In the port of Novorossiysk, Russians began to draw silhouettes of submarines (satellite photos)
UK intelligence releases satellite images of a Russian submarine and a painted “false target” in the port of Novorossiysk.
The image was released by the UK Ministry of Defense.
The British intelligence agency published a satellite image from February 25 showing the silhouette of a submarine painted on a pier in the port of Novorossiysk.
Latest Defense Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine – March 20, 2024.
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The agency suggests that the purpose of such measures is a dubious attempt to mislead Ukrainian drone operators and enemy satellites.
This practice has long been known in the Russian army and has migrated to the navy from the Russian Aerospace Forces, which have long painted silhouettes of fighters and strategic bombers on their runways.
Due to the high resolution of optical reconnaissance satellites, these methods are considered ineffective. In addition, they do not work against radar surveillance satellites.
Disguise of ships
The British intelligence report also emphasizes that the Russian navy has begun to pay considerable attention to camouflage due to its numerous losses in the Black Sea.
In particular, in May last year, the Black Sea Fleet began applying camouflage to the ships, which was supposed to break up the silhouette and reduce the visibility of the vessel at sea.
This camouflage was given to an unknown large amphibious assault ship of projects 775 and 11711, frigates of project 11356R “Admiral Essen” and “Admiral Makarov”, two small missile ships of project 21631 and 2 patrol ships of project 22160.
Experts from Naval News suggested that this camouflage scheme was intended to confuse the drone’s operators into mistaking it for a less valuable target.
However, given that a thermal camera is used to identify and target the ship, which clearly shows the entire silhouette of the ship, such camouflage is ineffective.
As a reminder, after a series of cruise missile and naval drone attacks on ships and facilities of the Black Sea Fleet, most Russian ships left occupied Sevastopol and relocated to Novorossiysk.
In October last year, six large amphibious assault ships were deployed to Novorossiysk, including the frigates Admiral Essen and Admiral Makarov and three Project 636 submarines, the Varshavyanka. The Project 22160 patrol ship Vasyl Bykov and two Project 21631 small missile ships Buyan-M were also relocated.
