THE RISE OF THE RED NAVY

the first time we saw the Russian fishing flame was back in the 1950s at that time nobody paid too much attention to them except for some of the statements they had made that they were going to come over here and catch the fish and put us out of the fishing business which most effectively I think they've done I view the growth of Soviet Navy with a great concern it's a highly efficient modern thoroughly competent far-ranging blue water Navy today at home virtually in any ocean areas of the world they've learnt the lesson that the country that has maritime power controls events it indeed the lesson that the British taught them 150 to 200 years ago and every week brings another new example of how the Soviets are using their fleets to spread their influence [Music] good morning Admiral with the inch off of the Soviet Kara guided missile cruiser last night after she came through the Bosphorus the total Soviet units in the Med now total 44 the car of course has the SS intend missile aboard and will be a we have a submarine rescue tug on its normal station just off the chat fellas we have an intelligence collector the present one is the travelers residents in the Clyde approaches we also have in the southwest Admiral Sir Terence Lewin commander-in-chief of all British warships afloat attends with his staff at Northwood the daily briefings on the worldwide dispositions of the Soviet fleet the AGI which is normally on station or Portland has moved up to the scag rack where yesterday it was reported in surveillance of NATO units on exercises a Cresta class guided missile cruiser is transiting south across the Bay of Biscay and is probably enroute to the Indian nation it has recently come down the channel after working up in the exercise areas in the Baltic following the building at the Sudan off shipyard at Leningrad these waters are the highways of all nations sea travel is an integral part in the maintenance of modern communities to protect their rights of sea travel governments build navies to patrol the open waters at present United States and the Soviet Union dominate sea power but Russian ships are newer and experts believe there are differences in design priorities as well according to Norman Polmar US editor of Jane's fighting ships the United States priorities appear to be first electronics second habitability third endurance fourth weapons and finally propulsion in sharp contrast with American priorities the Soviet Union seems to place its emphasis on weapons followed by a propulsion then electronics endurance and at the bottom of the list habitability the difference is dramatically underscored when you examine the priorities of the United States Navy during World War two when the US was trying to build up its Navy quickly the priorities were exactly the same as Russia's today I think it's difficult to give an estimate a very neat comparison of relative strengths in such a ways you would rank football teams for example when we look at numbers of ships the the Soviet Navy has almost three times as many ships as does the United States Navy and when we add the Warsaw Pact allies and the NATO allies that ratio remains about the same on the other hand if we compare displacement tonnage --is which represents the size of ships the United States has almost twice the displacement tonnage in our Navy that the Soviets have perhaps the best measure of comparative abilities of the two navies is to ask ourselves the question can the United States Navy with its allies carry out its wartime missions and functions in a NATO Warsaw Pact conflict or can the Warsaw Pact countries prevent our navies from doing their job I believe that today the United States and its NATO allies can carry out their wartime tasks and responsibilities but it would be a very tough fight there's no question about it but I think that we are in a position today where we would prevail I can't say I'm necessarily that sanguine about the future one reason for the Soviets preoccupation with naval strength is possibly their recent weakness at sea a witness that was exposed to the world in the incredible and frightening events of October 1962 this government as promised has maintained the closest surveillance of the Soviet military buildup on the island of Cuba within the past week unmistakable evidence has established the fact that a series of offensive missile sites is now in preparation on that imprisoned Island the purpose of these bases can be none other than to provide a nuclear strike capability against the Western Hemisphere to halt this offensive build-up a strict quarantine on all offensive military equipment under shipment to Cuba is being initiated all ships of any kind bound for Cuba from whatever nation or port will be found to contain cargoes of offensive weapons be turned back the American fleet sailed from home ports to do just that Khrushchev his Bluff called and without a fleet to support him had no choice but to climb down the missiles were dismantled and returned to Russia and the world breathed again there is no sure way of knowing but the outcome of that crisis might have been different had the Kremlin remembered the words of Joseph Stalin no nation that becomes a world power said Stalin does so without a navy in the early years of this century the seeds of revolution in Russia were germinating and because of wretched living conditions they first bought fruit in the Navy in 1905 a ship in the black seas fleet mutiny she was the battleship potemkin after an officer had shot a seaman the mutineers killed the captain and several officers then sailed to Odessa after this revolutionary fervor seems to have abated and for a while longer the Navy gave its monarch the respect that was his due [Music] but for the czar in his family the sands were running out fast in 1914 war came [Music] there were several operations in support of the army with troops being landed on the coast of Thrace and Armenia behind enemy lines and in a number of skirmishes with the Turkish Navy the Russian sank several ships 1917 the Revolution in Saint Petersburg the Navy did it share the cruiser aurora helped the Bolsheviks to power by firing at the Winter Palace [Music] long reign of bazaars was finally over and in their place came a man whose name was to become a household word Lenin the sailors didn't find conditions under his rule any better than that at the Czar's and in 1921 they revolted Bolshevik soldiers attacked them across the ice and after heavy casualties on both sides the rebels surrendered most were executed Lenin died and his place was taken by a man just as famous and much more infamous Stalin when Josef Stalin took over the reins of Soviet government the Navy was little more than a few coastal crafts but Stalin believed in the Navy and began slowly to build it up first because there was little money with coastal craft then during the 1930s with big cruisers built to Italian design and later he built submarines more than a hundred so that by 1936 Russia had the biggest submarine fleet in the world then in 1937 worried that the regime was losing its grip Stalin ordered the killing of more than two million of his fellow countrymen including the commanders-in-chief of the Baltic Black Sea and northern fleets as well as the great majority of all Admirals captains and commanders it was a massacre so that when in 1941 war with Germany came the Navy was in no position to take the offensive the Baltic Fleet seldom ventured far from port it ships did little more than support the flank of the army and helping the defense of Leningrad even the famous Arctic Convoys to Murmansk an archangel that kept Russia's supplied with weapons of war were mostly escorted not by Russian but by British warships in 1945 Europe's war ended and even as the world leaders in Potsdam debated how to divide its spoils another war what became known as the Cold War began across Europe in Churchill's words an iron curtain came down but when a tyrant Stalin died he was succeeded by the eccentric Khrushchev and suddenly the ice began to thaw a British squadron was invited to Leningrad for the first time since the war onboard the aircraft carrier triumph was BBC's David Woodward it was tremendously thrilling to be going to Kronstadt and Leningrad in the first place across that's always been a mystery for even Czarist times but when we got there we stopped thinking about that we were so surprised by what we actually saw there now the Bing Harbor was absolutely packed with warships a battleship couple of cruisers destroyers and submarines more ships and most of us guessed the Russians head and this was only one of their ports we came that we came back to London and of course the Naval Intelligence Division asked us around to explain how clever they've been and they haven't been because they've been saying all along the Russians are building a big Navy and people said no this is tendentious propaganda is provoked provocation they're not but of course they were and we'd seen it next year the Russian Cruiser or Jono kid Z steamed in a Portsmouth England on board were mr. Khrushchev and marshal Bulganin B&K as they were jocular they call and it looked as though anglo-russian relations were entering a new and better age but today the visit is remembered less for B and ke and for the legendary story of commander crab crab a professional diver had it was rumored been paid by British intelligence to inspect the hull of the origin orchid see the screws and rudders and anti-submarine equipment rumour also says that the Russian defenses were able to cope with him no one has confirmed or denied it but that was about the last time commander crab was seen alive and months later his headless body was found floating in Portsmouth Harbor the visit had been a success but big cruisers said Khrushchev were now only fit to carry elderly statesmen like himself on goodwill visits about the world instead Russia now concentrated on the vessels that would be your best defense against the Americans strike carrier force submarines and now that a trade with the West had begun to expand she started for balance-of-payments reasons to build up her own merchant fleet something that no great naval power has ever been without it was to be part and parcel of the Navy and then Khrushchev appointed as head of the Navy an admiral who was still there today who has been more responsible than anyone for the rise of the red Navy Sergei Gorshkov Admiral Gorshkov is probably the most remarkable figure and the navies of the world in the 20th century certainly maybe in history as a hell because he started his naval career in a perfectly normal way but reached preeminence in in the last war in he in command of the kestrel flotillas was promoted to Rear Admiral at the age of 32 and this was at a time when he met Khrushchev in the area of operations where he was he's been extremely successful in influencing his government to provide the necessary resources to the the Soviet Navy I think he must be particularly persuasive and skillful because the Soviets have traditionally been a land power but certainly the the Russian bear has been exposed to a sea breeze and has developed a liking for saltwater countries with strong navies said Gorshkov a rich and powerful those without them are doomed to decay and he prodded the Kremlin into authorizing the building of a new fleet but first he had to find a man most some 80% were and still are conscripts called up for three years military service at the age of 18 those that liked the life could voluntarily sign on for a further three years could even graduate to the rank of officer and some of the best man it was found came from places furthest from the sea there was political training too when they went abroad they were told they were the representatives of the sober-minded Soviet Union and must conduct themselves accordingly it was a policy that was handsomely to pay off [Music] [Music] every month new ships and new crews came into service they were all part of gosh coughs two-fold plan to nullify American sea power for it threaten Russia and established Russian sea power where it could threaten America and secondly to spread Soviet influence abroad by showing the flag around the world the Cuban Missile Crisis may likely have been an unforeseen come of this effort stemming from Khrushchev's overconfidence it was a humiliating moment for the Kremlin and brought home to them even more forcibly gorsh coughs preachings about sea power orders went out the dockyards in the soviet union to accelerate construction of existing ships and lay the keels of new ones in the middle 60s a new Russian Navy was born it was to be the most powerful the most balanced Russia had ever had cruisers destroyers missile ships frigates vessels of almost every kind [Applause] [Music] [Music] they included a completely new class of ships the helicopter cruiser with his fleet of anti-submarine helicopters fast attack craft with missiles and torpedoes [Music] tank landing craft capable of landing up to 15,000 men the most sophisticated naval missile system yet building anna fleet of 400 submarines of every description Foxtrot class diesel-powered 20,000 miles range deployed worldwide Viktor class nuclear-powered speed 30 knots submerged Juliet class torpedoes and surface-to-surface missiles whiskey long bin torpedoes and surface-to-surface missiles echo class five thousand tons crew of 100 nuclear-powered torpedoes and surface-to-surface missile Hotel class small range ballistic missiles Yankee class 8,000 tons crew of 120 16 intermediate range ballistic missiles a fleet train was built to to accompany their warships on a voyage is abroad and make them self-sufficient supply ships with stores and a munitions oil tankers to fuel the fleet at sea and the 45,000 ton satellite tracking ship cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin and spy ships were built to lurk off Polaris submarine bases watch and listen and send reports to Moscow [Music] the British Polaris submarines that leave the Clyde know that the spy ships and sometimes Russian submarines too may be waiting for them and they have their own ways of coping with him they assume of the Search Appliance state and the listeners in their turn are listen to [Music] [Music] and how in the last few years as the Soviet Navy made use of its newfound sea power the Mediterranean was once a NATO Lake first the province of the British Navy together with the French and Italians later it became the stamping ground of the American 6th fleet with its nuclear-armed carrier striking force when war broke out in the Middle East in 1956 the British felt obliged to try and stop it by landing troops at Suez and when the Lebanese government called for help in 1958 the Americans felt no less obliged to land Marines to support it on both occasions the Russians protested but could do nothing about it and then in 1964 their ships came out of Russia and into the Mediterranean [Music] some sales South to Egypt as the British had done in the old days and came in at the port of Alexandria to show solidarity and friendship to show their strength to convince smiling Egyptians that not only America and Britain but Russia too was now a naval power that in exchange for a base and Porter facilities there was much thicker tool to help them in their running war with Israelis there were as good as their word in the 1967 war a missile boat they gave the Egyptians Sankey Israeli destroyer a lot elsewhere in the Mediterranean the Soviet naval buildup went on the helicopter ship Moskva made its appearance and some of the new 4000 ton cash in class destroyers by the early 1970s there were as many Soviet ships in the Mediterranean as America in Arab countries along the North African coast they were able to establish semi-permanent basis and in remote Anchorage's outside territorial waters they left boys with visiting cards on them belongings of the USSR and then growing bolder the Russian Navy started what has become known as shouldering tactics passing as close to American and British warships as they dared without actually colliding their object to test allied nerves and ship handling and gain intelligence at close quarters but sometimes they miscalculated in November 1970 the carrier ark royal struck a Russian destroyer the damage to the ark royal was slight - the destroyer that had crossed its boughs it was more serious two men were killed and a tarpaulin quickly pulled over the damaged box today the I spy tactics continue here a Russian destroyer steams close to the US carrier Forrestal but because of the danger of accidents the Russians have agreed not to be too provocative and for the Allied ships they're little more than a nuisance like being followed by a strange dog you can't quite get rid of if they don't really well they can bother you but they don't really bother us we know that they have a job and we have our job to do for instance when one crossed my bow I know he's going to do it and as he always does it appears he always does he chooses to have me in a in a position where he can embarrass me or test me just a little bit and that's fine there they are possibly more aggressive than we are and I would suggest if I may that it's because the repercussions are a little different if they run into somebody they are it's their job to to nudge us as it were and it's not our job to nudge them but I find that their part they're pretty fair senior we care the dawn is 981 with other Soviet ships may be out of sight beyond the horizon but to the intelligence officers rarely out of mind a Carlin DDG and a tanker at that Anchorage and deep down below decks using the most complex instruments both sides watch and listen to each other all the time [Music] console 2002 our position of the Soviet destroyer place today the familiar dots and dashes of the Morse code are rarely heard now messages go out into the ether in a scrambled computerized code impossible to break [Applause] day and night the watch goes on the Russians no less than the Americans and British look and listen exercising their own systems gleaning what intelligence they can they to send out computerized messages that sound little different to those of the Americans [Music]