President Donald Trump has ordered the world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, to depart the Caribbean for the Middle East as the administration weighs military options against Iran.
The move, first reported by the Associated Press on Thursday, will join the USS Abraham Lincoln strike group already in the region. The deployment aims to escalate pressure on Tehran to secure a new nuclear deal following recent indirect talks in Oman.
Trump warned Thursday that a failure to reach an agreement would be “very traumatic” for the Islamic Republic, suggesting a one-month timeline for a resolution.
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The Ford’s redirection marks a pivot from its recent mission in the Caribbean, where it supported the January raid that captured then-Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
While the shift aligns with Trump’s “armada” strategy to deter Iranian escalation, it also extends the Ford’s current deployment to eight months, placing additional strain on the crew and appearing to deviate from a national security strategy that previously prioritized the Western Hemisphere.
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