The Deployment

Last week, I wrote about retired Colonel Sam Gardiner’s appearance on The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer. (“Phase Two,” The Chair-Herding Pictures, 10/8/2006) Gardiner said that war plans against Iran were already well underway and that the “go-ahead” order had already been given by the White House.

According to The Nation (9/21/2006) —

...the Bush Administration and the Pentagon have moved up the deployment of a major “strike group” of ships, including the nuclear aircraft carrier Eisenhower as well as a cruiser, destroyer, frigate, submarine escort and supply ship, to head for the Persian Gulf, just off Iran’s western coast. This information follows a report in the current issue of Time magazine, both online and in print, that a group of ships capable of mining harbors has received orders to be ready to sail for the Persian Gulf by October 1.

The Daily Press, (Hampton Roads, Virginia) reported that the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower sailed from Norfolk Naval Station on October 4, bound for the Middle East. Reportedly, the strike force includes the USS Anzio (a guided-missile cruiser), the USS Ramage and USS Mason (destroyers), and the fast-attack submarine USS Newport News.

Maybe the deployment is a bluff. Then again, maybe the administration is prescient. If Iranian terrorists strike the U.S. just before the November elections, we will be able to retaliate promptly.

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