Analysis: Does Russia remain a naval superpower if its only aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov is retired?.

The US Naval Institute, in September 2025, reports that Russia is preparing to retire its only aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov and, in effect, to wind down fixed-wing carrier aviation. Kuznetsov is a Project 1143.5 heavy aircraft-carrying cruiser built in the late Soviet era, about 58,000 tons at full load, fitted with a ski jump and a STOBAR layout that launches fighters without catapults. Unlike Western carriers, it was designed with a large organic weapons fit that originally included the P-700 Granit anti-ship missile battery, Kinzhal surface-to-air missiles, Kashtan close-in weapon systems and AK-630 guns. Its air group mixed Su-33 and later MiG-29 K fighters with Ka-27 and Ka-31 helicopters for anti-submarine warfare and radar picket duty.
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Russia is preparing to retire its only aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov, marking the end of its carrier aviation and raising questions about whether Moscow can still be considered a full naval power without a flight deck at sea (Picture source: UK MoD).

The refit stumbled from one mishap to the next, from dock accidents to on-board fires, and each incident pushed schedules to the right while the bill kept growing. The ship’s conventional propulsion system, eight boilers feeding four turbines, has long been maintenance-heavy. Getting consistent power and speed from that plant has never been difficult. With a shortage of specialized yard capacity, sanctions that complicate the supply chain for high-end components, and a war economy that pulls people and money toward higher priority lines, the refit no longer makes strategic sense. At some point, the decision becomes a resource call rather than an engineering challenge.

The Kuznetsov carrier has always been a compromise. The STOBAR deck simplifies the ship but caps launch weight and sortie rate. It is workable for fighters like Su-33 and MiG-29 K, and it can support helicopter operations at a decent tempo, but it cannot get heavier aircraft, such as fixed-wing airborne early warning types, off the deck. That drove the reliance on the Ka-31 helicopter for radar coverage, a useful but limited solution compared with a catapult carrier that can fly larger AEW platforms. Modernization intended to tame some of those limitations with upgraded arresting gear, new sensors, and updated aviation facilities.

Without a flight deck at sea, the Russian Navy’s carrier-capable Su-33 and MiG-29 K become land-based squadrons. They can still fly and fight but the deck handling skills, the trap and launch currency, and the training pipeline tied to at-sea operations start to fade. Simulators help, shore-based training helps, yet there is no substitute for cycles at sea with an actual deck, actual weather and the pressure of real recoveries in rough water.

Could there be a new carrier project on the horizon? Concepts have circulated for years but no project is under construction yet. Shtorm, sometimes labeled Project 23000E, sketched a large nuclear carrier with catapults and a modern air wing. Lamantin has also been mentioned in design circles. These look impressive on paper and serve a signaling role at trade shows. The hard part is translating drawings into a funded program with a yard slot, long lead items ordered, and an industrial base aligned to deliver catapults, arresting gear, power plants and aviation facilities. A deck with 70 to 90 aircraft is not only a shipbuilding project, it is a multi-decade commitment that would compete for funding with submarines, long-range missiles and air defense programs that the government uses and values right now. There is no public sign that steel is being cut or that a build sequence is locked in: for the foreseeable future, a next-generation Russian carrier looks highly hypothetical.

A carrier allows a fleet to put combat air patrols and limited strike packages over a surface group beyond the normal reach of coastal aviation. Even with STOBAR limits, Kuznetsov’s fighters could push back hostile maritime patrol aircraft, complicate enemy targeting and widen the anti-submarine warfare screen with helicopters. The Ka-31 allows anti-submarine and reconnaissance missions. Without these capabilities, the Northern and Pacific Fleet task groups lean harder on land-based aircraft that may be hundreds of miles away, with all the response time and tanker requirements that imply. In a crisis, those minutes are important. In peacetime, presence missions feel thinner without a flight deck to round out a formation.

The geopolitical context does not favor carriers for Moscow just now. The war in Ukraine consumes resources and attention, with Western sanctions weakening the economy, especially in high-end manufacturing and marine engineering. The defense industry is busy turning out what the armed forces use daily: cruise and ballistic missiles, air defense interceptors, artillery and drones, diesel electric submarines and smaller surface combatants with land attack reach. A supercarrier or even a large conventional CATOBAR ship is not a priority. That is why talk of retiring Kuznetsov reads as strategic triage rather than a temporary pause. It is the fleet adjusting to the wars it actually has.

Is a carrier mandatory to be considered a naval great power? A full-spectrum navy that wants to project influence far from home still needs at least one operational deck to integrate airpower with surface and subsurface forces. The United States, China, the United Kingdom, France, India, Italy and Japan field carriers in different configurations because the capability binds together strike, air defense, anti-submarine warfare and diplomacy at sea. A navy can be operational without one, and Russia will remain dangerous with submarines and missiles, but the absence of a functioning carrier means it will not be treated as a complete blue water force by its peers. That informal threshold matters because status at sea translates into options, access and leverage.