North Korea SURROUNDED: US warships, bombers, missiles and 80,000 soldiers READY

The USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier leads a formation of ships (UIG Via Getty Images)

 

NORTH Korea is nearly totally surrounded by a wall of US warships, bombers and missiles with more than 80,000 soldiers on alert as Donald Trump heads for Asia.

The US President is jetting into the Pacific this week for a whistle-stop tour of the nations surrounding North Korea.

Trump will be popping in for one-on-one meetings with the leaders of China, South Korea and Japan – with Kim Jong-un’s nukes right at the top of the agenda.

Sources: 3rd US Naval Strike Force Deployed to Deter North Korea

FILE – Ships assigned to the Nimitz Carrier Strike Group participate in a strait transit exercise in the Pacific Ocean in this April 3, 2017 photo.

 

The USS Nimitz, one of the world’s largest warships, will join two other supercarriers, the USS Carl Vinson and the USS Ronald Reagan, in the western Pacific, the sources told VOA’s Steve Herman.

The U.S. military has rarely simultaneously deployed three aircraft carriers to the same region.

What China’s New Missiles Mean for the Future of the Aircraft Carrier

Two F-35C Lightning II warplanes prepare to launch from the USS Nimitz. The U.S. Navy plans to buy dozens of the F-35C fighters, but their range is no more than 650 miles.Dane Wiedmann/Lockheed Martin/U.S. Navy

 

 

In late 1995, escalating Chinese threats against Taiwan prompted President Bill Clinton to stage a show of American support for the beleaguered island that Beijing’s leaders couldn’t ignore. Clinton sent two aircraft carrier battle groups steaming into the conflict zone, their heavily armed fighter jets poised on deck for takeoff. One battle group, led by the carrier USS Nimitz, sailed down the middle of the Taiwan Strait, less than 50 miles from the Chinese mainland, while the second stood in reserve off Taiwan’s eastern coast. Chinese officials decried what they called “foreign intervention” in their long-standing claim to Taiwan. But lacking the weapons to deter the American warships, they had little choice but to heed Clinton’s show of force and back away.

The F-35 Has To Phone Texas Before Taking Off

The U.S. military ran the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter through a series of tests aboard the USS Nimitz super carrier in San Diego in early November. It performed adequately, with one exception — it needed to send its diagnostic data to Lockheed Martin in Fort Worth, Texas, before taking off. If the most recent exercises are any indication, the F-35 may need to phone home every time it sets out on a mission.

First, the good news. The plane flew through its aerial paces well enough and passed a majority of its flight tests.

Iran admiral says if there’s war, U.S. aircraft carriers in Persian Gulf will be a target

TEHRAN, Iran — Iran will target American aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf should a war between the two countries ever break out, the naval chief of Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard warned Tuesday as the country completes work on a large-scale mock-up of a U.S. carrier.

The remarks by Adm. Ali Fadavi, who heads the hard-line Guard’s naval forces, were a marked contrast to moderate President Hassan Rouhani’s recent outreach policies toward the West — a reminder of the competing viewpoints that exist at the highest levels within the Islamic Republic.

Iran planning to target decoy U.S. aircraft carrier in drills

An Iranian newspaper is reporting that the country’s military plans to target a mock-up American aircraft carrier during upcoming war games.

The Sunday report by independent Haft-e Sobh daily quotes Adm. Ali Fadavi, navy chief of the powerful Revolutionary Guards as saying Iranian forces should “target the carrier in the trainings, after it is completed.”

Fake US ship spotted in Gulf is a movie set, Iranian media say

A replica of a US aircraft carrier spotted near the coast of Iran is nothing more sinister than a movie set, Iranian media said on Sunday.

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Satellite photos showed what looked like one of the US Navy’s Nimitz-class aircraft carriers, complete with planes, rising from Iran’s Gachin shipyard, near the port of Bandar Abbas.

Why is Iran building a mock US aircraft carrier?

Washington: Iran is building a nonworking mock-up of an American nuclear-powered aircraft carrier that US officials say may be intended to be blown up for propaganda value.

Intelligence analysts studying satellite photos of Iranian military installations first noticed the vessel rising from the Gachin shipyard, near Bandar Abbas on the Persian Gulf, last summer. The ship has the same distinctive shape and style of the Navy’s Nimitz-class carriers, as well as the USS Nimitz’s No. 68 neatly painted in white near the bow. Mock aircraft can be seen on the flight deck.

The Iranian mock-up, which US officials described as more like a barge than a warship, has no nuclear propulsion system and is only about two-thirds the length of a typical 1,100-foot-long Navy (335 metre) carrier. Intelligence officials do not believe that Iran is capable of building an actual aircraft carrier.

Exclusive: USS Nimitz carrier group rerouted for possible help with Syria

(Reuters) – The nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Nimitz and other ships in its strike group are heading west toward the Red Sea to help support a limited U.S. strike on Syria, if needed, defense officials said on Sunday.

The Nimitz carrier strike group, which includes four destroyers and a cruiser, has no specific orders to move to the eastern Mediterranean at this point, but is moving west in the Arabian Sea so it can do so if asked. It was not immediately clear when the ships would enter the Red Sea, but they had not arrived by Sunday evening, said one official.

Zones of Future Conflicts

BEIJING/WASHINGTON/BERLIN (Own report) – German government advisors are warning against an arms race and possible military confrontations in East Asia. As a recent study by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) explains, China’s attempts to take control over its coastal waters and its maritime trade routes collide with the USA’s attempts to uphold Washington’s claims to maintain its “international leadership role.” The arms buildup of the Chinese Navy and the initial shift of US armed forces to the Pacific are colliding head-on and could – in the worst case – result in armed conflict. In effect, as a NATO partner of the United States, Germany would also be implicated in cases of conflict. German naval vessels are already being incorporated with growing frequency into the US Navy’s combat units. Berlin is also contributing to the expansion of NATO military cooperation with the pro-western countries of east and Southeast Asia, and the Pacific regions through military policy measures and arms exports. German naval circles are also demanding that the German Navy soon be given an arms upgrade and an offensive posture.

Pentagon strengthens naval forces in Gulf

The US Navy has deployed three additional coastal patrol ships to its Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain, bolstering America’s presence in the strategic Gulf, officials said Wednesday.

The USS Tempest, the USS Squall and the USS Thunderbolt arrived Wednesday at the port of Manama, bringing the total number of patrol craft to eight, the Navy said.

PLA Navy’s three fleets meet in South China Sea for rare show of force

China’s navy has carried out a rare joint exercise, involving its three fleets, in the South China Sea as regional tensions over territorial disputes mount.

The combined drill was carried out in southern waters by warships, submarines and the naval air force from the People’s Liberation Army’s North Sea, East Sea and South Sea fleets, national broadcaster CCTV reported on Saturday.

Global naval balance of power shifting with introduction of China’s aircraft carrier

WASHINGTON — China has showcased its first aircraft carrier landings while maintenance woes have reduced the United States to a single carrier in the Gulf, pointing to the beginnings of a subtle shift in the balance of naval power.

With South China Sea tensions growing, the threat of Middle East conflict still very real and counterterrorism [sic] and counter piracy operations also demanding resources, demands on Western navies — and the U.S. in particular — seem ever-growing.

Even as it emerged that problems with the USS Nimitz would leave Washington unable to maintain its standard two-carrier Gulf force for the first time since 2010, its navy found itself sending new forces to a volatilce eastern Mediterranean.

China’s Aircraft Carrier Hit A Huge Milestone

Amid the recent political shift within Chinese politics, the effort at modernizing and advancing its military has remained unchanged.Minnie Chan of the South China Morning Post reports that to demonstrate this unwavering effort, China today confirmed the first successful carrier landings of its J-15 fighter aboard its first aircraft carrier the Liaoning.

The landings are the culmination of a years long effort at refitting the Soviet-era carrier, originally christened the Varyag, and are perhaps the most difficult technical carrier maneuvers to accomplish.

Testing on land-based, carrier shaped decks, has been going on for months, so this recent achievement is causing a bit of celebration. While not the culmination of China’s entry into a functioning carrier military power, the successful landings put it on track to enter that club with gusto when it adds additional carriers to the group.