The Kirov-class heavy cruiser in the Pacific had followed a rather similar pattern of operation to that of the Kirov herself in the Atlantic. That is to say, she would from time to time sortie from Petropavlovsk and proceed south-eastwards into the Pacific for some days, apparently in order to provide a reconnaissance and strike target for the Soviet Naval Air Force. On 1 August the cruiser followed the usual course into the Pacific. Fortunately, the US submarine La Jolla was on surveillance patrol in the vicinity of Petropavlovsk and the Soviet cruiser had a ‘tail’ as she went on her way. Shortly after hostilities were opened, the Soviet ship was attacked. The stricken cruiser, hit by three torpedoes, sank within twenty minutes.
In the meantime, the carrier Kitty Hawk — one of two in the US Seventh Fleet at that period — which was exercising to the eastward of Yokosuka with her Aegis-equipped cruiser consorts and some units of the Japanese Maritime Self-Defence Force, had been ordered to intercept the Soviet heavy cruiser as back-up for the La Jolla. But before this group had come within striking range of the Soviet warship the submarine report of its sinking was received in the Kitty Hawk, which then set course with her group to return to Yokosuka.
The American carrier John F. Kennedy, with her battle group, was in Subic Bay in the Philippines on 4 August. Admiral Carlsberg, the Commander, US Seventh Fleet, reckoned that his first duty, if the state of tension should be followed by war, was to take his force to sea and seek out and destroy the Soviet carrier Minsk, sister ship of the Kiev, which was currently using Cam Ranh Bay as an operational base. Accordingly he sailed his battle group from Subic at 1800 on 4 August after having conducted energetic ASW operations along the sortie route. What he did not know was that a Soviet submarine had that morning laid a minefield precisely where the John F. Kennedy would have to go when leaving Subic. The carrier duly detonated one of those mines and had to return to harbour, having first managed to fly off her aircraft. The Minsk’s Forger V/STOL fighters were no match for the strike carried out at dawn next day by the John F. Kennedy’s own air group, flying from the airfield in Manila. The Soviet carrier and two of her group were sunk. Two guided missile cruisers and two destroyers survived, however, and sank several merchant ships in the South China Sea before being interned in Surabaya, Java.
By this time the Kitty Hawk had been redeployed to Subic as flagship for Admiral Carlsberg in place of the damaged John F. Kennedy.
The Soviet submarines stationed off Cape de Sao Roque, to the west of the Straits of Gibraltar, and off the Cape of Good Hope, all sank several important merchant ships during the first few days of hostilities, and all round the world ships were kept in harbour or back from danger zones pending developments. Several vessels struck mines laid a few days previously by Soviet merchant ships. There can be no doubt that the ‘instantaneous threat’ had been successfully put into effect.
The final operation now to be mentioned is the launching by the Soviet armies in the south, together with Romanian and Bulgarian assistance, of a seaborne assault upon the Dardanelles. Rather than make a direct attack in the immediate vicinity of the Bosporus, the Soviet forces advanced by land from Bulgaria — strongly opposed by a combined Greek-Turkish force already deployed against just that contingency — while simultaneously launching a sea and airborne assault on the port of Zonguldak. From there it was intended to proceed westwards along the coast, supported by the Black Sea Fleet, while at the same time threatening Ankara. As is now evident from Soviet records, it was expected that this campaign would induce the Turks to come to terms following the Soviet success in West Germany: These intentions were frustrated owing to the failure to reach their objectives on the Central Front.
One general point should be made before giving an outline — and it will have to be just that — of the naval operations that followed the first two days of hostilities, which is all that we have dealt with in the war at sea so far.
It will be recalled that the Soviet aims, in seeking to occupy the whole of the Federal German Republic within ten days, was to cause the collapse of the Atlantic Alliance and to bring the United States to the negotiating table. The Soviet Main Naval Command deemed it imperative to destroy or neutralize US carriers in a surprise attack at the first possible opportunity. It was this act, more than any other, that gave the war an immediate worldwide character, and perhaps above all else ensured that, even if the Red Army reached the Rhine stop-line on time, the United States would have been very unlikely indeed to negotiate. Quite apart from the fury of the American people at what many saw as almost another Pearl Harbor and the determination of the United States to reassert naval supremacy in the Atlantic, isolationism was no longer, in the 1980s, a valid option for America. The United States was now forced to import oil and strategic raw materials from other continents — and hence had now become truly sea-dependent. Soviet naval predominance around the continents of Europe, Asia and Africa was therefore unacceptable. Yet that is what total US withdrawal from Europe would have meant.
Turning now to the sea/air campaigns that followed the initial surprise attacks, there were five separate, but more or less simultaneous, conflicts being waged within the NATO area as a whole; and of course there were worldwide attacks on shipping, with regional naval activity east of Suez and in the Pacific. The campaigns were: in the Norwegian Sea in support of the Commander-in-Chief Allied Forces Northern Europe (CINCNORTH); in the Baltic, North Sea and Channel in support of the Commander-in-Chief Allied Forces Central Europe (CINCENT); in the Western Approaches to north-west Europe and in general support of Allied Command Europe; in the Atlantic reinforcement operation; and in the Mediterranean in support of CINCSOUTH.
Taking the Norwegian Sea first, it will be recalled that the heavy cruiser Kirov was sunk on her way back to base in Murmansk after sinking merchant shipping in the Atlantic. Another operation of special interest in progress at the same time involved the carrier Kiev. She had sailed from Murmansk on 23 July, nearly a fortnight before war broke out, accompanied by the two Krivak-class frigates. The group arrived in Cork in the Irish Republic on the 27th for what was presented as a courtesy visit. The ships were reported to be on a training cruise to the Caribbean. The group had of course been tracked by NATO surveillance forces since leaving its home waters as a matter of routine, and it remained under observation after sailing from Cork to the south-westward on 2 August. Contact with the Kiev group was lost, as a result of effective Soviet electronic deception measures, on the night of the 3rd. Luckily, owing to the use of Shannon air base, the subsequent air search was successful in relocating the Kiev on the 5th.