Navy Commander tells what Moskva cruiser looked like: 7 floors, elevators, swimming pools and Russia's pride

The cruiser Moskva, which was destroyed by the Ukrainian Navy in April 2022, had seven floors, an elevator and a swimming pool, and had undergone a major renovation just before the full-scale invasion; this flagship was a real pride of Russia, and it was precisely because of the presence of the Moskva vessel that Russia had a fleet, not a flotilla.

Source: Vice Admiral Oleksii Neizhpapa, Commander of the Ukrainian Navy, in an interview with Ukrainska Pravda (the interview will soon be translated into English)

Quote: "This is a flagship. If there is no cruiser, then a fleet cannot be called a fleet anymore. Without a cruiser, which is a vessel of the first rank, it is called a flotilla. This understanding of gradation has been accepted as mandatory since the Soviet Union.

Now their flagship is the Admiral Makarov frigate, but it is not a cruiser. By old Soviet standards, it was a second-rank ship. Now, probably, its rank has been raised, because it is still a Kalibr cruise missile carrier. So the Moskva cruiser was the flagship of the fleet."

Details: Neizhpapa reiterated that the Moskva cruiser was built in Ukraine, in Mykolaiv. Its first name was Slava (Glory). 

It was named Moskva after a petition from the mayor of Moscow, when the previous Moskva vessel, a large anti-submarine aircraft carrier, was decommissioned and the Russians needed someone to name it after the Russian capital.

Neizhpapa said that since then, the vessel has been the focus of the attention of Russian President Putin, who has visited the cruiser on several occasions, and of the then-mayor of Moscow, Yurii Luzhkov, and his successor, Sergei Sobyanin (who is now the mayor of Moscow). 

Quote: "It was the pride of the Black Sea Fleet. The cruiser took part in all the conflicts of the post-Soviet period: in the war with Georgia, it controlled all the fleet forces off its coast, it was in Syria and in the areas of other conflicts."

Details: He also said that before the full-scale aggression, the cruiser had undergone a complete renovation, and Russia had invested a lot of money in its modernisation.  

Neizhpapa explained that from the military point of view, the Moskva was designed for the ocean, not the Black Sea.

The sea, he said, is too small for a cruiser carrying cruise missiles with a range of 500 kilometres. This flagship was designed during the Cold War to destroy US aircraft carriers and was called the "aircraft carrier killer", even though there are no aircraft carriers in the Black Sea.

Quote: "The Moskva could be a good place to place a command post. There are large flagship cabins. To give you an idea, I think there are seven floors. An elevator to go from the main command post, which is below the main deck, to the bridge. Seven decks that the elevator goes through! Well, so that the commander or the senior officer do not have to walk. There was a swimming pool. In other words, the ship provided very comfortable living conditions for the personnel for long voyages.

And, of course, the Moskva covered the main issues of air defence: it was equipped with detection systems, electronic warfare, and a naval version of the S-300 anti-aircraft missile system called Fort. It was an umbrella of air defence over the ships of the order (the order of deployment of ships during a campaign or battle – ed.)."

Details: Neizhpapa stressed that the Moskva served several functions: a command post, an air defence ship, and a symbol that "Moscow has come with war".  

He also said that he was overwhelmed with emotion when he realised that the Moskva had been struck.

"Of course, there were emotions. But we hadn't yet comprehended the significance of the moment. Because the war is still going on, tomorrow some vessels might appear there again... There was no time to sit around and enjoy a great victory, the situation was very tense at the time. 

Yes, there was joy, of course, that Ukrainian weapons proved so successful. Of course, this is a historic moment. But for me personally, it somehow passed very quickly," Neizhpapa concluded.

Read more on the topic: Sinking the Moskva: previously undisclosed details. How the Ukrainian Neptune destroyed the flagship of the Russian fleet

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