RUSSIA’S RUSTING NAVY.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 16212, 24 August 1923, Page 12

RUSSIA’S RUSTING NAVY.

SOLD FOR THE SCRAP HEAP. NO OFFICERS FOR FLEET. LONDON, August 7.-—M. Trotsky’s dream of a Bolshevik navy which would dominate the Baltic has vanished. It has been proved impossible lo replace the experienced naval officers who were butchered in a. wholesale manner by the crews on tho outbreak of the Soviet revolution. * Russian warships are rusting in their harbors, and everything portable lias been looted by tho crews. Only the battleship Sebastopol is fit to put to sea. British shipbicaking firms.have bought 13 big Russian warships, including several that participated in tho RussoJapanese war, for breaking-up purposes. Other warships in the course of const ruction wore never completed. Tho Sebastopol, which is tli& sole efficient battleship in tho Russian navy now, was laid l ]o\vn at. Hie Baltic works in June, 1009, and was completed in January, 1915, in time to participate in Hie war. She carried twelve 12in guns, sixteen 4.7 in., and of hey lighter weapons. She lias an armoured belt which is &3in. thick at its maximum amidships. ; Tho late General Vittorio Cuniberti prepared the. original designs for this class. The old Russian Ministry of Marine, however, afterwards altered the plans, to include Russian ideas of armoring, ice-breaking bows, and other special features. Together with her sister ships, the Petropavlosk, Poltava, and Gangut, tlie Sebastopol was always a most unhealthy, insanitary, and badly ventilated vessel. The murder of Russian naval officers bv their crews was begun on September 10, 1917, when tho sailors of the Baltic fleet shot in cold blood a number of their officers on suspicion of their favoring General Korniloff against Kerensky. The Vyborg garrison, a nest, of Bolshevism at that time, threw dozens of their officers into tile river for similar reasons.