The Soviet Navy (Russian: Военно-морской флот СССР, Voenno-morskoj flot SSSR, literally "Military Maritime Fleet of the USSR") was the naval arm of the Soviet Armed Forces. Often referred to as the Red Fleet, the Soviet Navy would have played an instrumental role in a Warsaw Pact war with NATO, where it would have attempted to prevent naval convoys from bringing reinforcements across the Atlantic Ocean from North America to Western Europe.
The Soviet Navy was divided into four major fleets: the Northern, Pacific, Black Sea, and Baltic Fleets; under separate command was the Leningrad Naval Base. The Caspian Flotilla was a smaller force operating in the land-locked Caspian Sea. The 5th Operational Squadron in the Mediterranean drew its units from the Black Sea, Baltic, and Northern Fleets; the Indian Ocean Squadron primarily from the Pacific Fleet. Other components included Naval Aviation, Naval Infantry (the Soviet equivalent of marines), and Coastal Artillery.
According to a 1980 Time article citing analysts from RAND Corporation, non-Slavs were generally prohibited from joining elite or strategic positions in the armed forces like the Navy, Strategic Rocket Forces and the Soviet Air Force because of suspicions of the loyalty of ethnic minorities. However, this assertion is contradicted by numerous ethnic surnames among the admirals of the Soviet Navy and Generals of the Soviet Army.
Most of the Soviet Navy was reformed into the Russian Navy after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Read more about Soviet Navy: History
Other articles related to "soviet navy, soviet, navy":
... Ivan Stepanovich Yumashev (17 January 1947 – 20 July 1951), Fleet Admiral of the Soviet Union Nikolai Gerasimovich Kuznetsov (20 July 1951 – 5 January 1956), second term, Fleet Admiral of the ...
... and Soviet forces engage in brinkmanship across the world ... Jack Sorensen, one of the Navy's best sonar operators, is sonar chief of USS Barracuda, a nuclear-powered Skipjack-class submarine ... Navy's 6th Fleet and the flagship, the aircraft carrier ...
... A total of 87 boats were built for the Soviet Navy between 1960 and 1970 ... The boats were built at yards in Zelenodolsk and Yaroslavl ...
... leader and Commander-in-Chief of the Soviet Naval Forces from August 1937 to January 1938 ... commanded the Baltic Fleet and in 1924 was the founding commander of the Soviet Pacific Fleet He became commander of the Soviet navy following the arrest. 1937- December 1937 Succeeded by Pyotr Alexandrovich Smirnov (People's Comissar of the Soviet Navy, Commander-in-Chief of the Naval Forces) Persondata Name Viktorov, Mikhail Alternative names Short description ...
... In October 1939, the Soviet Union approached Germany with a request to purchase the then unfinished Admiral Hipper-class cruisers Lützow, Seydlitz, and Prinz Eugen, along with plans for German capital ships ... contract name, for the transfer to the Soviet Union ... then led an advisory commission assigned to assist the Soviet effort to complete the ship ...
Famous quotes containing the words navy and/or soviet:
“I wish to reiterate all the reasons which [my predecessor] has presented in favor of the policy of maintaining a strong navy as the best conservator of our peace with other nations and the best means of securing respect for the assertion of our rights of the defense of our interests, and the exercise of our influence in international matters.”
—William Howard Taft (18571930)
“Is there life on Mars? No, not there either.”
—Russian saying popular in the Soviet period, trans. by Vladimir Ivanovich Shlyakov (1993)