Vladimir Putin the Terrible responded to US permission to Ukraine to employ US-supplied weapons to strike military targets deeper in Russia with a show of force designed to strike fear in American hearts.

He dispatched a Russian naval flotilla, including a nuclear submarine, to sail dramatically close to Florida while steaming in the direction of Havana.

The world’s newspapers headlined Tsar Putin’s scary, scary sabre rattling.

South Florida Sun Sentinel:

Three Russian Navy ships and a nuclear-powered submarine will arrive at the Port of Havana for an official visit next week, the Cuban armed forces said in a statement Thursday, confirming the military exercises first disclosed by U.S. officials on Wednesday.

The Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces said the Russian missile frigate Admiral Gorshkov, the nuclear sub Kazan, the oil tanker Pashin and the salvage tug Nikolai Chiker will arrive on June 12 and stay for a week.

The Cuban military said the visit by the Russian Navy ships is part of the “friendly” relations between the two countries, complies with international law and does not pose a security threat to the region because “none of the ships carry nuclear weapons.”

Take that, United States! Tremble in your boots, American warmongers!

It sounded downright alarming, alright. But a little dose of reality from Murphy Barrett responding to a question on Quora puts it all into proper perspective.

Could Russia simply blockade America’s ports to stop and search every ship heading towards Europe and seize military equipment bound for Ukraine?

You do realize that most of Russia’s Black Fleet was sunk…by land forces.

As a show of force, Russia sent a “flotilla” to putter around Cuba consisting of one frigate, a submarine that is missing part of soundproofing panels (you know, those things that keep submarines quiet), and two support ships. So that’s one surface combatant that a Coast Guard cutter could deal with, a submarine that Helen Keller could hear coming, and two support ships to nursemaid them.

Meanwhile, the US Navy is the largest navy in the world (fuck China, we’re counting combatants, not just every thing that can float including canoes), the US Navy is also the second largest air force in the world (after the US Air Force), and frankly nobody who fucks with our boats gets away with it, as the Houthis most recently found out, and the Japanese found out hardest.

Hell, Iran fucked with our boats once, and we wiped out half of their navy, in eight hours, and only stopped because the US Admiralty thought that we probably shouldn’t wipe the whole thing out because…reasons, I guess.

I mean, if Putin somehow lost what little sanity he has left, and decided to fuck with our boats, the only problem the US Navy would have bitch-whipping him all the way back to Moscow would be to explain how in fuck all the lady sailors managed to actually pop motto-boners. Anatomically improbable, yes, but goddamn is the Navy gonna have a field day protecting the environment and creating new coral reefs.

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Many decades ago, when I was young and working on war game design at the late great Simulations Publications in New York in the late 1970s, there was news of a Soviet naval build-up, and SPI began contemplating a new Soviet Navy versus NATO and US Navy game.

At the weekly designers conference, all the keen military history buffs sat around the big table discussing current and future projects. And the new major “Naval War with the Russians” proposal came up.

One of the older grognards interrupted, inquiring aloud: When exactly was the last time the Russians ever won a naval action?

Present were over a dozen knowledgeable experts in military history, and we all were flummoxed. “Uh, how about the Battle of Navarino (20 October 1827 during the Greek War of Independence)?” asked a true savant.

No, someone else reminded us: the Russians were only a small part of a mostly British and French Allied fleet under British command.

We were left wondering if it would be possible to count John Paul Jones victories against the Turks under Catherine the Great in 1787. And the proposed game died buried under gales of laughter at the idea of the Russian Navy trying to take on the US Navy.

Daily Mail:

Vladimir Putin has sacked every single commander in Russia’s Baltic fleet in what has been described as a ‘Stalin-style’ purge.

Up to 50 officers of the fleet were fired alongside Vice Admiral Viktor Kravchuk and his chief of staff Rear Admiral Sergei Popov after they reportedly refused to follow orders to confront Western ships.

Reports in Russia also suggested the purges followed an alleged cover-up of a submarine accident, flaws in recruitment and military construction projects.

It comes amid an undisclosed number of other senior officers of the fleets have been fired over serious flaws in combat training and their failure to take proper care of personnel.

The purges’ scope and publicity make them highly unusual for the Russian military, which usually removes senior officers in a more subtle way.

It is particularly unexpected as it follows Putin’s visit to the Baltic fleet last year in Kalingrad, during which he praised its performance.

However, there has been speculation the drastic measures were prompted after the US Navy ship the USS Donald Cook was ‘buzzed’ by Russian fighter bombers in April, which was meant to be part of a series of confrontations against Western ships in the Baltic.

But international affairs analyst Peter Coates told news.com.au: ‘But the Russian Baltic Fleet, however, refused to follow such dangerous orders – hence Putin’s retaliation against his own naval officers.

Meanwhile after news of the sackings were announced, the Moscow Times noted that ‘not since Stalin’s purges had so many officers been ousted at once.’