The United States sends aircraft carrier to Middle East in anticipation of tensions between Israel and Hezbollah
A defense official in the Pentagon’s Naval Operations press office said that the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower will leave the Red Sea and head to the eastern Mediterranean, on a mission to support any military operations that may be imposed by developments between Lebanon and Israel.
The decision comes as part of the strategic movements of US forces in the region, where it’s expected to be replaced by the carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt, according to the website of the US Institute of the Navy.
According to a US official, the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower and its accompanying cruisers will move to the Mediterranean, while the escort destroyers will remain in the US Fifth Fleet.
Aviation controllers have tracked the separation of the C-2A Greyhound from the base of the US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain to the Mediterranean.
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin chose not to extend the deployment of the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower for the third time, after the carrier was deployed for more than 8 months.
As of Friday, aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower was the oldest aircraft carrier in the US Navy, having been deployed longer than any other US carrier in the past five years.
It’s not yet clear which aircraft carrier from the Pacific will move to the Middle East to replace aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, but the closest, according to USNI News and the Navy, is the USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71) deployed from San Diego, California, in January.
The next carrier on the East Coast preparing to depart is the USS Harry Truman (CVN-75), which is still in the early stages of its preparations before being published later this summer.
The last time an aircraft carrier was deployed from the Pacific to the Middle East was in 2021, when the United States evacuated troops from Afghanistan.
The Japan-based USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) then moved into the North Arabian Sea to provide air cover for the withdrawal of US troops.
aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower was deployed on October 13 and was part of the US response to Ansar Allah’s attacks on merchant ships and their presence in light of the war between Israel and Hamas.
The aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower’s departure comes at a time when tensions between Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Israel have escalated over the past few days.
The US Secretary of Defense had directed the extension of the carrier for the second time in late May, as aircraft carriers sent to the Mediterranean or Red Sea have seen multiple extensions since February 2021 after the start of the Russian-Ukrainian war, in order to maintain a US presence in the region.
While in the Red Sea, aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower and other ships participated in a number of central command activities where Ansar Allah drones and weapons were shot down.
More recently, aircraft from aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower and the cruiser USS Philippin C (CG-58) helped evacuate crews from merchant ships hit by the Ansar Allah group’s weapons.
