Russian Bastion Anti Ship Batteries with P-800 Missiles Wipe Out Enemy Fleet in Crimean Combat Drills

Russian K-300 Bastion coastal defence systems under the Navy’s Black Sea Fleet have reportedly held drills to destroy enemy warships at range. The exercise was carried out on August 12th on the Crimean Peninsula, a disputed territory under Russian control since early 2014. Crimea is today one of the most heavily defended regions of the Russian Federation, with Moscow perceiving a considerable potential security threat from the Western Bloc, and the peninsula houses some of the country’s most advanced military hardware including Su-30 heavy fighters, S-400 air defence systems and Iskander hypersonic tactical ballistic missiles. The Black Sea Fleet press office stated regarding the testing of the system: "During the drills, the personnel of the Bastion coastal defense missile systems practiced the assignments of changing positions and deploying in a new positioning area with missile strikes against a notional enemy."

The Bastion first entered service in 2015 and is currently operated by the armed forces of Russia, Syria and Vietnam. The platform deploys P-800 Oniks supersonic anti ship cruise missiles which retain a 350km range against enemy surface vessels and impact targets at speeds of Mach 2.5 - enough to tear frigate sized ships in half with the force of impact. The scenario under which the drills were carried out saw the Black Sea Fleet’s command and control center receive reconnaissance data indicating that an enemy strike force was preparing to attack the fleet’s coastal infrastructure facilities and ships, to which the Bastion systems responded with electronic launches of cruise missiles. This was reportedly sufficient to wipe out the enemy force. The drills took place to provide practice in operating multiple units and formations together in a complementary way, an involved over 30 desperate weapons systems. Russia is currently developing a more capable and longer ranged replacement for the P-800 which is expected to be widely fielded by the mid 2020s, the 3M22 Zircon, which will have over three times the speed of the P-800 and may well also deploy from mobile coastal defence batteries such as the Bastion.