There is a post on LinkedIn this afternoon by a person who appears to be a Ukranian entrepreneur. He posted a long story about a four drone attack on a Russian missile boat February 1 (Ukraine time).
He included four pictures from drones showing the strikes and final catastrophic explosion (claimed to be a result of a drone hitting four missiles loaded on the ship. The story leads off:
For the first time in the history of world wars, a group strike by naval drones guided through a space satellite destroyed a warship that was on the move on the high seas in full combat readiness.
On February 1, 2024, marine drones of the Group 13 unit of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry destroyed a Russian Project 12411 missile boat in the Black Sea near a protected naval base on Lake Donuzlav in temporarily occupied Crimea.
The Project 12411 missile boat, with a displacement of up to 500 tons and a crew of 40, is armed with supersonic Moskit P-270 anti-ship missiles
The Washington Examiner has a story here — www.washingtonexaminer.com/…
The boat is purported to be traveling at 30 knots and maneuvered while under attack. The drone operators are said to have attacked the starboard and then port propellers, rendering the boat unmaneuverable. A final strike caused munitions to explode and leave no large pieces of the vessel. The Ukranians are rightly publicizing this victory. Likely to cause the Russian Navy to pull their assets even further from Ukraine.
This raises a whole question about the survivability of naval vessels in littoral on near-littoral waters where they can be reached by land-based drones. Will this change the use of naval vessels?