Today’s Ukrainian Navy is Well-Trained & Combat Hardened – Gary Tabach 

The Ukrainian military fleet is holding combat drills to prepare for a possible Russian navy attack on the shores of Ukraine. The United States’ guided-missile destroyer, the USS Donald Cook recently joined the Ukrainian navy in the Black Sea.

“Donald Cook particularly is the ship that has been visiting Ukraine and the Black Sea quite often. It is an old friend of Ukraine and it keeps coming like it was during the Sea Breeze exercises that I held every summer. Now it is coming to show the support to the Ukrainian Navy after what happened in the Kerch Strait,”  retired U.S. Navy Captain Gary Tabach said in an interview with UATV,

Ukrainian Minister for Foreign Affairs Pavlo Klimkin has said that a new passage of Ukrainian warships through the Kerch Strait temporarily controlled by Russian invaders will be carried out under the supervision of foreign military. The minister also said the foreign ministry would thoroughly, although not publicly, instruct Ukrainian sailors on how they should act in the event that they’re captured.

Since the annexation of Crimea in 2014, NATO has increased its presence in the Black Sea. The number of patrols of NATO naval groups increased in 2018 from two to three.

“Today’s Ukrainian Navy does not resemble 2014. Today it is quite a professional military as well as well-trained and combat-hardened. Many young officers have been educated not with the old Soviet system but to the western school and western education in a military style. It is converting and is getting closer to the NATO standards. Its weapons became more sophisticated. It is modernizing well considering Ukraine’s economic state. Ukraine is doing very well in bringing its army to top standards,” Tabach said.