Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 5 – In a move that potentially may prove more consequential that Tehran’s ongoing supply of drones to the Russian army now invading Ukraine, Iran’s Maritime Industrial Company (SADRA) is currently repairing a Russian ship that crashed into ice in the Volga River (casp-geo.ru/rossijskij-suhogruz-otpravlen-na-remont-na-kaspijskie-verfi-irana/).
Three aspects of this development are important. First, it represents a kind of solution to the difficulties Russia has long faced in its domestic shipbuilding capacity and its more recent exclusion from the use of foreign yards (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/10/russian-navy-and-its-shipbuilding.html).
Second, it represents a major step forward in Iran’s efforts to become a major shipbuilding center, something that could help it project power in a variety of directions including northward (tehrantimes.com/news/480398/Iran-s-shipbuilding-an-old-but-newly-developing-industry).
And third, it highlights the difficulties Russia is having with its river fleet, a set of ships closely tied to its invasion of Ukraine and its efforts develop a north-south trade corridor to end run Western sanctions (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/08/moscow-wants-north-south-transport.html and jamestown.org/program/russia-now-forced-to-look-east-of-caucasus-to-reach-iran/).
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