The Russian Navy has lost the nuclear-powered cruiser Peter the Great

Russia no longer has its most powerful ship—the nuclear-powered missile cruiser *Peter the Great*—in service. Formally, the fleet still has one such ship, but it is currently undergoing trials.

 

A special commission has decided not to repair or modernize the Project 1142.2 heavy nuclear-powered missile cruiser “Peter the Great.” This was reported by the propaganda outlet TASS.

“The commission has already made a preliminary decision—the final one has not yet been announced—that the cruiser ‘Peter the Great’ is not to be restored. The ship has a certain degree of wear and tear,” the agency quotes Vladimir Maltsev, head of the All-Russian Movement to Support the Navy, as saying.

Despite the vague wording, the ship’s fate has effectively already been decided.

Once the modernization of another nuclear-powered cruiser—the “Admiral Nakhimov”—is complete, the “Peter the Great” will be decommissioned. In fact, the Russian Navy has already lost this ship: according to the Defense Express portal, the cruiser has not gone to sea since 2023 and remains moored at the dock.

In August 2025, Russia had considered the possibility that the “Peter the Great” might still be sent for repairs, reversing the 2023 decision to decommission the ship. Now, plans to return it to service are no longer relevant.

This decision has significant implications for the Russian Navy. Recently, the Russian fleet has effectively lost two key ships—its only aircraft carrier, the “Admiral Kuznetsov,” and one of its two nuclear-powered missile cruisers. Moscow will not be able to replace them, as it has not built ships of these classes for a long time.

In practice, this will mean abandoning established naval traditions and the need to fundamentally rethink the concept of developing the Russian Navy’s blue-water fleet in the coming years.

Analysts have cast doubt on the effectiveness of the modernized cruiser Admiral Nakhimov.

As a reminder, Russia is returning the Admiral Nakhimov cruiser to active service after 30 years of repairs.

Russia has launched the nuclear-powered cruiser Admiral Nakhimov for sea trials.