By Robert Farley
In response to its invasion of Crimea, the EU will likely bar the sale of a pair of French Mistral warships.
Over the next two years, the Russian Pacific Fleet is expected to receive two new Mistral class amphibious assault ships, fresh from French naval yards. These flattops would have joined the burgeoning family of flat-decked aircraft carrying ships in the Pacific, including the Liaoning, the Korean Dokdos, the Australian Canberras, and the Japanese Izumo class.
That sale is now in considerable doubt. Because of Russia’s invasion and presumed annexation of Crimea, the European Union is considering a variety of sanctions against Moscow. The biggest stick, in military terms, may be the Mistrals, a pair of 21,000 ton warships capable of carrying over a dozen helicopters, in addition to a well-deck for amphibious landing craft. That the Russians chose to name the second ship Sevastopol, after a city not in Russian possession until after the recent invasion, only makes the sale so much uglier from the European point of view.
Read the full story at The Diplomat