Technical lost opportunities: USSR Cold War

Another subject to ramble about. I will start with probably one of THE biggest lost opportunities, the Kievs. Four 40,000 tons ships (largest in their day after the US CVs) that were really useful as missile firing ships rather than carriers, simply because the Yak-38 was a dismal weapon.

A few words about the background. I'm sure many of you are aware of the projects for full fledged CVNs namely project 1160 and project 1153, discarded because they were too expensive. Also the soviets were perfectly capable of building catapults, they did had them in prototype form before 1980 and as i understand it a couple of sets were already completed for the Ulyanovsk.

So what could they have done differently? Historically they build 4 Kievs, 1 Tbilisi and one unfinished (Riga/Varyag) plus starting on Ulyanovsk, also 230 Yak-38s. But for the same money, a far, far better solution would be built four slightly larger Kievs (say 50,000 tons- they did had conventional carrier projects about this size at the time the Kiev program was started, they looked like a smaller version of a typical US CVN) with 2 catapults (hell, even one would do!) and about same aircraft/ helicopter capacity as historical (30-36). They could built 150 MiG-23K (which could be replaced by the MiG-29K in late eighties) instead of the Yak-38s, an aircraft which is light years away in capability compared to the Yak, probably at least twice the range with twice the payload, Mach 2, radar equipped and BVR capable, possibly leaving resources for say 50 Beriev P-42 AEW and ASW aircraft, or maybe it's development, the Korchagin Typhoon.

Alternatively, at least the Yak-44 AEW (and possibly ASW) development can be brought forward, historically they initially tried to have it operate from a ski-jump carrier by fitting it with four lift engines (!), that didn't work, tried to replace it with the An-74K, that was even worse, finally they went back to the Yak-44 concept and redesigned and refitted it with more powerful engines along the lines of the E-2C. I'm not sure if it could operate from a ski-jump Tbilisi or it was destined only for the catapult fitted Ulyanovsk and subsequent sister-ships.

So yes, for the same money and resources they could have had four successively improved and actually useful carriers, certainly more sellable (if the dissolution of USSR still happens), this would cancel the middle line Tbilisis, but they could have started on the larger CVNs like Ulyanovsk of 70-80,000 tons, able to operate the larger Su-27K and strike derivatives alongside the MiG-29K, they could fit it with 2 catapults and ski-jump if they wanted to (though probably as they would have had considerable catapult experience in this ATL, perhaps they would have fitted it with 3 catapults), whether they could have finished or not that is of course another matter.

If they really wanted to continue the VTOL development, the Yak-38 should only have been an experimental program, paving the way for the Yak-41 that despite it's complexity and cost was a capable weapon which could have been used on the Kherson class (and subsequent) LHAs, if they would have gotten that far (to build them i mean).
 
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The problem with a USSR large surface fleet, which means not just carriers but also the escorts and support ships they will need, is that there are lots of other things the USSR needs more and even the USSR has only so much money to spend on the military. To have one deployed carrier group you need 2.5 at least under peacetime conditions. Of the four "coasts", the Baltic and Black Sea are of no use for large combatants/carrier battle groups because of the geographic constraints. This means these groups have to be based at Murmansk and Vladivostok (Petropavlosk is OK for forward basing but not a homeport for obvious reasons). Both of these have some negatives.

The bottom line is that while the USSR might have been able to build something better than they did for both ships & aircraft, they did not have a need for anything close to western/US carrier battle groups. The real job of the Soviet navy was to disrupt NATO and other opposition maritime traffic including reinforcement from America to Europe and to prevent NATO navies (in particular the USA) from attacking the USSR. The deterrence mission of the missile submarines is a different strategic issue.

A nation's military has to match resources (financial and human), geography, and the threat it (perceives) it faces. Attempting to create a carrier battle group force competent and large enough to confront the US/NATO on the high seas would be something the USSR neither needed nor could afford.
 
The primary role for the Soviet carriers was ASW. As I understand the Yak's were primary used for recon, along with possessing some crummy air to air capabilities. But their purpose was to protect their SSBN force, which would sail into the Barents Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk where they would launch their missiles if the time came. And the carriers, along with supporting destroyers, was supposed to keep the American attack subs away.

As to conducting true carrier operations using MiG-23s and later SU-27s or MiG-29s, my understanding is the learning curve is a generation or so. Figure 10 years+ of trials and improvements etc.
 
The problem with a USSR large surface fleet, which means not just carriers but also the escorts and support ships they will need, is that there are lots of other things the USSR needs more and even the USSR has only so much money to spend on the military. To have one deployed carrier group you need 2.5 at least under peacetime conditions. Of the four "coasts", the Baltic and Black Sea are of no use for large combatants/carrier battle groups because of the geographic constraints. This means these groups have to be based at Murmansk and Vladivostok (Petropavlosk is OK for forward basing but not a homeport for obvious reasons). Both of these have some negatives.

The bottom line is that while the USSR might have been able to build something better than they did for both ships & aircraft, they did not have a need for anything close to western/US carrier battle groups. The real job of the Soviet navy was to disrupt NATO and other opposition maritime traffic including reinforcement from America to Europe and to prevent NATO navies (in particular the USA) from attacking the USSR. The deterrence mission of the missile submarines is a different strategic issue.

A nation's military has to match resources (financial and human), geography, and the threat it (perceives) it faces. Attempting to create a carrier battle group force competent and large enough to confront the US/NATO on the high seas would be something the USSR neither needed nor could afford.

At their peak in the 80s, the Soviets had a pretty large surface force, which was numerically superior to the West. The ability to create a carrier battle group was limited by not having an effective carrier and operational experience. Numerically, they were there. As to financial resources, count excessive naval spending as just one more contributor to the USSR's death.
 
I spent quite a bit of the Cold War serving on American subs. The Soviet's ASW was horrible at best. I am convinced that the only thing Soviet surface warships would have been good for is target practice for American fast boats. IMHO I would have built more subs if I was them.
 
Thanks for the replies. It is instructive to see the battle group built around the Kuznetsov today, no doubt the same could have been done (and probably was done) about the Kievs, by that time the Kirov*, Slava, Udaloy and Sovremeniy classes were coming online. Also an example of what the Kievs might have been is to look at Vikramaditya, they did got a useful carrier of out of a Kiev hull. Of course, it does not have the AshM battery nor catapults, which leads me to a query, is anyone familiar with carrier catapults, how much do they weigh and what is their influence on a ship's displacement -in other words, if one is to put two typical catapults of that era on a Kiev, how much bigger the ship needs to be? I was just guesstimating that it needs to be 10,000 tons bigger.

The primary role for the Soviet carriers was ASW. As I understand the Yak's were primary used for recon, along with possessing some crummy air to air capabilities. But their purpose was to protect their SSBN force, which would sail into the Barents Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk where they would launch their missiles if the time came. And the carriers, along with supporting destroyers, was supposed to keep the American attack subs away.

As to conducting true carrier operations using MiG-23s and later SU-27s or MiG-29s, my understanding is the learning curve is a generation or so. Figure 10 years+ of trials and improvements etc.
Well, my whole argument was that it would have been better- all things being equal, without any change in the soviet doctrine of those days- to have the full monty (MiG-23K), rather than the crummy ( Yak-38). Tactically anything the Yak could do the MiG could do ten times better. As for the learning curve, being still the soviets time intensive flying would not have been a problem, so probably they could cut that timeframe to half. Getting Kuznetsov fully operational have been enormously slowed down by the soviet dissolution and subsequent economic crisis.

There is certain amount of material and various opinions on the theme, the choosing of the Kievs and Yak-38 had also to do with politics, personal preferences and influence, whoever was in charge at that time did not wanted big carriers (hence the projects 1160 and 1153 being canceled), while Yakovlev was using his clout trying to sell the Yak-38, the VVS didn't wanted anything to do with it, but the navy leaders (unfortunately imo) bit.

*speaking of which, perhaps those nuclear reactors would have been more useful in a CV, a less ambitious conventionally powered Kirov also reducing cost, i was thinking they could have kept it under 20,000 tons and have it almost as formidably armed. They did had projects for a smaller 14,000 tons CGN (project 1293) and also for a 12,000 tons carrier escort (project 1199 Anchar) by the end of the eighties.
 
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While the actual number of Soviet surface ships may have exceeded the USN, the USSR/WP did not exceed NATO and many of the Soviet ships were small and/or attached to coast guard/KGB functions. Soviet naval vessels also were relatively short legged, and Soviet support vessels for UNREP were both limited in number and capacity. Basically the Soviet navy, outside of coastal operations and submarines, was a one shot deal - try and get in a surprise attack on US/NATO forces before getting sunk. Any sustained naval operations outside coastal waters were submarine only. While there were Soviet naval bases outside the USSR they were limited and sketchy, and the countries they were based in had little or no ability to protect those bases - US overseas bases, on the other hand, much better facilities better protected. (obviously a nuke missile...)

You don't need an aircraft carrier to provide ASW protection for SSBNs in a "bastion", much better and cheaper ways to do it. Except for prestige the USSR had no need for a carrier/big ship navy, and has been mentioned the money they spent on that was a waste, and another nail in the coffin.
 
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