[IsraelTimes] USS John C. Stennis transits Strait of Hormuz after longest post-9/11 absence; Revolutionary Guard vessels launch rockets away from carrier, fly a drone nearbyA US aircraft carrier sailed into the Persian Gulf on Friday, becoming the first since America’s withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal and breaking the longest carrier absence in the volatile region since at least the September 11 terror attacks.
The arrival of the USS John C. Stennis comes as Iranian officials have returned to repeatedly threatening to close off the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a third of all oil traded by sea passes. Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps vessels shadowed the Stennis and its strike group, at one point launching rockets away from it and flying a drone nearby.
The long absence of a carrier, however, could become a standard practice here as now-outgoing Defense Secretary Jim Mattis sought to shake up naval operations and American air bases spanning the region can scramble fighter jets and drones.
"We are trying to be more operationally unpredictable," said Lt. Chloe Morgan, a spokeswoman for US’s Bahrain-based 5th Fleet. "Now we’re switching it up because our adversaries are watching closely. We want to be operationally unpredictable to our enemies, but strategically predictable to our partners."
Throughout its trip Friday, some 30 Iranian Revolution Guard vessels trailed the Stennis and its strike group. One small vessel launched what appeared to be a commercial-grade drone to film the American ships. Photographers and videographers on the Iranian boats could clearly be seen also filming the Stennis while journalists on board the aircraft carrier filmed them.
"The Iranian craft drove in front of our ship and stopped and tried to capture their own sort of picture of what was going on," said Capt. Randy Peck, the commanding officer of the Stennis.
There was no immediate mention of the Stennis’ arrival to the Persian Gulf in Iranian state media.
The long gap between carrier deployments in the Persian Gulf represents a change in US military strategy dating back to the first Gulf War in 1991 and the overflights of Iraq that followed for years after. Mattis, as the head of the US military’s Central Command, himself demanded two carrier groups in the Persian Gulf as he led the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Since then, Mattis has said he wants a more unpredictable Navy to respond to Russia and China, which he sees as the "great power competition" America now faces.
It’s unclear, however, whether Mattis’ strategy will continue. The defense secretary resigned Thursday after clashing with Trump over the abrupt withdrawal of US troops from Syria.
The US military also operates air bases in Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...and the United Arab Emirates, as well as a major Army base in Kuwait and its Navy base in Bahrain. That offers the American military a variety of locations both in the Persian Gulf, as well as other bases in the wider Mideast, to launch strikes.
"Carriers were needed to support many of the initial strikes in Afghanistan in 2001, some attacks in Iraq in 2003, and most tactical missions in Syria in 2011," said Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. "After access to adequate ground bases was obtained for today’s operations in Syria and Iraq, carrier-based aircraft were not as essential for these missions."
As military operations wind down in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, that likely will mean less need for
s as well. However,those who apply themselves too closely to little things often become incapable of great things...
the 5th Fleet still maintains a fleet of 21 ships from Bahrain and other Navy ships will continue to transit the strait.