Hero of the Soviet Union, Candidate of Military Sciences, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Professor of the Department of Operational Art of the Navy of the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, retired Vice Admiral Rudolf GOLOSOV reflects on the prospects for the development of the Russian Navy

Golosov Rudolf Aleksandrovich was born in 1927. In the Navy since 1945. He graduated from the Frunze Higher Naval School (1949), the Naval Academy (1965), and the General Staff Military Academy (1971). In 1978, under his leadership, a group of submarines was transferred from the Northern Fleet to the Pacific Fleet. He was Chief of Staff of the Pacific Fleet, Head of the Department at the Military Academy of the General Staff. Hero of the Soviet Union (1978). Awarded the Order of Lenin, Red Banner, Red Star," For service to the Motherland in the Armed Forces of the USSR " III degree.

- Rudolf Alexandrovich, how do you see the future of the Russian Navy?

- It seems natural that the composition, structure and combat power of the fleet should ensure the performance of deterrent functions in relation to possible aggressive intentions of other powers, primarily those with the most developed naval forces. The Russian Navy should be a single combat system designed to solve specific tasks in a specific sea or ocean theater of military operations. The fleet should include: a strike subsystem designed to directly hit enemy targets; a support subsystem covering all types of support for combat operations (intelligence, electronic warfare, etc.); a control subsystem and a service subsystem that includes basing, ship repair, personnel training, housing for personnel and families. All subsystems must be quantitatively and qualitatively balanced.

- When talking to Navy veterans, we often hear them complain that the current state of the Navy is far from rosy. Here, they say, was a powerful fleet during the Soviet Union, and now...

- Not everything is so clear. Yes, the Soviet Union had a sufficient number of excellent design bureaus. We are still ahead in many of the developments they have implemented, such as the speed of underwater navigation and the depth of submergence of submarines. However, instead of choosing the best project on a competitive basis, integrating many of the advantages of the development of different design bureaus, and launching such a submarine in a series, we built an unjustified number of submarines of various types. How this affected the cost of production, and especially the operation of such a diverse fleet and training of personnel, is not difficult to understand.

The following. The shipbuilding industry of the former Soviet Union had considerable production capacity and experienced personnel of shipbuilders, which allowed building submarines at a high pace. However, I dare say that almost no submarine, and even a surface ship, was also accepted into the fleet without certain shortcomings, often very serious.

Further. The rules of operation of the ship and its equipment are set out in official documents. They provide for a whole range of activities-from daily inspection and turning of mechanisms to various types of repairs in the factory. To carry out such a complex of works, it is necessary to have an appropriate number of ship repair plants and workshops, the availability of an assortment of spare parts and consumables. Alas! The bulk of the funds absorbed by the fleet were invested in the creation and development of its strike component - ships and weapons. For everything else-what's left. In terms of the total number of submarines, both diesel and nuclear, by the end of the 80s, we surpassed the submarines of all developed countries combined, including the United States. And in terms of usage efficiency? We could hardly realize half of the American standard for the time of using submarines for their intended purpose, for the time they were in combat service.

The lack of development of the supporting infrastructure has led to the fact that boat crews, when parked in the base, are forced to solve many problems of support, as in the old days, using the "self-service method". Instead of being engaged only in maintaining the ship's combat readiness, professional training and rest before going to sea, sailors perform a lot of extraneous tasks - outfits and guards, repairs to barracks, berths and roads, loading and unloading operations, cleaning snow drifts...

- Rudolf Alexandrovich, so what is your vision of reforming the Russian Navy, taking into account all that has been said above?

- The creation of mobile coastal units armed with new-generation naval missiles in the Baltic and Black Sea Fleets, and in the future, possibly in the North and Pacific, would largely allow us to solve the problem of combating enemy submarine forces. In addition, the ability to solve various fleet tasks can be significantly expanded by the development of special sabotage units, which, by the way, is given the closest attention in foreign fleets.

Another possible direction for the development of the fleet in the current conditions is the construction of vessels that can be conditionally called dual-use vessels. In peacetime, such vessels are built according to the orders of shipowners, but when designing, their military purpose is laid down, taking into account the minimum re-equipment and retrofitting. Additional expenses are reimbursed to the shipowner by the State. Of course, you can't build an aircraft carrier, but it is quite possible to convert a pre-designed vessel, for example, into a helicopter carrier in a short time.

From ordinary civilian vessels that can be called up to the fleet, dual-use vessels should differ by a much greater degree of military purpose, provided for in the design. Simultaneously with the construction of the vessel, a complete set of additional equipment is created and stored, and all organizational issues are thought out to the smallest detail.

A similar idea can be implemented in underwater shipbuilding - for example, by creating nuclear-powered underwater container transporters for transporting cargo under the ice of the central Arctic between the ports of Europe and the Far East, and nuclear-powered underwater tankers for transporting oil from offshore fields in the seas of the Arctic Ocean.

In general, there are enough different ways to solve the problems of fleet reform that correspond to the new geostrategic position of Russia and its economic opportunities. But in all cases, the starting points should be the clarity of these tasks and the military-economic justification of the proposals.

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