65 
leaders, represented by marshalls whose experience and outlook were 
limited by army operations, clearly underevaluated and to a certain 
degree neglected the role of the navy. Soviet naval theory, on the 
contrary, even under the condition of severe limitations on the availa- 
ble hardware imposed mainly by the weakness of the economy and 
availability of allocated resources, continued to be quite active and 
modern. Various theoretical groups on the fleets, the academy, and 
naval schools encouraged and supported by a more imaginative navy 
leadership worked out a number of original and innovative proposals 
concerning the further development of the navy under new strategic 
and technological conditions. Strategically, in the postwar period, the 
Soviet Union has been facing opponents of which the majority have 
been traditional maritime nations headed by the United States and 
which have possessed strong navies. Moreover, military geography 
has changed, elevating the importance of naval warfare. 
On the technological side, it was claimed that the development 
of nuclear weaponry, particularly coupled with the new means for 
its delivery—missiles and the progress in electronics, all of which 
the Soviets have termed the “‘scientific-technological revolution in mili- 
tary affairs’, made the navy particularly suitable for the application 
of these new means of warfare. The mid-1950’s decision of the Soviet 
leadership to drastically alter the course of naval development is 
testimony to the success of the Soviet Navy’s persuasion and probably 
of the military-political leadership’s understanding of the problem. 
A far looking approach taken in the course of the decisionmaking 
process, which rejected any plans to construct attack aircraft carriers 
and to fight the opponent with its own weapons, approved the orienta- 
tion of further naval development toward the missile armament and 
emphasized the prevailing role of the submarines and naval aviation. 
This seems to have been the best possible approach for the Soviet 
Navy under the circumstances. The relatively rapid adjustment of 
both the Soviet Navy and the defense industry to the new course 
has produced a qualitatively new navy. 
MERCHANT MARINE 
HISTORY OF DEVELOPMENT, PLANS AND THEIR IMPLEMENTATION 
At the beginning of World War I, the Russian mercantile fleet 
numbered 1,040 ships with a total cargo carrying capacity of 912,000 
tons. Many of these were old, slow, technically obsolete streamships 
and sailing vessels. Although three quarters of Russia’s foreign trade 
was carried by sea, only 7 percent of it was carried on Russian 
ships.** Foreign (German, French, British) interests owned a considera- 
ble percentage of the joint stock companies. 
As a result of World War I, the chaos of the Revolution and 
particularly the civil war, many merchant ships were lost or sunk, 
taken overseas by the White Guards, or confiscated by foreign states. 
The total loss amounted to over 400,000 tons, or more than 40 
percent. For example, in the Black Sea-Sea of Azov basin in addition 
to combat losses, 204 ships with a total cargo capacity of 206,000 
register tons were taken away in 1920 by the retreating White Guards. 
°4“Wodnyy Transport’, June 20, 1970. 
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