The United States has removed its remaining aircraft carrier in the Middle East, a report said on Monday, concluding its surge deployment amid tensions between Israel and Iran.
USS Abraham Lincoln, one of 11 aircraft carriers of the U.S. Navy, has left the Middle East and entered the Seventh Fleet’s area of operations, which covers the Western Pacific Ocean and the Eastern Indian Ocean, according to the U.S. Naval Institute’s USNI News.
The “flattop” has been operating in the Middle East since late August, when the Pentagon retasked it from its scheduled Seventh Fleet’s deployment. Its sister ship, USS Theodore Roosevelt, was also in the region for a surge deployment from mid-July to mid-September.
The departure of two aircraft carriers leaves a “carrier gap” in the Middle East. This is the second time the U.S. military has no aircraft carrier in the region since June when USS Dwight D. Eisenhower ended its combat operations and left for the Mediterranean Sea.
The White House issued a warning last week, which said threats posed by Iran and its associated militia groups to Americans and U.S. interests in the region is “the most immediate issue.”
On Monday, Abbas Araqchi, Iran’s foreign minister, has vowed to attack Israel in response to its October strike “at the right time.” Israel launched an airstrike on Iranian military targets in response to Tehran firing around 200 ballistic missiles against Israel.
While underway in the Gulf of Aden on November 9 to 10, the Abraham Lincoln sent its combat aircraft, including the stealthy F-35C fighter jets, for airstrikes against Iran-backed Houthi rebels’ facilities in Yemen that housed their weapons, including antiship missiles.
A website that records the U.S. aircraft carrier fleet’s deployment history said the Abraham Lincoln was reportedly carrying out operations in the North Arabian Sea after the airstrikes. It was not immediately clear what its precise location was in the Eastern Indian Ocean.
Another two U.S. aircraft carriers were underway for deployment. USS Harry S. Truman was in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean and will likely transit to the Middle East via the Mediterranean Sea to protect shipping in the Red Sea region, USNI News reported.
U.S. defense officials also told USNI News that California-based USS Carl Vinson, which shares its home port at Naval Air Station North Island in San Diego with the Abraham Lincoln and the Theodore Roosevelt, left for a Pacific Ocean deployment on Monday.
A naval vessel tracking account on X (formerly Twitter), @WarshipCam, said that the Carl Vinson is on a surge deployment. USNI News, citing a Navy spokesperson, said the aircraft carrier was underway in the Eastern Pacific Ocean for “routine operations.”
Besides the Carl Vinson, USS George Washington is operating in the Western Pacific Ocean. It is scheduled to arrive in Japan in mid to late November for forward deployment, while its carrier-based aircraft have already landed in the East Asian nation.
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