The Stavropol is the twelfth corvette (designated locally as Малые ракетные корабли or “small rocket ship”) of the Buyan-M-class, closing a series of these low-displacement vessels armed with the Kalibr-NK missile system. According to a statement by the commander of the Russian Federation Navy Adm. Alexander Moiseyev, the Stavropol will join the Baltic Fleet. She will be the fifth Buyan-M in that fleet.
“The 12th ship in the series, the Stavropol, will be part of the Baltic Fleet. It will solve security problems on our western borders and, if necessary, in other areas of the World Ocean“
Adm. Alexander Moiseyev, The Commander of the Russian Federation Navy
Given that the Baltic Sea is turning into a NATO lake, the Stavropol may have a difficult task….
Project 21631 Buyan-M was developed at the Zielonodolsk Design Bureau, while their construction was ordered in the shipyard in the same city mentioned in the introduction. The design is based on the Project 21630 Buyan small artillery ship, which was constructed for operations in coastal waters, including the deltas of large rivers, lakes, and shallow sea areas. That’s why these vessels have a small draft and two pump jets instead of conventional propellers.
However, they are larger than their predecessors: displacement of 950 versus 560 tons and length of 74.1 instead of 61.8 meters. The most important difference, however, is the armament. The Buyan-M carries the Kalibr-NK missile system. Nevertheless, the dimensions allow it to pass through rivers and channels, under bridges, in locks, and other hydrotechnical constructions, which the Russians use, among other things, when transferring vessels from the south of the country to the Baltic Sea.
Around the same time, the Russians designed Project 22800 Karakurt corvettes, which are counterparts of the Buyan-M optimized for at-sea operations (a different shape of the underwater part of the hull and three propellers). Construction of the Karakurts has a higher priority and is continuing.
Production of the Buyan-M-class corvettes was prolonged as a result of sanctions by Western countries, as originally four Rolls-Royce Solutions diesel engines (MTU 16V4000 M90) were used for propulsion, driving two pump-jets. An export blockade led to the use of Chinese Henan Diesel Engine Industry Company CHD622V20 engines from the sixth ship. However, they proved unreliable, and in addition, Moscow sought independence from imports, so the last three Buyan-Ms received Russian powerplants with Kolomienskiy Zavod 16D49 engines, gearboxes manufactured by Zvezda and control systems from NPO Avrora.
Buyan-M: Small but heavily armed
The relatively small Bujan-M are heavily armed. In addition to the 100mm A-190 automatic gun, they have an eight-cell UKSK 3S14 (Universal’nyy korabel’nyy strel’bovyy complex, Universal ship firing system) vertical launcher from which cruise missiles 3M14 of the 3R14 Kalibr-NK and anti-ship missiles 3M55 Oniks can be fired, and reportedly the hypersonic 3M22 Tsirkon in the future. The Buyan-Ms, along with the Dagestan corvette of the 11661K Gepard-class, were the first Russian surface ships to use Kalibr cruise missiles in combat conditions, firing at targets in Syria in 2105 (26 missiles were fired).
The weaknesses of the Buyan-M corvettes are mainly air defense. These are formed by an AK-630M-2 Duet system with two 30mm six-barrel Gatling guns and two 3M-47 Gibka launchers of Igla MANPADs. It was rumored that the last ships of the series were to receive the more modern Pantsir-M system, known from the small missile ships of Project 22800 Karakurt, but this did not happen.
The keel of the Stavropol was laid on July 12, 2018. The ship is expected to join the Baltic Fleet by the end of this year. The previous Buyan-M – Naro-Fominsk – also joined that fleet, which took place last December.
