Ukraine: Harpoon missiles to loosen the vice on the port of Odessa
Harpoon missile launchers, photographed on the USS Coronado, at Changi Naval Base, Singapore, in 2016. AFP - ROSLAN RAHMAN
Text by: RFI Follow
1 min
Ukraine claims to have received Harpoon anti-ship missiles.
This American weapon can serve as a coastal defense battery, and thus help loosen the Russian naval vice, which is blocking the port of Odessa.
Advertising
Read more
In its best version, the Harpoon is able to blast a ship within a radius of 300 kilometers.
It is much more worrying for the Russians than the antediluvian Ukrainian Neptune missiles (which, despite everything, have already managed to sink the flagship
Moskva
).
►To re-read: The sinking of the Russian cruiser
Moskva
, engaged in the war in Ukraine
The Harpoons, assures Elie Tenenbaum, a researcher at Ifri, are therefore capable of keeping the Russian navy offshore.
But on their own they will not solve the blockade of Odessa.
This brings interdiction capabilities from land, on the coast, which are important.
It pushes back the prospect of an amphibious assault on Odessa.
This increases the sanctuarization of this small southern cone of the Ukrainian coast.
However, this is not likely to be able to dislodge the counter-position of Serpents' Island, which is truly problematic in the short, medium and long term.
Will Serpents' Island become a real lock, which would obviously not only block maritime traffic to or from the port of Odessa, but also the mouths of the Danube?
With a garrison, speedboats and surface-to-air defense batteries, the Russian army has made Serpents' Island, off the coast of Odessa, an impregnable stronghold.
All of our daily, live coverage of the war in Ukraine.
© FMM Graphic Studio
Newsletter
Receive all the international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_EN
Ukraine
Russia
Defense