Enterprise replaces Stennis, Nimitz in Mideast - Navy News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Navy Times

Enterprise replaces Stennis, Nimitz in Mideast

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The Enterprise carrier group arrived in the Middle East on Wednesday, replacing two carriers that had left the Gulf after a months-long deployment aimed at sending a signal of strength to Iran.

The U.S. 5th Fleet’s headquarters in Bahrain confirmed that the carriers John C. Stennis and Nimitz were returning to their respective home ports of Bremerton, Wash., and San Diego.

Nimitz was the last of the two carriers to leave the Middle East’s restless waters in mid-July, the Navy said.

After a much-publicized U.S. military buildup in the Persian Gulf, where the Navy kept a two carrier presence since February, there was at least a week with no U.S. carrier patrolling the area, although there were other Navy vessels in the theater during that week.

“We still had enough ships and air forces available during a weeklong absence of the carrier, so our response capabilities were not diminished,” Navy spokeswoman Lt. Denise Garcia said in Manama, Bahrain.

Rear Adm. Daniel Holloway, Enterprise’s commander, said Wednesday that the Navy remains “committed to demonstrate our nation’s resolve to maintain security and stability to the region.”

But the arrival of the Enterprise, with its fleet of 5,500 sailors and Marines, 70 attack, fighter and detection planes, as well as four helicopters, reflects that the Navy is scaling down its Gulf presence, as the ship group will be the lone carrier for at least three months, until the Harry S. Truman is deployed in the fall.

The Nimitz and John C. Stennis, with 15,000 sailors and Marines between them, have conducted two major exercises off Iran’s coast since February.

The war games were clear U.S. muscle-flexing at a time when Tehran increasingly came at loggerheads with the international community over its disputed nuclear program and threatened to close the strategic Strait of Hormuz for oil transporters in case of a U.S. military strike on Iran.

When Enterprise set sail for the Mideast in early July from its home port of Norfolk, Va., Pentagon officials declined to say whether the reduction in carriers in the Persian Gulf was due to scheduling or funding — but pointed out that the norm is for one carrier to be deployed here.

Vice Adm. Kevin J. Cosgriff, 5th Fleet commander, said earlier this month that the Enterprise will provide “power to counter the assertive, disruptive and coercive behavior of some countries, as well as support for our soldiers” in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Cosgriff did not identify the countries, but he said that the nuclear-powered carrier will “ensure the free flow of commerce in the region.”

The U.S. maintains nearly 40,000 troops in Gulf countries other than Iraq, including about 25,000 in Kuwait, 6,500 in Qatar, 3,000 in Bahrain, 1,300 in the United Arab Emirates and a few hundred in Oman and Saudi Arabia, according to figures from the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center.