Meanwhile in the war, It seems Ukraine might have hit another Russian warship, this time a frigate (their definition of a frigate is significantly different from what we use to call fast frigates). This one, the Admiral Makarov, is their newest class of frigates, commissioned in 2017.
For years US naval experts have figured that Russian Navy damage control systems and coordination were substandard and it's finally being proven true. These guys are going down after 2, or in this case maybe just 1, missle hit. It's going to take some lucky hits for two 500 lb warheads to take out a US destroyer. It's going to degraded but it will still fight.
Thanks to the Brits' experience in the Falklands (the Argentine AF kicked their ass until we broke neutrality and provided AWACS cover) we made improvements in our destroyers enhancing their survivability (of course we wouldn't go into battle with massive cooking vats still full of cooking oil which caught fire because they couldn't imagine going without their fish and chips). Every man on a US Navy shop, right down to the doctors and dentists, has to go through damage control school.
Plus we have our history from WW2 where on multiple occasions the Japanese were sure they had sunk a carrier and would think they were seeing a completely different ship when subsequent attack waves encountered the "sunken" carrier doing 20 kts.
The Russians last significant naval action was the Russo-Japanese war in 1905 and that didn't turn out too well. Guess things haven't changed much.
As General Buck Turgenson said, "Mr. President, if I may speak freely, the Russkie talks big, but frankly, we think he's short of know how. I mean, you just can't expect a bunch of ignorant peons to understand a machine like some of our boys."
