In the late 1970s, forward thinking Soviet Naval officers began to realise the potential benefits of "Force projection", but how would they ever break the stranglehold the imperialists had with their supercarrier battlegroups? One of their intrepid admirals pushed through a pet project of his: the Submersible Carrier. It was hoped to not only break the Soviet Union into worldwide naval force projection, but would once again catapult them into the technological lead.
Using the basic hull (albeit a bit stretched) of the upcoming "Typhoon" class missile subs, the Project 344 would carry a complement of 8 Yak 141s and a single Kamov Ka-32 helicopter. This eliminated the potential of at least 32 MIRV capable SLBMs, for a minimal weapons carrying capacity at a very short range.
After a protracted development the Project 344 set sail on August 11, 1990, and began her shake-down cruise. A single Yak 38 was carried aboard to test the launching and recovery capabilities, and it was found that basic takeoffs and landings were fairly straightforward, but no weapons were carried. The deteriorating economic and political situation at home caused the cruise to be cut short, and the Project 344 was tied up in Vladivostok on August 23, 1990, never to set sail again.
While officially never named, the Type 344 was most likely to be named after a famous Soviet Arctic explorer, Admiral Phrozenutov, best known for his repeated attempts to sled to the North Pole, and to discover a direct link from Moscow to the Pacific. He got lost twice in Gorky Park during vicious snowstorms, and was forced to eat his sled dogs to survive. It is unknown how somebody with such poor navigation skills was able to rise to the rank of Admiral in the Soviet Navy...
The colossal cost overruns for developing such an ambitious project helped to bring about the economic collapse of the Soviet Union. Long believed scrapped, recent information has come to light that it was quietly sold to China, who promised to develop it as a deep sea tourist liner.
I used two Dragon 1/350 Typhoon subs to make this. The ski ramp was built up with sheet styrene. The planes were from Trumpeter, and the little peoples are from Fujimi.
I got the idea from a video game in 1989, called "F-18" It was an Amiga system game, and involved defending San Francisco from various attacks, one of which was from a submarine carrier off the coast. I always wanted to make something like it, and the idea began to percolate...
Alvis 3.1
