Fatih Yurtsever*
Freedom of navigation and safety of navigation in the Black Sea are now seriously threatened by floating mines. There are official statements by both the Russian and the Ukrainian authorities blaming each other for the threat posed by the floating mines. A total of three mines, two off the Turkish coast and one off the Romanian coast, were discovered and destroyed by mine-hunting teams from the Turkish and Romanian navies. So who is responsible for the threat of floating mines in the Black Sea?
From Feb. 13-19, 2022 the Russian Federation held an exercise in the Black Sea, including along the Odessa coast, involving surface ships and submarines from the Black Sea Fleet. The Ukrainian Navy may have considered the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s exercise off Odessa as the positioning of ships before a possible amphibious operation in Odessa. Therefore, the Ukrainian Navy may have mined the water to protect its beaches. A message had already been posted on NAVTEX (Navigational Telex – an international service providing navigational and meteorological warnings and forecasts) by the Ukrainian NAVTEX station that navigation at the entrance of Odessa, Ochakov, Chernomorsk and Yuzhni was prohibited due to the danger of mines.
#Odessa NAVTEX, frequency 518 KHz: "warning of danger to navigation (mines)".
Issued on 22 February, the notice is still valid.
(via https://t.co/AOSdbqk7Do)#Ukraine #Russia #UkraineWar pic.twitter.com/ZVOy4Q3UEO— Itamilradar (@ItaMilRadar) March 15, 2022
An Estonian freighter sank after colliding with a sea mine off the coast of Odessa on March 3, 2022. On March 15, 2022 a Russian amphibious task force guided by minesweepers advanced into the Odessa approach waters but returned without conducting any amphibious operations.
The Russian Novorossisiyk coastal station broadcast an alarming NAVTEX message on March 18 informing the public that some mines anchored by Ukrainian naval forces near the port of Odessa had broken from their cables due to stormy weather. The Novorossisiyk station claimed that 420 YAM and YARM-type sea mines were floating in the water and accused Ukraine of violating the provisions of the 1907 Hague Convention, which prohibits the use of drifting mines unless they are anchored and obliges states to notify of mined areas internationally. Simultaneously the Port of Sochi warned shipowners and captains in the region of the danger of explosions from Ukrainian sea mines in the Black Sea. “Sailors in the northwestern, western and southwestern Black Sea are asked to navigate cautiously,” the message reads. Following the Russian threat notification, Turkey’s Samsun NAVTEX station issued a warning to sailors about the mine threat reported by Russia.
Viktor Vyshnov, deputy head of the Ukrainian Naval Administration, called Russia’s announcement “disinformation.”
“This was done to justify the closure of these districts of the Black Sea under so called ‘danger of mines’,” Vyshnov told Reuters.
Two mines were discovered off the coast of Turkey this week. The first mine was found on March 26 by fishermen at the northern entrance to the Bosporus. The second was found on March 28 in the Black Sea near Bulgarian territorial waters. Both mines were recovered by the Turkish Navy and safely detonated. The Ministry of Defense did not provide information on the type of mines destroyed or the country they belonged to. The public was informed that they were only an old type of mine.
The Romanian Navy discovered a floating mine about 39 miles off Cape Media. The minesweeper Vice-Admiral Constantin Balescu and its Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) team safely detonated the mine, following regular operations for mine identification and destruction. The Romanian Navy shared images of the mine destruction with the public. According to the picture, the Ukrainian Navy’s markings on the hull of the destroyed mine show that it belongs to Ukraine.
#war The marking on the hull of this naval mine indicates that it belongs to the 🇺🇦Ukrainian Navy. The mine was destroyed today by a EOD unit of the 🇷🇴Romanian #Navy in the Black Sea. https://t.co/Hg2TRygnD0
— Capt(N) (@Capt_Navy) March 28, 2022
In response, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on March 29. According to the statement, “As of the beginning of 2022, the detected mines were not registered with Naval Forces of Ukraine. The Russian armed forces seized these mines in 2014 during the military invasion and temporary occupation of the Ukrainian city of Sevastopol, Russia. Thus, using naval mines seized in 2014, Russia deliberately provokes and discredits Ukraine in front of international partners. By such actions, the aggressor state seeks to conceal its illegal activities in the Black Sea, contrary to the principles and norms of international maritime and humanitarian law, and to evade responsibility for war crimes and piracy.”
The Turkish Defense Ministry prefers not to give any information about the type of mine, while the Romanian navy shared images indicating the origin of mine. The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry claims that the Russians captured the mines in question during the annexation of Crimea in 2014. Throughout the Ukraine crisis, we have been subjected to intense misinformation. Due to the “fog of war,” it is impossible to claim that this information is 100 percent accurate. However, if you draw some analytical conclusions, you can arrive at a possible suspicion.
The approximate distance between Odessa and the Bosporus is 320 nautical miles. For the mine to reach the Bosporus from March 18, when the Russians first issued the warning, to March 26, the date of the first discovery, there had to have been a continuous southerly current of about two nautical miles per hour in the region. The current speed recorded in the area at this time of year is about 0.3 nautical miles per hour, and the current in the Gulf of Odessa is not in the direction of the Bosporus. Therefore, it is impossible for the mine discovered near the coast of Turkey to have traveled from Odessa to the Bosporus within eight days under the current weather conditions.
Ukraine now has the support of the international community against Russia. It is only logical for Russia to try to reduce that support and reverse the international community’s positive attitude toward Ukraine. Commercial shipping and fishing have declined, albeit only partially, due to mines floating in the Black Sea. Insurance premiums for ships navigating in the Black Sea are rising because they can be damaged by floating mines. For this reason, the international community’s accusations directed at Ukraine because of the developments could be seen as a win for Russia. Suppose Russia has mines of Ukrainian origin that were seized during the annexation of Crimea in 2014, as laid out in the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry’s statement. It could be a logical course of action for Russia to secretly lay them in the sea to discredit Ukraine.
Since February 19, 2022, Russia has conducted continuous reconnaissance and surveillance activities with warships off Odessa. If there were 420 floating mines in the sea, as Russia claims, they should have been easily detected by Russian ships. So far, Russia has not released any pictures or videos of floating mines. On the other hand, the US Global Hawks and NATO AWACS are constantly patrolling the region and have not yet detected any floating mines. From the available data, it can be concluded that there are not many floating mines in the sea. This reinforces the possibility that the mines discovered could be part of a covert operation by the Russians. So how could the Russians have secretly laid mines in the sea?
Since the mines detected off Romania and Turkey cannot have come from Odessa, they must have been released into the sea somehow. Given that NATO and the US constantly monitor the Black Sea with Global Hawks and AWACS as well as intelligence satellites, the mine-laying activity must be carried out covertly. At the moment, the only vehicle capable of secretly releasing mines in the Black Sea is a submarine.
Russia’s upgraded Kilo-class submarines are capable of deploying up to 24 sea mines, and Russia currently has four or five submarines patrolling the Black Sea. Ukraine, however, does not have that capability. Although no conclusion can be made in the face of enormous propaganda and misinformation, if Russia does not present more credible evidence proving that the drifting mines were laid by Ukraine, then Russian submarines can be considered the most likely suspects at the moment.
* Fatih Yurtsever is a former naval officer in the Turkish Armed Forces. He is using a pseudonym out of security concerns.