Egyptian shipping sources said US aircraft carrier USS Enterprise crossed the Suez Canal on Friday coming from the Red Sea en route to the Mediterranean.
4 hours ago
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Oh hai! Just me, widdle 'ole Big E
Hmmmmmm.....
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17 comments:
Getting in more licks before congress does?
Half assing it has made it take longer. Bring in the real strike aircraft and be done w/ this mess. You can't half ass fighting. Either fight or don't, but once you do, bring the pain. If you are not willing to deal w/ that, then don't start fighting to begin with.
Enterprise has already been on cruise for 6 and 1/2 months. And isn't she supposed to decomm early next FY? I'll bet this has nothing to do with combat off Libya-but getting her home on time to save money. Lke when they made Coral Sea come back from cruise early so they could get her off the books by 30 September 1989.
Can you get a nuke "off the books" that quickly? Sure you can decom her, but Navy still pays until she's been de-cored and decontaminated.
There is nothing on Gods green earth or Neptunes blue seas worse than decom'ing a proud ship... I damn near cried when they hauled the flag down on Sara for the last time.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
To quote Yoda, "Between the lines, you should read."
In Libya what is deficient is not firepower, but targetting info... all that is needed is one hellfire into the right room/car, which is not-so-coincidentally our modus operandi in PAK. With generalissimus dead there is succession fight between sons and collapse of the regime. But that requires intelligence sources on the ground... which puts us in the spooks territory. Dont expect much info from there. I must say that given leaks form military and diplomatic networks, CIA safeguards own info better...
And re: Enterprise - when she is decommisioned, I propose Navy-wide petition to name very next carrier built again with big E... even if this means sending some politicians back to queue!
Think she might launch a strike or two as she transits from Port Said toward the Gates of Hercules?? No way the COCOM lets her steam past Libya without using some of that airwing.
It's my contention that this a another case of a liberals definition of limited war. First, USS Kearsage LHD 3, with 6 Harriers. I think this was intentionally done - politically, to get a capitol warship in the area, w/out really bringing the pain (super carrier). Then they looked tough by speeding up the Bataan deployment, again, w/6 Harriers.
USS George H W Bush could have stopped by for a 'session' on the definition of American firepower, but politically, probably deamed too much firepower. So, when the Big E sails by, I suspect there are political decisions in the WH on how to use it to their advantage,
Listen - Harriers w/a Marine pilot is not someone I'd like to tangle with. But setting just 4 on a strike, and that's pretty much it, well - not good enough.
I didn't even know the Suez Canal could take a ship like Big E.
Panama is a bit too small with all the locks - it could take about a WW2 BB, but not more.
But Suez is really easy to dig up some more, just sand around so it was steadily made more wide and deep, about 200m wide and over 20 deep is easily capable of moving even supercarrier.
Intel is always an issue. And Intel is needed for proper targeting, but we had a better feel for Kadaffy in the beginning of the bombing campaign that marked the non-hostile evolution. We cooked off a butt load of TLAMs, but didn't really bring the air power. Typical lib response and thought that you can go to war w/o killing or getting people killed. They should have started w/ the carrier and done it right.
WR, I concur.
"Odessey Dawn" = "Desert Fox" + "Desert Strike", more or less -- all brought to you by the same leadership philosophy and muddled thinking.
<span>"Odyssey Dawn" = "Desert Fox" + "Desert Strike", more or less -- all brought to you by the same leadership philosophy and muddled thinking.</span>
Well the french carrier and naval forces arent designed or used to operating on combat footing for a extended period of time.
So only one Naval force can really replace them. As others have said send in Big E and end the basterds.
Just have read French are retreating DeGaulle by septemberItalians are thinking on quitting too, so Garibaldi will be out of action too... So either Big E will stay longer in service to help with Libya or there will be no carrier left for the operation. I wonder if Quadaffi is betting that NATO war fatigue will rescue him before the rebels (who are 80 klicks from Tripoli now) will put him on the firing squad.
Photo of CVN-65 visiting GREECE.
http://www.navy.mil/view_single.asp?id=103221
Date of picture is last Friday. No much of a "liberty" port in Souda Bay. But the crew can rest and the Coast Guard patrols the harbor for safety.
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