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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPutin Endorses Permanent Russian Navy Presence in Mediterranean
President Vladimir Putin endorsed a plan by the Russian navy to keep a permanent presence in the Mediterranean Sea, where the Syrian crisis is adding to the regions instability.
Russias Mediterranean fleet of 16 ships will visit ports in Syria, which hosts the countrys only military base outside the former Soviet Union, during a mission that will include missile practise, commander Yuri Zemskoy told Putin via video link during a news conference in Moscow today.
This is a strategically important region, Putin said today at a meeting with military commanders. We have our national interests here, linked to the need to maintain national security. Resuming a permanent Russian military naval presence in the Mediterranean sea isnt saber rattling.
Russia stepped up patrols in the Mediterranean in 2010 amid escalating unrest in Syria. In January, the country held its biggest naval maneuvers in the region in more than two decades. The defense ministry decided to make the fleet a standing force in March, the same month Putin ordered a large-scale unplanned exercise on the Black Sea involving 36 warships and almost 7,000 personnel.
The navys Mediterranean presence, becoming permanent in for first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union more than two decades ago, will be modeled on the Soviet fleet stationed in the region during the Cold War to balance U.S. deployment, according to the defense ministry. The force will draw on Russias Black Sea, Baltic and North Sea fleets.
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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-06/putin-endorses-permanent-russian-navy-presence-in-mediterranean.html
clarice
(5,504 posts)Purveyor
(29,876 posts)nation building crusades.
clarice
(5,504 posts)all it takes is one nut..........boom.
Purveyor
(29,876 posts)et.al.
clarice
(5,504 posts)railsback
(1,881 posts)I would even put it out there that Putin has his eye on Afghanistan, too, once the faint of heart withdraw U.S. troops from that country. Not only does it have superlative strategic value for the military, Afghanistan also has a vast wealth of heavy metals sitting in those mountains, just waiting to be mined.