- Russia's move of its Black Sea Fleet to safer waters signals its waning power there, experts told Insider.
- Ukraine's ability to strike hard at Russia's ships at Sevastopol is a "significant problem" for Russia, an expert said.
Russia's withdrawal of ships from a key Crimean base to safer ports shows it has "clearly lost its control" over the Black Sea in naval and geopolitical terms, a top naval expert told Insider.
Ukraine's ability to strike hard at Russian ships with long-range missiles — even "without an operational navy" — has become a "significant problem" for Russia, Basil Germond, a maritime security expert at the UK's Lancaster University, told Insider.
"We often forget that warships are the most expensive military assets in a country's arsenal," Germond said, pointing out that building them and getting them afloat can take upwards of a decade.
At the same time, the Montreux Convention, which places limits on the number of warships that can enter the Black Sea through Turkish-controlled waters, means Russia can't simply boost its limited supply of ships from the Baltic or beyond, Germond said.
According to an analysis of satellite imagery, Russia has moved most of its ships from Sevastopol to the southwestern port of Novorossiysk in Russia, with some others going to the port of Feodosia — still in Crimea, but much further east.
It confirms earlier assessments made by the UK's Ministry of Defence last week that Russia had moved some operations out of the port, though it remains unclear if the move is permanent.
This comes after Ukraine struck hard and repeatedly at Russia's naval infrastructure at the key port, most notably its strike on the fleet's headquarters on September 22 and its attack on a shipyard there a week earlier.
Pointing to those attacks, James Heappey, a UK defense minister, said during a defense event in Warsaw last Tuesday that the move signaled the "functional defeat" of the Black Sea Fleet.
"I would argue that that is what it is because it has been forced to disperse to ports in which it cannot have an effect on Ukraine," Heappey said.
Minister for the Armed Forces @JSHeappey addressed the Warsaw Security Forum today focussing on the successes that the Ukrainian armed forces continue to achieve on land and at sea.@WarsawForum #WSF2023 pic.twitter.com/wE4sjibX4B
— Ministry of Defence (@DefenceHQ) October 3, 2023
But some experts have been skeptical of the significance of the move, with analysts such as Shashank Joshi, a visiting fellow at King's College London's War Studies program, writing on X that while the Black Sea Fleet is "weakened and constrained," Heappey's remarks represent premature "triumphalism."
Russia can still send cruise missiles to strike Ukrainian infrastructure from the alternative ports.
Sidharth Kaushal, a sea power expert at the UK's Royal United Services Institute, told Insider that to his mind, Heappey's assessment would only be the case once it's clear that the move is permanent.
He pointed out that much of the Black Sea Fleet moved to Novorossiysk last winter when Ukraine was mounting regular maritime drone attacks at Sevastopol ships. The fleet returned to the Crimean port later, to continue to assert its power over the Black Sea.
While Ukraine's threat to Russia at Sevastopol is even "more robust" now than last winter, "it would be a mistake to assume that now the facility is effectively defenseless," he said.
But while its navy is at Novorossiysk and Feodosia, Russia is at a disadvantage, Kaushal added.
"The fleet may be safer in Novorossiysk," he said, largely because Ukraine is unlikely to use its Western-supplied cruise missiles on Russian territory.
But facilities at the new ports are much poorer, he said. "In terms of the tempo of activity it can keep up, and of course, its ability to project power into the northwestern Black Sea, it'll be much more constrained," Kaushal said.
Russia's submarines can still lay mines along trade routes, according to Germond. But in political and diplomatic terms, he said, Russia's blockades — which have strained the country's exports — have "lost credibility."
"This has an important implication," he added. "The less credible Moscow's threats are, the easier it will be for Ukraine to strike deals with maritime insurers."
As of Sunday, multiple ships carrying grain, sunflower oil, and metals had sailed out of Ukraine's ports in the northwestern Black Sea, The Guardian reported.
In political terms, the move is also a "pretty considerable embarrassment" for the Kremlin, Kaushal said.
Not only because of the Russian air defense system's failure against cruise missiles, "but also because of the symbolic importance of Sevastopol itself," he said.
Germond agreed. "For Putin, the recent attacks constitute a political blow," he said. "Russia looks weak in Crimea."
And the embarrassment is seeping out publicly, at least among some pro-Putin military bloggers.
Hardline pro-Kremlin Telegram account Rybar wrote on Friday that it's "difficult to accept" that "the Black Sea Fleet cannot fully ensure its security now."