Russian Pacific Fleet enters the Mediterranean in challenge to West

For the first time in a decade, a large combat fleet from Russia’s Pacific Fleet based in Vladivostok in the Russian Far East is joining other Russian warships in the Mediterranean on a combat patrol.

Russia’s Admiral Panteleyev anti-submarine warfare ship of the Pacific Fleet.

The mission was apparently prompted by Russia’s determined desire to sustain the regime of the Syrian dictator Bashar Assad that is facing imminent collapse in the increasingly destructive civil war.
To deploy large warships thousands of miles away from East Asia to the Middle East demonstrates President Vladimir Putin’s resolve to resume Russia’s military and strategic glory of the past by challenging the collective military power of the West.
On March 19, a naval flotilla of half a dozen capital ships centered on the large destroyer Admiral Panteleyev set sail from Vladivostok on a long journey to the Mediterranean. http://www.worldtribune.com/2013/05/28/russian-pacific-fleet-enters-the-mediterranean-in-challenge-to-west/