An apparent Ukrainian drone-boat strike on Novorossiysk, a hundred miles from Russian-occupied Crimea in southern Russia, should sound the alarm in Sevastopol, the Crimean headquarters of the Russian navy’s beleaguered Black Sea Fleet.

A nighttime explosion in Novorossiysk’s harbor seems to indicate that the city is the latest target of the Ukrainian navy’s growing fleet of explosives-laden drone boats.

The 18-foot, radio-controlled boats apparently have been prowling the Black Sea for months. A swarm of the 50-mile-per-hour robotic vessels assaulted the main Black Sea Fleet anchorage back in October, blowing up at least one auxiliary vessel and possibly damaging the fleet’s flagship, the 409-foot frigate Makarov.

The unmanned surface vessels signal a sea change in Ukrainian naval strategy. When Russia widened its war in Ukraine starting in late February, the Ukrainian navy still hoped to…

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Source: news.google.com