They might be old—but they are getting a big, modern facelift. And that’s a big problem.
In the 1970s, the Soviet Union embarked on a project to do what no navy had done for decades—build a surface warfare vessel comparable in size to the battleships of World War I and World War II. The U.S. Navy—and every other navy in the world—had given up on ships of this size due to expense and vulnerability. Why concentrate capabilities in a single ship which could quickly fall victim to missiles and torpedoes?
The Soviets not only persisted in building the ships, but have kept them in service even after the Cold War ended. Originally intended to threaten the U.S. Navy’s most precious warships—aircraft carriers and ballistic missile submarines—the surviving ships now play a different role, showing the flag and ensuring that the world keeps Russian naval power in mind.
Origins