Russia's navy
LETTERS
From: Patrick Wall, MP, Alan Smith, Professor R. Trevor-Roper, Commander Robin Bousfield, RN, P. G. Foster, J. G. Warry, T. W. Hutchison, - Ewart Milne, James Donaldson. y, S. lnuaesiet, Barbara Higgins and Roger Moody, Graham Anderson, S. Macdonell, X. W. Nicholas.
Sir: Professor Laurence Martin in your issue of 4 October underlined the developing threat of the Russian navy in the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean.
This threat is increased by the fact that the latest Soviet destroyers are armed with super- sonic guided surface-to-surface missiles of up to 300 miles range. Earlier, slower and much shorter range surface-to-surface missiles mounted on fast patrol boats sank the Israeli (ex-British) destroyer 'Eliat' and a number of similar FPBS are in the hands of middle-powers who are friendly to the USSR. As Professor Martin says 'Whether they, i.e. the Soviet Navy, will undertake military interventions against local powers remains the great question.'
The danger is that the Royal Navy can only deal with these missile sllips by shore or air- craft-carrier-based fixed wing aircraft. But in the early 1970s our fleet air arm is to be phased out. HM ships will then have to depend on their own inadequate anti-missile weapons and the air defence of shipping, where no shore-based aircraft is in range, will depend on single heli- copters with no long-range early warning and armed with a wire-guided weapon with a range of 7,500 yards!
If our shipping is to survive in any conven- tional war the case for developing our own surface missiles or, better still, retaining our existing carriers and building cheaper flat-tops operating grot. aircraft seems unanswerable.
Where armed helicopters would be of parti- cular value is in the support of Royal Marine commando helicopter landings but apparently we have not yet digested the lessons learned by the Americans in Vietnam.
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