The US Air Force is taking the first steps to dispatch dozens of warplanes to the Gulf area, setting in motion "Operation Infinite Justice" for the promised war on terrorism.
President George W. Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, said Wednesday, "The United States is repositioning some of its forces to support the president's goal." She would not elaborate.
PHOTO: AFP
Senior defense officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said combat aircraft, including F-16 Fighting Falcons and F-15 Eagles, will be preceded by Air Force airlift control teams from bases in California and New Jersey.
The airlift control teams will establish what the Air Force calls an "air bridge," coordinating ground communications to match up refueling aircraft with fighters and, later, bombers crossing the Atlantic.
It probably will take about a week to get the combat planes in position, one official said.
Asked whether Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had signed a deployment order, his chief deputy, Paul Wolfowitz said Wednesday, "There are movements and we will see more movements." He would not elaborate.
Some officials involved in the military planning want Bush to target Iraq, but advisers close to the president say Saddam Hussein is not an initial target. He wants to strike Osama bin Laden and his alleged terrorist network, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
However, the Bush administration has put the world on notice that any nation -- including Iraq -- harboring terrorists could be the focus of US strikes down the line.
"This is not a war against just one country or just one person," Wolfowitz said at the Pentagon when asked if Iraq was a target and whether the country was involved in the Sept. 11 terror strikes that demolished the World Trade Center towers and part of the Pentagon.
Separate from the order to send Air Force planes to the Gulf area, the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt and the ships in its battle group left their home port at Norfolk, Virginia, on Wednesday for a scheduled six-month deployment to the Mediterranean.
Just before the carrier left Norfolk Naval Station, the Navy secretary, Gordon England, gave the sailors a pep talk.
"We're learning once again that freedom and liberty and the American way of life are not a birthright," he said. "It is time for us to pick up the mantle to destroy terrorism and remove this cancer."
The loudspeaker played "New York, New York" as the carrier pulled away from the pier.
The deployment from Norfolk includes more than 15,000 sailors and Marines, including 2,100 Marines aboard a battle-ready unit known as an Amphibious Ready Group, led by the assault ship USS Bataan.
The Navy already has one carrier battle group in the Gulf -- the USS Carl Vinson -- and a second, the USS Enterprise, is in the Arabian Sea to the south.
At Kharan in southwest Pakistan, US military personnel have been spotted moving satellite and radar equipment at an isolated air base that has a long runway, said a Western military official.
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