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The Red Banner Pacific Fleet is the largest of the four Soviet fleets and the one with the largest operating area. In wartime, the three European fleets would oppose the United States and NATO forces, the Pacific Fleet would oppose the People’s Republic of China, as well as the United States and its allies (Australia, South Korea, Japan). The peacetime responsibilities of the Pacific Fleet include operations throughout the Pacific and the fleet provides most of the ships that deploy to the Indian Ocean.

With the recent unsettled political situation in the Southeast Asia area, there has been a significant buildup of the Pacific Fleet since 1979. The principal mission of the Pacific Fleet is the defense of the Soviet Siberian coast. Unlike the European fleets, the Pacific Fleet enjoys more direct access to the ocean. The port complex of Vladivostok opens into the Sea of Japan with four major straits giving egress into the Pacific. One exit (Kuril Strait) is controlled by the Russians, the second separates Japan and the Russian-held island of Sakhalin (La Perouse), while the two other exits are controlled by Japan and Japan and South Korea (Tsugaru and the Korean straits, respectively). Their blockade by the US is unlikely, except in the most dire of circumstances, because of the dependence of Japan and South Korea on maritime trade. The second major naval port is Petropavlovsk, on the coast of Kamchatka. Most of the Pacific Fleet’s submarines are based there, where they have direct access to the Pacific.

The Soviet Siberian coast has several ports vital to Soviet trade. These ports move cargo to and from European Russia and they facilitate the economic and politically lucrative trade with the Third World nations of Western South America, Southeast Asia, India, the Middle East and eastern Africa.

By 1985, the Pacific Fleet consists of almost one-third of the Soviet submarine force (including 25 of the 62 SSBN), 29 percent of the Navy’s major surface warships, some 30 percent of its aircraft and 33 percent of the Navy’s personnel.

Headquarters of the Pacific Fleet is at Vladivostok.


Sources are the “4th Edition Guide to the Soviet Navy” and “Combat Fleets of the World, 1993”