<story><title>Moskva cruiser sank while being towed in a storm – Russian Defense Ministry</title><url>https://tass.com/russia/1438045</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>cm2187</author><text>Would you be able to share some light on what a cruiser is (that&amp;#x27;s how this ship is classified on wikipedia) vs another kind of ship. I am comparing to the british navy which doesn&amp;#x27;t seem to have anything above destroyer (outside of aircraft carriers). In these days and age where all war ships seem to be essentially floating missile launch platforms, what is the difference?</text></item><item><author>WJW</author><text>More like being &amp;quot;sank while being towed&amp;quot; I think? (edit: original title was &amp;quot;Cruiser &amp;#x27;Moskva&amp;#x27; sank while towing&amp;quot;) Anyway, as a former navy officer it looks very bad that the flagship of a fleet was apparently sunk by a anti ship missile (ASM) strike. Certainly in NATO navies you always keep a layered defense for your high value targets and while the Neptune ASM is very modern, the flagship should definitely not have been the first to be sunk.&lt;p&gt;This will be (should be) a wake up call for the rest of the fleet and keep them much further from the shore, which in turn has impact on the amount of air control the Russians can exert on the southern parts of Ukraine as apparently they have been leaning on navy vessels to provide SAM cover.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>brimble</author><text>Ship class designations are weird. Russia keeps a ship or two designated as &amp;quot;battlecruisers&amp;quot; (in the WWII era, that would have meant a lightly-armored, probably fast, very large ship with battleship-class guns) that would just be called cruisers in most other navies, now. I&amp;#x27;ve seen British ships with tonnage that would put them nearly up to a WWII-era heavy cruiser (step under a battlecruiser, the smallest thing generally regarded as a &amp;quot;capital ship&amp;quot; in that era) called a destroyer (formerly that would have been a &lt;i&gt;much&lt;/i&gt; smaller size of ship), these days.&lt;p&gt;From their design, the ship class in question seem to be some kind of largish general-purpose missile cruisers with substantial armament and decent anti-air&amp;#x2F;anti-missile defenses, but not intended to survive sustained fighting (their weapon placement suggests that—all those missile tubes on the deck can&amp;#x27;t possibly be safe, but it might let them cram more weapons on there cheaply)&lt;p&gt;[VERY LATE EDIT] The TL;DR here is that &amp;quot;cruiser&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;destroyer&amp;quot; and all that are nearly meaningless without context of who&amp;#x27;s doing the labeling, and when.&lt;p&gt;[ANOTHER LATE EDIT] I overstated the degree to which the Kirov class&amp;#x27; designation is misleading: its displacement &lt;i&gt;is&lt;/i&gt; roughly in the range of WWII-era battlecruisers (~1&amp;#x2F;2 the displacement of an Iowa class battleship—armor is really, really heavy). It lacks battleship-class guns, but so does everything else these days and it&amp;#x27;d be kinda silly if it had them.</text></comment>
<story><title>Moskva cruiser sank while being towed in a storm – Russian Defense Ministry</title><url>https://tass.com/russia/1438045</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>cm2187</author><text>Would you be able to share some light on what a cruiser is (that&amp;#x27;s how this ship is classified on wikipedia) vs another kind of ship. I am comparing to the british navy which doesn&amp;#x27;t seem to have anything above destroyer (outside of aircraft carriers). In these days and age where all war ships seem to be essentially floating missile launch platforms, what is the difference?</text></item><item><author>WJW</author><text>More like being &amp;quot;sank while being towed&amp;quot; I think? (edit: original title was &amp;quot;Cruiser &amp;#x27;Moskva&amp;#x27; sank while towing&amp;quot;) Anyway, as a former navy officer it looks very bad that the flagship of a fleet was apparently sunk by a anti ship missile (ASM) strike. Certainly in NATO navies you always keep a layered defense for your high value targets and while the Neptune ASM is very modern, the flagship should definitely not have been the first to be sunk.&lt;p&gt;This will be (should be) a wake up call for the rest of the fleet and keep them much further from the shore, which in turn has impact on the amount of air control the Russians can exert on the southern parts of Ukraine as apparently they have been leaning on navy vessels to provide SAM cover.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>nickff</author><text>Most of the other replies here say it’s all about size, and size does matter, but it’s not the whole story.&lt;p&gt;Generally, cruisers are designed with capabilities that allow them to operate anywhere on the ocean on their own, or as the lead vessels in small groups of ships (along with frigates and destroyers). Destroyers are usually smaller and have a more limited set of capabilities, and are intended to operate as ocean-going support ships in a combat group. Frigates are usually even smaller, with similar set of capabilities to a destroyer, but more limited equipment and intended to operate relatively close to their home ports.&lt;p&gt;Every navy has different sizes for each, with the USA having some of the largest ships of each designation. You should also keep in mind that each type of ship has gotten progressively larger over time; as of WWII, destroyers were roughly 2000 tons, and cruisers were about 8000 tons.</text></comment>