3rd CSG heads to Gulf !

interesting analysis from Todd Croft's GEO-STRAT

www.geocities.com...

# 6th- USS Enterprise verified to deploy Saturday 7/7/07 with a large battle group (www.wtkr.com... ), Combined with the large Nimitz group, it makes for a very formidable naval force opposite Iran. I discussed the shape of things with my Naval contact a couple days ago. Nimitz was said to have pulled out of theater into the Bay of Bengal, not so much to visit India, as it was to effect a repair to their elevators (again, Nimitz is having a recurring problem with them). As for having 3-4 carriers opposite Iran, he sees it all as wag-the-dog bluff. He, not being a Bush fan, sees the President as being in trouble and needing a diversion, and so has sent a bunch of saber rattling ships off Iran’s coasts. Maybe something will happen, maybe not, but the navy isn’t at all keen to pick that fight. If something happens, they’ll happily finish it, but they aren’t looking to fight …yet. The urge to attack continues to be resisted, on the basis of congressional authority and legality. They also don’t like putting carriers into the Persian Gulf. It’s, tactically, a bad spot, and they know it. They prefer, when opposing Iran, to station them in the Arabian Sea, and have the DDGs do all the fancy footwork inside the pond. They also prefer to start at long ranges, and walk in using free-fire orders; otherwise you risk damaging your capital assets. So, stationing a carrier in the Red Sea is strictly an operational maneuver, for long distance strikes versus Iran, as was discussed earlier.

* Carrier Strike Group-12
* USS Enterprise (CVN-65)
* USS Gettysburg (CG-64)
* USS Arleigh Burke (DDG-51)
* USS Stout (DDG-55)
* USS James Williams (DDG-95)
* USS Forrest Sherman (DDG-98)
* USS Philadelphia (SSN-690)
* USNS Supply (T-AOE-6)
* Carrier Air Wing (CVW-1)

nm

[edit on 23-7-2007 by princeofpeace]

This article is short and to the point, we have a strike group heading to the ME and should arrive in about 3 weeks
"mid August".

Pat Buchanan predicted a mid August Iran strike, hmmm maybe he is right.

Strike group of 6,000 to deploy Monday

July 27, 2007

NAVAL STATION NORFOLK

More than 6,000 sailors and Marines with the Kearsarge Expeditionary Strike Group will leave Naval Station Norfolk and Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek next week, bound for the Middle East.

The USS Kearsarge, an amphibious assault ship; the Ponce, an amphibious transport ship; and the Gunston Hall, a dock landing ship, will deploy Monday.

The Porter, a guided-missile destroyer, and the Carr, a guided-missile frigate, will leave Wednesday.

An attack submarine from Connecticut and a guided-missile cruiser from Florida are also part of the strike group.

On the ships are the North Carolina-based 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, which includes the 3rd Battalion, 8th Marines, a helicopter squadron and combat logistics battalion. The ships will conduct maritime security operations.

According to a Navy press release, "these operations deny international terrorists use of the maritime environment as a venue for attack or to transport personnel, weapons or other material."

www.dailypress.com...

Pat Buchanans thoughts on the Iran situation

www.antiwar.com...

I dont really agree with Buchanans view on world events, but he does seem to have the time frame right on a possible strike on Iran, time will tell if he is right.

Hi, NoFuture! Welcome to ATS! Thanks for the article that you showed everybody; it was an interesting read.

However, there are some guidelines you should follow when posting the work of others:

If you post something that is not 100% your own writing or work you must use the QUOTE BOX TAG, post NO MORE THAN 15% of the original (or three paragraphs, whichever is least), and GIVE A LINK TO THE SOURCE MATERIAL.

Please Read - Posting Work Written by Others

Just be careful for next time!

Again, Welcome to ATS! Glad to have you aboard.

The other 2 carriers in the gulf are scheduled to depart in a few weeks only leaving one.

Majik Ninja,

Thanks for pointing that out. I didn't know about using the quote box when citing other peoples' work. I'll be sure to use the quote box from now on.


nofuture

Ok everyone here we go!

Will the JFK be the false flag we all have been waiting for?

Why would we pull a moth balled aircraft carrier out of the bone yard??

Do we need the extra fire power from the JFK to fight terrorists, Iran, Russia, China or North Korea???

Or will the JFK be sunk as an excuse for war with Iran????

It makes perfect sense to use an old ship instead of one of our newer ones.

Use a skeleton crew and float her close to Iran in the Persian Gulf, let Iran take shots at her, then rescue the crew and then kick Irans ass for sinking the JFK!

From the US Navy website date July 30.

The 'decommisioned' aircarft carrier USS John F. Kennedy is listed as being at sea.

www.navy.mil...

This false flag stuff is BS. We dont need to sink one of our own carriers to strike Iran. If anyone has learned anything about how we act is that if we feel like striking them then we will do so period. No need to sink one of own to do it. We really dont need to use that as an excuse.

Originally posted by princeofpeace
This false flag stuff is BS. We dont need to sink one of our own carriers to strike Iran. If anyone has learned anything about how we act is that if we feel like striking them then we will do so period. No need to sink one of own to do it. We really dont need to use that as an excuse.

Yeah like the american people and the world will accept just a plain bombing of Iran without any motives other than imperialism... sure. Bombing Iran without any reasons other than the present propaganda would be suicide for the elite.

Not really. The UN has passed 2 rounds of sanctions on Iran and they have actually increased or sped up the enrichment of uranium, not stopped it. The world powers are deadlocked on passing another round of sanctions. How long has it been now since the second set expired? The US can now say that Iran is operating (Iran admits this) 3,000 centrifuges which is enough to produce a bomb in a year. As soon as the US and or Israel deems that Iran has passed the point of no return (which in reality it already has) they can justify taking out the reactors.

A strike on Iran can be ordered and deemed necessary at any time now. What folks on here are confusing is a strike limited to crippling Irans nuclear infrastructure and a full fledged gound assualt and regime change which the US is not looking to do.

Bottom line is we dont need or want to have one of our carriers (albeit an old one) destroyed to "justify" a strike on Iran.


[edit on 30-7-2007 by princeofpeace]

[edit on 30-7-2007 by princeofpeace]

The UN Sanctions and diplomacy are the way to go for now. Next year I believe they will take another look at the military option. They will have some new toys available like the MOP bomb. MOP stands for massive ordnance penetrator. It should be available on the B-2 bomber some time early next year. It is tailor made for a strike against Iran. Boeing makes the bomb. Northrop Gruman is the primary contractor who is integrating and adapting the B-2 to carry it. The important take home point is that this allows the US to take these sites down with conventional weaponry.

The Sunday Times reported that Israel was planning to use a tactical nuclear weapon. I'm sure that didn't sit well hence the MOP.

www.timesonline.co.uk...

By next year Iran will have the bomb and it will be too late. The strike will occur this year if it is to occur at all, if not, then Iran succeeded in getting the bomb. The same exact reason we didnt and couldnt bomb N. Korea. Once they have the weapon its too costly to bomb them only to have them use it against another country. The action against Iran will have to be taken fairly soon or not at all.

Just my opinion but i think the US is waiting until the last possible second by trying to get things in Iraq as "stable" as possible before hitting Iran. It would only make sense to do so. The repercussions of striking Iran will be felt in Iraq and we may as well get that as squared away as possible first. There will be a time line and red line that will be crossed soon though that wont matter.

prince:
The real red line is not the nuclear program. It's the state of Iranian air defense. It doesn't matter much what their capability is at any point in time as they can always blow it to bits later with some good intel. The fly in that ointment is air defense. In 16 months Iranian air defense augmented by the Russians will reach a point where it will be able to repel or significantly diminish a US led strike. All of this was laid out by Dennis Ross in a July 7, 2007 interview with The Huffington Post. He was the top negotiator in the Middle East for Bill Clinton's White House.

www.huffingtonpost.com...

You are right on point when you mention the desirability of bolstering Iraq before launching a strike. There was an article in the December 2006, American conservative called "How to Lose an Army." It mentions the danger US forces would be in as Iran could cut the supply lines in Kuwait. US forces are embedded in the Iraqi population and are configured to fight as a counterinsurgency force. They are not particularly well prepared to handle a large conventional force. Air power would be critical.

www.amconmag.com...

War is very close!

When the USSR fell so did their naval base in Syria, along with that the spy ship left that was not so secret about mid way in the Mediterranean between Cyprus and Israel.

Private boats that didn’t know its location would often come close to that Russian Spy Ship at night as it just sit there with its lights turned off and on a very dark night a grey battle ship is hard to see if you are not watching your radar.

We were told back then that it sat there to intercept communication between Israel and Europe.

The naval base made it very easy for Russia to supply Syria with weapons to fight and hopefully destroy Israel.

We now learn that Russia has made a deal with Syria to supply them with weapons also in that deal Russia can re-establish its naval base on their Mediterranean coast.

This puts the Russian navy just north of Israel in a position to once again spy for its Arab allies who live for the day they can kill every Jew on this land.

It also puts the Russians in a very close proximity to the US 6th fleet that often bases itself in Mersin Turkey not that far from the Syrian border.

It certainly makes me wonder what is really going on, with the great friendship of Bush and Putin, and at this very time the aircraft carrier Enterprise with its group of battle ships are playing war games with the French navy in the Mediterranean.

At the same time the US 5th fleet is grouping in or around the Indian Ocean near the Persian Gulf.

With deployment of three carriers and their air and naval strike groups: USS Stennis, USS Nimitz and USS Kitty Hawk, altogether 30 warships, 280 warplanes and 22,000 soldiers and sailors.

If that don’t sound like war on the horizon I must have missed something!



We all know of the great battle that will take place in the northern part of Israel, we also know it is Russians that will lead the charge. It is Russians the French, North Koreans and Pakistan who are making nuclear weapons available to the Islamic Terrorist Arab Countries. It is Russia who has nuclear subs at all times just off both coast lines of the US. As deadly serious al-Qaida Hamas and Hezbollah are, I think they are the smoke screen for what is really about to happen. The people of the Middle East and North America have never been in so much trouble as they are today. It’s like a deadly serious chess game and each move is being thought out very carefully for all the marbles are at stake, it is winner take all.

All of that may be true but if Russia pulls anything like that then they can be rest assured thier subs will have no home left to return to. Their country will cease to exist. Just when Russia appears to be getting its act together economically and they are goping to throw it all away to fight the US? Who knows.

By the way, none of our carriers are in the Persian gulf anymore. The 3 have left are now near Guam performing exercises. In fact some gulf leaders are a little perturbed by this as Cheney promised them a few months ago that would continue to have a presence their.