An item reported that according to the British Admiralty the Russian fleet within two or three years would consist of 2,500 ships including 30 cruisers, 150 destroyers, 500 submarines, 500 motor torpedo boats, 1,000 minesweepers and 300 escort vessels and a navy air force of 4,000 planes.(1) Almost all ships were built after the Second World War and their armament was of the latest design including nuclear tactical weapons and missiles. British experts estimated that the Soviet Union yearly at least six modern cruisers, 60 submarines and a large number of torpedo boats and other vessels. The Soviet Union possessed according to the intelligence reports about far inland located plants beyond the reach of enemy bombers where prefabricated submarines were build. This resulted in the largest submarine fleet of the world and more as twice the number of the number of the Western powers together. Estimated was that the Soviet Union spent since the end of the Second World War 120 milliard Dutch guilders. Regarded the first comments of British naval experts pointed the composition of this fleet out that this fleet was not for defence but for aggressive purposes, they called it a raiding fleet. The British Royal Navy possessed within three years about five battleships. 19 carriers, 29 cruisers (mostly with an age of 12-20 years), 100 destroyers, 194 frigates or escort vessels, three fast minelayers, 57 submarines and 309 minesweepers. The US navy possessed at that moment over 15 battleships, 112 carriers, 75 cruisers, 600 destroyers and 201 submarines. Although the joined Western powers seemed to have a larger naval potential as the Soviet Union was to be remind that the Western powers had to divide their strength over the seven world seas. Being a principal land power the Soviet Union could concentrate her power for an attack on the weakest point(s) of the sea lanes which connected the Western powers with each other.
Note
1. Directly after the Second World War started the period 1946-1991 which became known as the Cold War between the Eastern or Communist Bloc (Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact) and the Western Bloc (USA and the NATO allies). In this political and economic conflict with a (nuclear) arms race both sides tried to expand their influence for example in the Middle East. The Royal Netherlands Navy was in this period even interested in having her own nuclear submarines with British and American aid and knowledge.
