The U.S. Navy has scrambled in recent days to deploy a different aircraft carrier to the waters off Iran after the families of sailors and Marines aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln confronted military leaders about poor conditions last week. 

During a contentious meeting in San Diego on Aug. 6, Navy leaders told family members that the Navy was planning to send a different carrier — the USS Theodore Roosevelt — to switch out with the USS Lincoln, according to three people who attended the meeting and were granted anonymity by MS NOW to describe the closed-door discussion.

In that meeting at Naval Air Station North Island, Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao said the aircraft carrier USS George Washington was not considered an option for replacing the Lincoln because the U.S. has to maintain a presence in the South Pacific and there were operational commitments it had there, according to the three people.

But in the days since that meeting, as public pressure mounted to bring the sailors on the Lincoln home, those plans changed, and the Washington was moved from the waters off Vietnam toward Iran.

The Washington is now heading toward the Middle East, said a U.S. official who was granted anonymity to describe sensitive military actions. 

The movement exposes the U.S. military’s limited resources as President Donald Trump continues an open-ended war against Iran. 

The ship could potentially relieve the beleaguered USS Abraham Lincoln, which has set a record for the most continuous days at sea for a Navy aircraft carrier and came under scrutiny for supply shortages, unsanitary conditions and the morale of service members on board.

Trump waved off the idea that military families are worried about the conditions onboard the Lincoln while speaking with reporters Friday. 

“No they’re not,” Trump said about military family members being concerned. 

“That ship is moving right now — well very shortly — and it’s being replaced with another very similar ship,” Trump said. 

When asked if the deployment has gone on too long, Trump replied, “Not nearly long enough.”

The Wall Street Journal first reported Thursday that the Washington aircraft carrier was preparing to replace the Lincoln. The Washington is based in Yokosuka, Japan, where the U.S. military is able to deploy the aircraft carrier quickly to respond to threats in the Indo-Pacific, including from China, Russia and North Korea. 

Navy officials declined to comment on why the Washington was moving toward the Middle East and not the Roosevelt, citing operational security concerns. Acting Navy Secretary Cao posted Friday on X that the Lincoln “crushed their deployment” and will return home soon as part of a planned rotation.

The Washington’s departure from near the South China Sea reduces the U.S. ability to reassure allies in the broader Pacific region, including Taiwan, said Mark Montgomery, a retired U.S. Navy rear admiral and a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

Having an aircraft carrier permanently based in the Indo-Pacific improves the time it takes a Navy carrier to respond to a threat in the area by more than two weeks, according to the Navy.

Montgomery said that moving the George Washington Carrier Strike Group will leave the U.S. military with “limited naval presence” in the Pacific for more than 18 months, because once the ship returns from the Middle East, it will need to go into a routine maintenance period. 

“This is a risk,” Montgomery said. It weakens the U.S. deterrence with China, he said, “and does not assure America’s allies and partners in the Pacific.”

When asked whether there was concern about the U.S. not having a carrier close to China, a U.S. official pointed to the aircraft carriers based on the country’s West Coast.

There are three Navy aircraft carriers currently along the West Coast of the U.S. The USS Theodore Roosevelt and the USS Carl Vinson are based in San Diego, and the USS Ronald Reagan is in Bremerton, Washington. The Vinson and the Reagan are both undergoing routine scheduled maintenance, which typically takes about 17 months, but it is unclear how far along they are in that process. 

That means the Roosevelt is currently the only aircraft carrier along the West Coast that is available if needed for deployment. 

The Iran war, which has entered its sixth month, has depleted U.S. stockpiles of key munitions, strained service members facing unexpectedly long deployments and exposed how military assets are stretched thin in critical regions of the world.

Retired Rear Adm. John Kirby said he is “confident” that the chairman of the joint chiefs and the combatant commanders have “worked their way through the risks” of the carrier movements and “will be monitoring” that risk. 

“There’s always a balancing act for the Pentagon, especially with capital assets like aircraft carriers. And while it’s never ideal to reduce carrier presence in the Pacific, it has certainly been done before. And I have no doubt we’ll have to do it again at some point,” Kirby said.

The Navy “has been stretched thin for a long time,” Kirby said. “At less than 300 ships, it’s just not possible to sustain a major regional conflict like what we’re doing in the Middle East and maintain optimal presence in every other part of the world. It’s just a math problem. And that means being willing to take a certain amount of risk in other places,” he said. 

The Lincoln left its home port of San Diego on Nov. 21 and was expected to return home in May, but was extended twice because of the Iran war. The ship has only stopped twice, once in Guam on Dec. 11 and once in Oman briefly on July 7, keeping the crew at sea for 208 continuous days, a modern-day record.

Three destroyers, the USS Frank E. Petersen Jr., the USS Spruance and the USS Michael Murphy, have been deployed alongside the Lincoln as part of a collective strike group. It is unclear if the destroyers will remain in the Indian Ocean if the Lincoln aircraft carrier gets relieved. 

The post Navy scrambles to deploy aircraft carrier to relieve USS Abraham Lincoln in Iran war appeared first on MS NOW.

From MS Now.