Kuznetsov

History: The Kuznetsov-class aircraft carrier, Soviet designation Project 11435, is a class of fixed-wing aircraft carriers (heavy aircraft cruiser in Soviet classification) operated by the Russian and Chinese navies. Originally designed for the Soviet Navy, the Kuznetsov-class ships use a ski-jump to launch high-performance conventional aircraft in a STOBAR configuration. The design represented a major advance in Soviet fleet aviation over the Kiev-class carriers, which could only launch VSTOL aircraft. Two ships were originally laid down at the Nikolayev South Shipyard in the Ukrainian SSR, followed by the first of the Ulyanovsk-class nuclear-powered supercarriers.

The plans were disrupted by the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Only the lead ship Admiral Kuznetsov had been commissioned when the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, and the ship now serves in the Russian Navy. Her sister ship Varyag remained in Ukraine unfinished and unmaintained for a decade before being sold and towed to China for use as a floating casino. Instead, the ship was eventually completed and commissioned in 2012 as the Chinese navy's first aircraft carrier, the Type 001 aircraft carrier Liaoning. A third ship is being built by China to a modified Type 001A design and is expected to be commissioned in 2019. It began sea trials on May 13, 2018.

Type: Carrier

Primary Country: The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. Nominally a union of multiple equal national Soviet republics, its government and economy were highly centralized.