Mutiny on the Storozhevoy

In 1975, a mutiny occurred on a Soviet Destroyer by the name of the Storozhevoy. The ship's second in command, Valery Sablin led a coup against the ship's commander in the hopes of seizing the ship and broadcasting a call to the citizens to raise up arms and commit to a second revolution.

Sablin's wish was to topple the current Soviet government, which he though was far from communist and highly corrupt at the time. After showing the crew the famous Soviet film,The Battleship Potemkin, Sablin conducted a vote in which a majority of the crew decided to go along with him. Their plan was to saild to Leningrad and issue the broadcast there in the hopes that it would be picked up on national frequencies.

Shortly after, the army got wind of the operation and managed to halt the mutiny. Out of all the mutineers, Sablin and his second in command were the only ones to be convicted, with Sablin being sent to the FIRING SQUAD. For the longest time, the Politburo hid the event from the public, only revealing it after the dissolution of the USSR.

In your opinion, what do you think would have happened had he been able to sail to Leningrad and issue his broadcast. Would the entire population really rise up as he would have hoped?

Here is a short documentary on the event if anyone is interested. I find the whole story to be really fascinating. Say what you want about the plan, but you got to applaud the guy for sticking to his ideals.

and yeah Tom Clancy did base his novel on the event. :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYQEl9OxnqM
 
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Cook

Banned
Out of all the mutineers, Sablin and his second in command were the only ones to be convicted, with Sablin being sent to the shooting range...

That’s jolly decent of them, sending him of to get some shooting practice and improve his marksmanship principles, most people would have put him in front of a firing squad.
;)
 
That’s jolly decent of them, sending him of to get some shooting practice and improve his marksmanship principles, most people would have put him in front of a firing squad.
;)

Well he might have been the target.:(
 

Hyperion

Banned
His best bet would have been to run for Sweden or a NATO port and seek asylum. That would probably do far more damage than anything, having a couple hundred Russian navy folks jumping ship, and taking their whole ship with them.

My understanding of the Russians during the Cold War was they put most of their navy resources into submarines as opposed to building as large a surface fleet as they could. An entire frigate defecting to the west would put a bit of a dent in their ORBAT.
 

Hyperion

Banned
As I understand it, they did make a run for it, but were stopped just short of Swedish waters

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storozhevoy

So how plausible would it be for the captain in charge of the mutiny to skip the whole revolution plan and simply make a dead run for Sweden or another port? If he wanted to screw over the Kremlin, I can't think of anything better than an entire warship defecting. The political fallout from such a move would be massive.

At the very least, the Kremlin will rip the navy commanders to pieces. I would expect a long, long list of officers, enlisted, and civilian bureaucrats being fired, demoted, or in some cases shot.
 

Thande

Donor
I tend to think the answer is: movement swiftly crushed, but provides enough ammunition for critics of Brezhnev to have him removed from power and replaced, probably initially with an uneasy troika with Andropov gradually gaining full power.
 
I remember reading about this in a book on the history of Soviet state security agencies. I think that the mutineers did attempt a few broadcasts, but government forces quickly jammed their signals with relative ease. I don't really see a way around that, unfortunately.
 
Perhaps the mutiny is more planned out, and some people back in the Army and other branches get involved (Enough for a broadcast to get out). At this point the Soviet Union was in decline, and a possible mix of 'Nationalism' in the Soviet Union to go back to the old glory days of the Revolution may spark another Revolution.
 
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