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June 26, 2026: In late May, Ukrainian drones recently attacked Taganrog Airport, which was near the Black Sea coast. The attacks destroyed a Tu-142MR over-the-horizon radio relay aircraft used for communication with submerged submarines. Russia only has about a dozen MR aircraft and is unable to build new ones due to Western sanctions. Each loss makes it more difficult for the Navy to keep in touch with its nuclear submarines. Most of those submarines are in northwestern Russia near the Kola Peninsula, where the Northern Fleet was based.

After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, there were a hundred nuclear submarines in the Northern Fleet that needed scrapping. By 2022, most of the work had been done, but the Russian invasion of Ukraine brought that to a halt and left at least two radioactive submarines spewing radioactivity into Arctic waters.

The Northern Fleet can’t seem to break its cycle of calamities. Twenty-six years ago, another Russian submarine went down, the then pride of the Northern Fleet, the 14,000-ton Kursk. This was not the first such disaster to plague Russia's Northern Fleet, which has always been a hard-luck outfit. A lot of that has to do with the fleet's location, near the Arctic Circle. Murmansk and Vladivostok in the Far East are Russia’s only two naval bases with year-round unhindered access to the high seas. But Murmansk was cold most of the year, and had too much darkness in Winter and too much sunlight in Summer. It's a dreary place. Nevertheless, Murmansk has long been Russia's largest naval base, with half the submarine fleet operating from there.

But since the end of the Cold War, fleet operations and shipbuilding have declined, and much of Murmansk’s economic activity has become decommissioning older Russian nuclear subs. Even though some 90 percent of the ships in the 1990 Soviet fleet had been taken out of service, Russia was having problems funding and manning the remaining ships. For decades, the main source of sailors was unenthusiastic and lackadaisical conscripts. This has led to safety problems, especially with nuclear-propelled ships. But this was nothing new for the Northern Fleet. For a long time, Russians told a chilling joke, How do you recognize a sailor from the Northern Fleet? He glows in the dark! Radiation sickness from poor shielding and accidents in submarine reactors was so common that there was a special hospital to treat the many victims. There were other problems. Lax supervision and bad safety practices also led to several nasty accidents in ammunition depots. One massive explosion in 1984 destroyed so many essential naval munitions that the fleet was unready for war for some six months.

The end of the Cold War also made naval service much less attractive to career sailors, especially officers, who had previously kept the Northern Fleet going. The lower quality of personnel and leadership was one reason for the decommissioning of so many ships. Even then, there still weren't enough capable crews to keep all of the ships operating effectively. Likely, the Kursk went down because of poorly maintained munitions and equipment. Russian ships have suffered onboard explosions because of this before. The 3M45 Shipwreck cruise missiles on the Kursk were particularly tricky beasts. They were launched underwater and then flew at several times the speed of sound to their targets. These missiles carried several tons of highly volatile rocket fuel and explosives. An accident with a Shipwreck was known to be likely fatal, and was with the Kursk. Ditto for most Russian torpedoes as those are temperamental and carry massive warheads. Ironically, Russian subs are carefully designed to survive a torpedo hit, but these design features are useless if a torpedo detonates inside the sub. Unlike the Shipwreck missiles, Russian submarine torpedoes are often worked on by technicians while their sub is at sea, and problems with cranky torpedoes are not unknown.

But Russia's main problem was not bad crews, quirky weapons or poor leadership. No, the main problem with the Russian navy was that Russia doesn't need a navy. Russia is a classic continental power, one that can do without control, or even use of, the high seas. Indeed, during the five hundred years that Russia has existed, a navy has rarely been a national priority. Every few generations, the nation gets bit with the navy bug and an attempt is made to build a fleet. These endeavors have always ended badly. Always. Even when foreigners were hired to help out, it didn't work. American naval hero John Paul Jones served for a while as a Russian admiral before he fled what he saw as a disaster waiting to happen. The Turks regularly humiliated the Russians at sea. The Japanese defeated a Russian fleet in 1905. During World War II, the Russian submarine fleet lost more boats than it sank. This was a unique record for underachievement, but the sort of thing that was common in the Russian navy.

While Britain and American sailors have a tradition that scares enemies, the Russian fleet suggests just the opposite. After years of operating against Soviet ships during the Cold War, American sailors became openly contemptuous of their potential foes. But the Russian navy has become a matter of national pride in Russia. Few will openly argue that Russia does not need a navy, and the loss of the Kursk was unlikely to change that. Thus, ironically, the Kursk disaster makes the Russian navy a force to be feared. Not so much for what Russian ships can do to anyone else, but for what they can do to themselves and anyone unfortunate enough to be nearby.