Soviet Sea Power

Hey Everyone

Thanks to JQ for the past couple of posts, and for the responses/discussions to topics that JQ have brought up. The media holds considerable power in their portrayal of various armies, which was aptly demonstrated in the history of the United States...where negative portrayal of US foreign involvement in theaters such as Vietnam, Korea, Iraqi Freedom, had a very contrasting effect on public attitudes in comparison with positive portrayal in WWII and the Gulf War. In the end, we have to ask ourselves why would discourse on the portrayal of war has to be limited to the dualism of the 'good guys' and 'bad guys'? War is a complex entity that tests our sense of 'right' and 'wrong', and (somewhat) cynically speaking, when will Man ever learn to live in peace?

Haha I'll stop the pseudo-philosophy here. On a lighter note, JQ has kindly uploaded a new batch of pics we have taken, and we hope the pictures will successfully carry on the spirit our previous photos have brought to this little corner of the internet.

For today, we have a couple of pictures of JQ's Sovremenny Class Destroyer (Soviet designation: Project 956, Sarych/Buzzard), a Soviet-era anti-surface warship that continues to be in service, primarily with the Russian and Chinese navies (PLAN). Contrary to naval trends during its development, the Sovremenny destroyers were steam powered as opposed to the more advanced gas turbine systems, as the Soviet production of gas turbine systems was insufficient to be implemented in the production of the destroyers.

There are a total of 3 variants of this class:

956 (with 3M80 Moskit anti-ship missiles)
956A (with 3M80A improved Moskit anti-ship missiles)
956EM (PLAN variant, latest in class with various improvements, such as SAMs and SSMs)

Interestingly, China's acquisition and subsequent upgrade of Sovremenny destroyers were a significant security concern for in the Asia-Pacific, especially Taiwan, since they exceeded the capabilities of contemporary Chinese naval vessels, and hence considerably improved PLAN's capabilties. Currently 4 are in the service of the PLAN East Fleet, and their names are as follow:

杭州 (hangzhou)
福州 (fuzhou)
泰州 (taizhou)
宁波 (ningbo)