, the Utes system will be replaced by the first Bastion-S silo-based coastal defence missile system (up to 36 Onyx missiles).

It is worth reminding that in 2019 simulation air attacks of the Russian military aviation on NATO ships during their stay in the Black Sea, as well as simulation attacks on the Ukrainian Black Sea ports, became familiar (on 10 July 2019, a Russian Tu-22M3 missile carrier simulated a missile strike against Odesa from the distance of 60 km).

As to amphibious assault training, it is regularly conducted by the Black Sea Fleet of the RF at the range of Opuk in occupied Crimea.

In September 2020, the Southern Military District of the RF (and it appears that not only it) will participate in full force in the large-scale Caucasus-2020 strategic command post exercise (SCPX).

About 100 warships and auxiliary vessels will take part in it. And it can be predicted that not only the ships of the Black Sea Fleet and the Caspian Flotilla will participate.

The main purpose of such exercises is to train for a large joint military operation in the south and south-western theatres of war.

Undoubtedly, the joint exercise of the Black Sea and Northern Fleets suggests another peculiarity of 2020 – the collective training of different fleets staffs and joint force groupings has already begun. This practice is being actively implemented in the Russian army based on the Syrian experience.