Afraid Of Ukrainian Missiles, The Russians Are Chaining Air-Defense Vehicles To Ships

The Black Sea Fleet of the Russian military is still mounting Tor air defense systems to at least one of its corvettes, undoubtedly in an effort to defend the boat against Ukrainian anti-ship missiles.

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It's questionable if wearing the Tor truly helps in combat situations, despite the fact that it's not as desperate as it may seem at first glance—the M2KM variant of the basic Tor device is designed for shipborne usage.

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The Ukrainians have knocked out a bunch of the vehicles, including at least one aboard a ship.

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In any event, it’s obvious why the Black Sea Fleet would pair patrol ships and Tors.

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The Black Sea Fleet now only has two air defence ships, each an Admiral Grigorovich-class frigate with 24 Buk medium-range surface-to-air missiles, after losing the missile cruiser Moskva in April to two Ukrainian Neptune missiles.

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The fleet maintains the frigates about a hundred miles away from the Ukrainian shore in order to prevent them from meeting the same fate as Moskva.

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That’s too far for Ukraine’s Neptune and Harpoon anti-ship missiles. However, the frigates' 30-mile Buks are too far away to provide any protection to smaller, less powerful warships patrolling closer to the shore.

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Vasily Bekh could have just been transporting the Tor to the island to bolster the garrison.

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It's also plausible that Project 22160's crew used the Tor, in the same manner, the tug's crew did: to protect themselves from missile attacks. If the latter, it should be obvious that it failed.

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A virtual no-go zone for Russian soldiers in the western Black Sea has already been established by the Ukrainians, despite many Tors—at sea and on Snake Island—failing to stop them.

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