Fox News is reporting that the USS Abraham Lincoln is now on station in the northern Arabian Sea amid rising tension with Iran.
The USS Abraham Lincoln is accompanied by a strike group that also hundreds of Tomahawk cruise missiles ready to strike if any U.S. forces are attacked.
Earlier this week, the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said its forces in the region had been placed on “high alert,” but no evidence was presented to justify the elevated security posture.
Fox News reported that under pressure to explain the military build-up and change of posture, Pentagon officials say they are in the process of declassifying several satellite photos that they say shows cruise missiles aboard small Iranian vessels.
Pentagon officials have taken great pains to emphasize the new American forces sent to the region are to deter Iran, not start a war.
President Donald Trump has sought to put the brakes on a brewing confrontation with Iran in recent days, telling the acting defense secretary, Patrick Shanahan, that he does not want to go to war with Iran..
Mr. Trump’s statement, during a Wednesday morning meeting in the Situation Room, sent a message to his hawkish aides that he does not want the intensifying American pressure campaign against the Iranians to explode into open conflict.
