Zavety Ilyicha Russian Naval Base (Zavety Ilyicha)

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Zavety Ilyicha

LOCATION: Postavaya Bay between the cities of Sovetskaya Gavan and Vanino
SUBORDINATION: Ministry of Defense

Deployment :
When the base in Sovetskaya Gavan was closed, all ships moved here into Postavaya Bay the base at Zavety Ilyicha . Now it is the base for the 38th independent division of coastal patrol ships (38-й отдельный дивизион кораблей охраны водного района) as follows:

МПК-125 "Sovetskaya Gavan '- small anti-ship project 1124M, commissioned in 1990
МПК-125 "Kholmsk" - small anti-ship Project 1124, commissioned in 1985.
BT-256 - Project 12650 coastal minesweeper, commissioned in 1990.
BT-215 - Project 12650 coastal minesweeper, commissioned in 1991.
BT-245 - Project 12650 coastal minesweeper, commissioned in 1989

old foto
forum.faleristika.info/viewtopic.php?f=568&t=48904

History :
This facility began as a conventional submarine base, but docks and necessary equipment were installed in the early 1980s for handling nuclear submarines. In 1982, four first-generation nuclear submarines (two November and two Echo I SSNs, built in 1959, 1960, 1962, and 1963, respectively) were transferred to Zavety Ilyicha and began operating out of the base during the ice-free months. These four submarines were retired in 1990, and the facility has since then served primarily as a holding area for decommissioned nuclear and diesel submarines. However, some of the reactors on the decommissioned nuclear submarines hold damaged spent fuel, and Russia is ill-equipped to deal with this fuel.

In the summer of 1990, local residents conducted demonstrations to protest government plans to offload nuclear fuel from the decommissioned submarines in the bay and to store the hulls at the base. These plans were canceled, and the Pacific Fleet committed itself to removing one nuclear submarine from Zavety Ilyicha per year beginning in 1991. The first was removed in October 1993. As of 1995, however, three still remained at the facility.

In mid-1997, Rensselaer Lee reported in an article in The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that 7kg of HEU was stolen from Zavety Ilyicha in January 1996 and that 2.5kg of the same material later appeared at a metals trading firm in Kaliningrad. Lee subsequently noted in another publication that the material allegedly taken from Zavety Ilyicha was spent fuel, not fresh.

Given the history of activities at the base, especially the fact that defueling activities were at one point scheduled to take place here, any material at the base or diverted from it would likely be spent fuel. There are no other reports available in the open literature that confirm the type of material or that a diversion of material ever occurred here. (For more information on nuclear smuggling cases, please see the NIS Trafficking Database.)