The recent attacks by Ukraine on the Russian Black Sea Fleet have resulted in a “functional defeat” of the Russian Navy in the Black Sea, said British Defense Minister James Heappey on October 3 at the Warsaw Security Conference, as reported by The Kyiv Independent.
Heappey stated that the Russian Navy is now “forced to spread to ports from which it cannot influence Ukraine,” wrote Patrick Wintour, the diplomatic editor of The Guardian, on X, formerly known as Twitter.
This victory at sea is “just as important” as Ukraine’s surprising counteroffensive in the Kharkiv region in the autumn of 2022, according to Heappey, as reported by Wintour. The Russian Black Sea Fleet, stationed in the occupied Crimea, has been repeatedly attacked in recent weeks, including an attack on a command post on September 20 and on its headquarters on September 22. These attacks have “almost certainly caused severe” damage to the fleet, reported the British Ministry of Defense on September 26. The ministry added that the fleet is likely to be unable to perform essential combat tasks such as missile attacks and local security patrols.
According to the Ukrainian military, the rocket attack on the fleet’s headquarters in Sevastopol on September 22 resulted in the deaths of 34 Russian officers, including the fleet commander, and injuries to 105 other soldiers.
According to Sky News, the attack was carried out using British long-range Storm Shadow missiles.
Image: Kora27, Large landing ship of Project 775 Olenegorskiy Gornyak (Olenegorskiy Miner), CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons, (no changes made)
