March 29, 2024

Balkan Travellers

Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, aggregated from sources all over the world

The UN says more than 3,000 civilians have been killed since the start of the Russian invasion.

The UN says more than 3,000 civilians have been killed since the start of the Russian invasion.

2:33 pm .: Caspian Sea, firing range and Russian tank

The Caspian Sea, though closed and far from the Ukrainian theater, is a strategic and logistical asset to the Russian Navy that serves as a missile launch site and troop reservoir. With about twenty small buildings, it contains a few warships, corvettes, patrol boats and other coastal buildings. But it is, above all, useful for its long-range ballistic missile attack capability.

“It’s not big in terms of the Navy, but they do fire support work,” explains Igor Delano, deputy director of the Franco-Russian Observatory and an expert on the Russian Navy. Capt. Eric Lavald, a spokesman for the French navy, analyzed the Russian intervention in Syria since 2015 and the fact that the sea was “used to fire high-velocity missiles over long distances, a major strategic change”.

“A few years ago, the Caspian Sea was a kind of duck pond without much geo-strategic interest, and it now has some,” he adds. In addition, the Caspian Navy could provide buildings that could be transported to the Black Sea through a network of 5 marine canals built during Soviet times.

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