Two US, one French aircraft carrier in Gulf region
Pastor Dale Morgan
Two US, one French aircraft carrier in Gulf region*
26 Mar 2007 16:55:12 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Stefano Ambrogi
LONDON, March 26 (Reuters) - The United States and France have bolstered
their naval presence in the Gulf region to three aircraft carrier groups
to support operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, U.S. and French naval
sources said on Monday.
The USS Stennis carrier strike group arrived in late February with an
additional 6,500 sailors to join the USS Dwight D Eisenhower carrier
strike group.
"The Stennis is in the region, in the Arabian sea outside the Gulf and
Eisenhower is inside the Gulf," said Lieutenant-Commander Charlie Brown,
a spokesman for U.S. Naval Central Command in Bahrain.
"Having a second strike group here is to support ongoing operations in
Afghanistan and Iraq and to reassure our regional partners of our
commitment to the area," he said.
Strike groups are typically deployed with four to five frigates and
destroyers and one submarine, but are then split up between different
coalition task forces on arrival, he said.
The French aircraft carrier group Charles de Gaulle arrived in the
Arabian Sea in mid-March for operations relating to Afghanistan, a
spokesman for the French naval forces in Paris confirmed.
He said the carrier deployed with an air-defence frigate, two
anti-submarine frigates, a supply ship and a submarine.
Lieutenant Commander Bertrand Bonneau, chief of press for the French
navy, said the carrier group would be restricted to actions over
Afghanistan.
He said the carrier's deployment had "nothing at all" to do with
exerting pressure on Iran. Tensions are high between the West and Iran
over Tehran's nuclear programme.
Bonneau said the carrier would only enter Gulf waters at the end of
April for a port call in Abu Dhabi.
Asked if the carriers, the Stennis and Charles de Gaulle, were within
easy reach of the Gulf, the U.S. Navy's Brown replied: "I don't know
about easy reach of the Gulf...They are here to fly missions over
Afghanistan.
"You can't fly missions over Afghanistan from the Gulf because you'd
have to fly over Iran."
Iran's southern coastline stretches into the Gulf of Oman and into the
Arabian Sea.
On Sunday Iran said it would limit cooperation with the U.N.'s nuclear
watchdog and resolved not to halt its atomic work after the Security
Council voted to impose new sanctions.