odanny
Diamond Member
We should not be involved in protecting Israel in a war it both maintains and prosecutes. They want a war, they can fight it.
The open-ended crisis in the Middle East has begun to squeeze the Pentagon, fueling unease over the U.S. military’s ability to balance imminent threats to American interests there with longer-term objectives as Russia and China test Washington elsewhere in the world.
Signs of strain were underscored in recent days by a decision to withdraw the sole U.S. aircraft carrier in the region, the USS Abraham Lincoln, whose imposing presence defense officials credit with helping to contain the ongoing violence between Israel, Iran and its network of well-armed proxies.
The Biden administration has kept at least one, and sometimes two, aircraft carriers in the Middle East for more than year, since the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October 2023 spawned a multifaceted conflict with no end in sight. When the Lincoln departs in coming days, the Defense Department instead will rely on a mix of other forces, including naval destroyers, B-52 bombers and land-based fighter jets, to sustain its expansive and potentially combustible deterrence mission that stretches from the eastern Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf and other volatile shipping routes around the Arabian Peninsula.
The shake-up occurs as the Pentagon grapples, too, with shortages of key munitions it has used to fend off attacks by Yemen’s Houthis, who have waged an aggressive, months-long campaign targeting commercial vessels in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and to help Ukraine resist Russia’s nearly three-year-old incursion. U.S. military officials have acknowledged also that they are struggling to distribute enough air-defense systems to protect assets and allies in Eastern Europe along with those in the Middle East, and analysts warn the strain could hinder Washington’s ability to defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion.
The Lincoln, and the dozens of combat aircraft that operate from its flight deck, was scheduled to deploy to the Asia-Pacific region as part of a Pentagon strategy meant to show force in an area where key U.S. partners have had to contend with an expansionist China and a wildly unpredictable North Korea. In August, after tensions between Israel and Iran hit a peak with the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, the carrier was ordered from the Pacific to the Middle East and later had its deployment extended as senior officials evaluated the potential risks of making such a significant shift.
The open-ended crisis in the Middle East has begun to squeeze the Pentagon, fueling unease over the U.S. military’s ability to balance imminent threats to American interests there with longer-term objectives as Russia and China test Washington elsewhere in the world.
Signs of strain were underscored in recent days by a decision to withdraw the sole U.S. aircraft carrier in the region, the USS Abraham Lincoln, whose imposing presence defense officials credit with helping to contain the ongoing violence between Israel, Iran and its network of well-armed proxies.
The Biden administration has kept at least one, and sometimes two, aircraft carriers in the Middle East for more than year, since the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October 2023 spawned a multifaceted conflict with no end in sight. When the Lincoln departs in coming days, the Defense Department instead will rely on a mix of other forces, including naval destroyers, B-52 bombers and land-based fighter jets, to sustain its expansive and potentially combustible deterrence mission that stretches from the eastern Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf and other volatile shipping routes around the Arabian Peninsula.
The shake-up occurs as the Pentagon grapples, too, with shortages of key munitions it has used to fend off attacks by Yemen’s Houthis, who have waged an aggressive, months-long campaign targeting commercial vessels in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and to help Ukraine resist Russia’s nearly three-year-old incursion. U.S. military officials have acknowledged also that they are struggling to distribute enough air-defense systems to protect assets and allies in Eastern Europe along with those in the Middle East, and analysts warn the strain could hinder Washington’s ability to defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion.
The Lincoln, and the dozens of combat aircraft that operate from its flight deck, was scheduled to deploy to the Asia-Pacific region as part of a Pentagon strategy meant to show force in an area where key U.S. partners have had to contend with an expansionist China and a wildly unpredictable North Korea. In August, after tensions between Israel and Iran hit a peak with the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, the carrier was ordered from the Pacific to the Middle East and later had its deployment extended as senior officials evaluated the potential risks of making such a significant shift.
