Russia’s Naval Parade to Involve 200 Combat Ships, 80 Aircraft

Russia’s Main Naval Parade to be held in St. Petersburg on July 31 will involve as many as 200 combat ships and 80 aircraft.

Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said the “naval parades will also take place at naval bases of all the Fleets and Flotillas and at the port of Tartus in the Mediterranean Sea."

"These events will involve up to 200 combat ships of various classes, about 80 aircraft, more than 100 items of combat hardware and around 15,000 military and civilian personnel," Shoigu said.

He revealed that the parade will involve the first female crew of the Raptor patrol boat.

Over 20 Russian Baltic Fleet ships are taking part in drills at the Fleet’s naval practice ranges.

The Russian naval drills are running amid NATO’s massive maneuvers in the central and southern parts of the Baltic Sea. NATO will conduct the Baltops 2022 (Baltic Operations) massive drills in the central and southern Baltic waters and at coastal training grounds in Germany, Sweden, Poland and the Baltic states on June 5-16. The drills involve 14 NATO member states, 44 warships and around 100 aircraft.

"In all, the scheduled drills at the Baltic Fleet’s naval practice ranges involve over 20 combat ships and gunboats accomplishing combat training tasks solely and as part of naval search/strike and surface action groups. These are corvettes, guard ships, missile corvettes and gunboats, small anti-submarine warfare ships, coastal and harbor minesweepers, and also small amphibious assault hovercraft and fast-speed boats," the press office said in a statement.

During the naval drills, the naval taskforce is practicing measures jointly with Il-38 anti-submarine warfare planes to hunt down a hypothetical enemy submarine, employing radars and sonars and anti-submarine weapons, the press office said.

"The crews of the naval hunter-killer groups made up of the guard ship Yaroslav Mudry, the corvettes Stoiky and Soobrazitelny, the small anti-submarine warfare vessels Urengoi, Kazanets, Aleksin and Kabardino-Balkaria have begun practicing the tactical drill task of hunting down the notional enemy’s submarine in the Baltic Sea," the statement reads.

After practicing anti-submarine warfare, the crews of the Baltic Fleet’s ships will conduct artillery fire against aerial and naval targets, hold a jamming exercise and carry out shipboard training in radiation, chemical and biological protection and ship damage control, the press office added.