Valiant Shield 2006=three Aircraft Carriers at Guam right now!!!

edit The picture is too small, but there are THREE CARRIERS there!

The U.S. Pacific Command exercise, which begins June 19 and lasts through June 23, will be conducted in the vicinity of Guam. Valiant Shield focuses on integrated joint training and interoperability among U.S. military forces while responding to a range of mission scenarios.
"Valiant Shield 2006 exercises the military's ability to rapidly bring together joint forces in response to any regional contingency," said Col. Robert Wheeler, 36th Expeditionary Operations Group commander. "It is a rare opportunity to bring together platforms that normally do not regularly exercise together, such as B-2 bombers and carrier strike groups, to ensure an integrated American air, sea, land, space and cyberspace force capable of an overwhelming and decisive response in any future contingency."

While more than 275 aircraft will participate in Valiant Shield. Approximately 80 including B-2 and B-52 bombers, F-15C, F-15E, F-16CJ and F/A-18 fighters; E-3 airborne and control aircraft and KC-10 and KC-135 tankers will fly from Andersen to conduct sorties in various simulated exercise events. To prepare for these operations pilots from various units are preparing for the events.

http://www.pacom.mil/exercises/vs2006/news/060616story1.shtml

more photos here: http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?t=83973

... because Safe Sex is a Man's Duty.

--p!

near all exits for the Pentagon. I'd love to hear that Rumsferatu was having an attack over it.

Iran has allies in Russia and China not to mention a real air force and real missiles that can reach any of those ships in the Gulf. I smell WW III!

Though you overstate the military risk if they do

I don't think it is overstated at all. An example....

Iran: A Bridge too Far?

by Mark Gaffney

10/26/04 "ICH" -- Last July, they dubbed it operation Summer Pulse: a simultaneous mustering of US Naval forces, world wide, that was unprecedented. According to the Navy, it was the first exercise of its new Fleet Response Plan (FRP), the purpose of which was to enable the Navy to respond quickly to an international crisis. The Navy wanted to show its increased force readiness, that is, its capacity to rapidly move combat power to any global hot spot. Never in the history of the US Navy had so many carrier battle groups been involved in a single operation. Even the US fleet massed in the Gulf and eastern Mediterranean during operation Desert Storm in 1991, and in the recent invasion of Iraq, never exceeded six battle groups. But last July and August there were seven of them on the move, each battle group consisting of a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier with its full complement of 7-8 supporting ships, and 70 or more assorted aircraft. Most of the activity, according to various reports, was in the Pacific, where the fleet participated in joint exercises with the Taiwanese navy.

But why so much naval power underway at the same time? What potential world crisis could possibly require more battle groups than were deployed during the recent invasion of Iraq? In past years, when the US has seen fit to “show the flag” or flex its naval muscle, one or two carrier groups have sufficed. Why this global show of power?

The news headlines about the joint-maneuvers in the South China Sea read: “Saber Rattling Unnerves China”, and: “Huge Show of Force Worries Chinese.” But the reality was quite different, and, as we shall see, has grave ramifications for the continuing US military presence in the Persian Gulf; because operation Summer Pulse reflected a high-level Pentagon decision that an unprecedented show of strength was needed to counter what is viewed as a growing threat –– in the particular case of China, because of Peking’s newest Sovremenny-class destroyers recently acquired from Russia.

“Nonsense!” you are probably thinking. That’s impossible. How could a few picayune destroyers threaten the US Pacific fleet?”

Here is where the story thickens: Summer Pulse amounted to a tacit acknowledgement, obvious to anyone paying attention, that the United States has been eclipsed in an important area of military technology, and that this qualitative edge is now being wielded by others, including the Chinese; because those otherwise very ordinary destroyers were, in fact, launching platforms for Russian-made 3M-82 Moskit anti-ship cruise missiles (NATO designation: SS-N-22 Sunburn), a weapon for which the US Navy currently has no defense. Here I am not suggesting that the US status of lone world Superpower has been surpassed. I am simply saying that a new global balance of power is emerging, in which other individual states may, on occasion, achieve “an asymmetric advantage” over the US. And this, in my view, explains the immense scale of Summer Pulse. The US show last summer of overwhelming strength was calculated to send a message.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7147.htm

and his hysteria about Sunburns is at best OBE, if it ever was valid. This has been beaten to death in other threads.

The real issue with Carriers in the Gulf is the amount of space required for escorts and air operations. Finally, its easier to do land ops, or even but the air wings ashore than try and stuff than many carriers together.

that's the big potential apocalypse right now