Russian military naval production now surpasses Europe

This August 23, the President Vladimir Putin announced the start of the construction of 6 new ships for the Russian military fleet on the occasion of its visit to ARMY-2021 in Patriot Park on the outskirts of Moscow. Thus, these are 2 new nuclear submarines for Borei-A class launchers, 2 submarines with conventional propulsion Project 636.3 improved Kilo and 2 light frigates whose exact model has not been announced (22380 or 22385 ) which will be built at the Severodvinsk, St. Petersburg and Komsomolsk-on-Amur shipyards. In recent months, Vladimir Putin has become accustomed to this type of announcement concerning the Russian Navy, after having do the same on July 16, 2020 by announcing the construction of 2 22350 Admiral Gorshkov frigates, 2 nuclear missile attack submarines 885-M Iassen and 2 new 23900 assault helicopter carriers under construction at the Kerch shipyards in Crimea, then April 28, 2021 announced the start of the construction of two nuclear submarines launching Borei-A missiles, two conventionally powered submarines 636.3 Improved Kilo and two corvettes 20380 Steregushchiy. With today's announcement, there are therefore 18 major new ships, including 10 submarines, whose construction will have been launched in barely a year.

Following the Soviet collapse, military shipbuilding went through 20 very difficult years, linked to the absence of public funding, the stoppage of investments and the leakage of know-how, which greatly affected the operational capacities of the Russian Navy, which could no longer replace or even properly maintain its naval units, even the most important such as nuclear missile submarines, or SSBNs, constituting a key component of the country's nuclear deterrence. Thus, at the end of the 2000s, the Russian Navy was not even able to ensure the operational permanence of Russian deterrence by only keeping an SSBN at sea half the time. The change in this area came in two stages. First, during the Georgia campaign in 2008, the Russian military quickly realized that if they had benefited from an amphibious force and its escort, they could have taken the Georgian forces from the rear and reduced the duration. and the losses of this lightning war (5 days). This gave rise to the order of 2 helicopter carriers of the Mistral class from France, the Russian shipyards not having the capacity to build such ships at this time.

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