Venezuelan Navy

Bolivarian Navy of Venezuela Armada Bolivariana de Venezuela
Coat of Arms of the Navy
Founded	1811; 206 years ago (1811)
Country	Venezuela
Allegiance	President of Venezuela
Branch	National Armed Forces of Venezuela
Type	Navy
Role	Defense of Venezuela's coastline and maritime and inland waters
Size	6 frigates, 4 corvettes, 2 submarines, 4 amphibious ships, 8 patrol boats, 3 auxiliary ships
Part of	Ministry of the Popular Participation for the Defense
Patron	Virgen del Valle
Motto(s)	Navegare necesse, vivere non necesse (Latin: "Sailing is necessary, but living is not".)
Colors	Navy blue
March	Marcha Epica de las Fuerzas Navales (English: "Grand March of the National Navy")
Anniversaries	July 24, Birthday of Simon Bolivar, Navy Day and Battle of Lake Maracaibo Anniversary
Engagements	Venezuelan War of Independence and the Battle of Lake Maracaibo
Commanders
Minister of the People's Power for Defense of the Republic of Venezuela and concurrently Operational Strategic Commander of the National Armed Forces	General-in-Chief Vladimir Padrino López
Commanding General, Venezuelan Navy	Admiral Orlando Miguel Maneiro Gaspar
Inspector General, Venezuelan Navy	Vice Admiral Carlos José Vieira Acevedo
Chief of Naval Staff, Venezuelan Navy	Vice Admiral Jorge Martín Hernández Salazar
Notable commanders	José Prudencio Padilla Luis Brión
Insignia
Naval ensign
Naval jack
Flag
Naval jack (1930–2006)

The Navy of Venezuela is officially called the Bolivarian Navy of Venezuela (Spanish: Armada Bolivariana de Venezuela).

It serves the purpose of defending the naval sovereignty of the country, including inland and fluvial security, and it also serves to prevent illegal activities in the Venezuelan borders and collaborates with international organizations to safeguard international waters from criminal activities.

The Navy was born as a coastal defense force during the beginning of the Venezuelan War of Independence. In May 1810, Commander Lino de Clemente, a veteran officer of the Spanish Navy who joined the April 1810 coup against the colonial government, was appointed the first Minister of Defense of the republic and began the long building of the armed forces including the formation of the navy. In April 1811 the Nautical School, with Ensign Vicente Parrado as its first superindentent, was opened by order of the national government in La Guaira to train future naval officers, months before the Venezuelan Declaration of Independence, thus the Navy's origins start from this date, with its first vessels being those formerly used by the naval forces of the Captaincy General of Venezuela, and participated in its first actions in the campaigns in Guayana in 1811-12, the baptism of fire for the fledgling naval service. Col. Antonio Mendoza from the Venezuelan Army was its first commanding general.

For long time their vessels, even if obsolete, were maintained properly by its sailors. In 1937 the Navy acquired from Italy two gunboats of the Azio class and rechristened them General Soublette and General Urdaneta; these ships where retained in service until 1951 (for other sources in 1948 or 1950) and scrapped later.

In September, 2008, the Russian Navy's nuclear-powered missile cruiser Pyotr Velikiy, accompanied by three other ships of Russia's Northern Fleet, sailed from its base in Severomorsk on a cruise to the Caribbean Sea for a joint exercise with the Venezuelan Navy. This action represented the first major Russian power projection in that region since the end of the Cold War. The fleet of ships, headed by the nuclear-powered Pyotr Velikiy, set off from its base at Severomorsk in the Arctic on Monday, September 22. Russian Navy spokesman Igor Dygalo told the AFP news agency, "It's the nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser Peter the Great, the anti-submarine warship Admiral Chebanenko and other accompanying ships". The other ships included a tug boat and supply ships.