The lack of a U.S. carrier in the Pacific may be short-lived if the Navy deploys another in the next couple of months. But it shows how the open-ended operations with Iran are running some American sailors ragged, analysts say, while the Trump administration further retreats from the Asia-Pacific region and focuses on the Western Hemisphere.

“The administration says that the Pacific is supposed to be the most important behind the Western Hemisphere,” said Greg Poling, director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Instead, the U.S. is “doing the exact opposite” of its previously expressed goal of pulling out of the Middle East.

  • jpreston2005@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    No one expects China to invade Taiwan because an American aircraft carrier has left the region. But the carrier’s absence gives the Chinese another opportunity to show its strength, said Bryan Clark, a former Navy submariner who is a defense analyst at the Hudson Institute.

    Uh, fucking, I DO!

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.worldOP
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      3 days ago

      How many years and how fortuitous do the circumstances have to get before people stop insisting an invasion is imminent?

      There’s an enormous amount of value in China and Taiwan remaining friendly trading partners. Westerners refuse to acknowledge this.