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Putin's Sunk Cost Fallacy [1]
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Date: 2023-09-17
Out of curiosity, I decided to approximate how badly the Black Sea Fleet is getting mauled by Ukraine, a country without a Navy, in percentage terms in order to get some perspective on how such losses would go over in the US. I could be over or under counting by a ship or two depending upon who you believe, but here are the numbers I used.
In 2014, the Black Sea Fleet had roughly 89 vessels. It consisted of 71 surface combat ships, 7 submarines, and 11 support and auxiliary ships.
From what I can gather, it has since lost 14 surface combat ships and 1 sub. In terms of percentages that's 19.2% of total combat vessels, 19.7% of its surface ships and 14.2% of its subs.
Could you imagine how well that would have gone over in the US if the Fifth Fleet suffered 20% losses during the Iraq War?
As Darth Putin put it the other day, the Black Sea Fleet is now the definition of a sunk cost fallacy. So long as this war goes on, it will continue to suffer losses that cannot be replaced.
As Ukraine's capabilities improve, no where, including ports, will be safe on the Black Sea for the Fleet. Its ships currently operating in the Mediterranean will have to think twice about returning home.
Upon the advice of a commenter, here's a brief word on the 1936 Montreux Convention. Turkey has exercised its authority under it to bar additional combat vessels from transiting the Dardanelles. However, any vessel based in the Black Sea when hostilities broke out may come and go via the Dardanelles.
Putin is fighting to retain a naval base that is pretty much unusable so long as he keeps fighting for it. It's just another disaster for the Master Strategist.
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