Russia launches tactical attack to protect warship fleet in Crimea

Nga tung đòn chiến thuật, bảo vệ hạm đội tàu chiến ở Crimea - 1 — Warships of the Russian Black Sea Fleet (Photo: Getty).

Military observers say Russia has begun jamming GPS (global positioning system) in the Crimean peninsula to protect its important strategic facilities from further attacks by Ukraine.

According to Naval News, since early November, several ships in the port of Sevastopol have reported their location as Sevastopol International Airport, about 8km north of their actual location. The ships transmit their location via AIS (automatic identification system).

AIS is a system in transport to identify vessels, their size, their course and is used by mobile and fixed civil services.

Naval News analysts believe that it is possible that the ships are reporting inaccurate positions intentionally or due to a series of technical problems. But this systematic approach suggests that there is something more behind Russia's move.

The erroneous positions of the ships are concentrated around Sevastopol International Airport, which may indicate that the source of the interference is located in this area.

Russia is also believed to use GPS jamming to protect important facilities such as President Vladimir Putin's residence.

Disabling satellites has a certain military significance. Ukraine certainly uses them as one of many tools to monitor the activities of Russian ports and plan attacks.

It was previously reported that Russia had significantly increased security measures in the summer to protect the Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol, but still failed to stop the Storm Shadow missile attack in September.

Newsweek estimates that since Russia began its military campaign in Ukraine in February last year, 17 ships of the Black Sea Fleet have been attacked, including the flagship Moskva and the new frigate Askold.

Satellite images taken on October 1 and 2 shared by several Russian military bloggers show that ships of Russia's Black Sea Fleet appear to have moved away from their ports in Crimea to other Russian ports to avoid the risk of being attacked by Ukraine.

Satellite images show some of the largest ships of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet anchored at a naval port near Novorossiysk in the southern Krasnodor Krai region, while smaller vessels are anchored at the port of Feodosia in the Crimean peninsula.

These ships include two missile frigates Admiral Essen and Admiral Makarov, three submarines, five large landing ships, several small missile boats, and minesweepers. These ships were originally stationed in the Crimean port of Sevastopol, but are now spread out to two ports in Novorossiysk and Feodosia.

The ability of the Black Sea Fleet to use the Novorossiysk base to reload cruise missiles on ships could become a key factor in the fleet's operational effectiveness, the British Ministry of Defense said on November 25.

The British Ministry of Defense believes that the relocation of some of the Black Sea Fleet's operations to the port of Novorossiysk is partly to limit the threat of attack from Ukraine, and also to narrow the coordination gap between their air and naval forces.

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