The story of Russia’s failure to build a nuclear aircraft carrier to compete with the US

MOSCOW – As the Cold War entered its twilight years, the Soviet Union—now called Russia —becomes more and more interested in building a “blue water” Navy, a force that can challenge Marine dominance United States of America (USA) around the world and protect the Soviet mainland from attack in the event of war.

As part of that, Soviet Naval authorities sought to develop a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, which would significantly increase the Soviet Union’s ability to operate overseas.

However, the construction of the aircraft carrier, named Ulyanovsk, ended up falling victim to a sharp reduction in the resources provided to the Russian Navy after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Compete with US Carrier Combat Group

Powered by four KN-3 nuclear reactors, the Ulyanovsk (or officially Project 1143.7) would become the Soviet Union’s first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.

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Development of the carrier began as an evolution of the earlier Project 1153 Orel design, which was also never completed.

Citing the 19fortyfive report, Ulyanovsk was first laid in 1988 at the Black Sea Shipyard in Nikolayev (now known as Ukraine; Mykolaiv).

Soviet Navy leaders hoped that Ulyanovsk would serve as an answer to the United States Navy’s use of the United States Navy’s Aircraft Carrier Combat Group as one of the main instruments of its military might in the world’s oceans.

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