In the ongoing debate about U.S. policy choices regarding Libya, one of the elephants in the room has been American aircraft carriers. Or, more precisely, where are American carriers, which could provide aircraft for enforcing a no-fly zone as well as protection for any non-combatant evacuation operation?
The reality is that, when the Libyan crisis struck, there was no American aircraft carrier with the U.S. Sixth Fleet, which is centered on the Mediterranean. The closest, the USS Enterprise (CVN-65), was in the Red Sea. At this point, a week after Libya sank into chaos, there are still no U.S. aircraft carriers available to mount air operations in the central Mediterranean.
One is forced to ask whether Secretary of Defense Robert Gates still scoffs at the value of aircraft carriers, as he did at the Navy League Sea-Air-Space Exposition in May 2010. Does he still believe that 11 aircraft carrier strike groups constitute “massive over-match the U.S. already enjoys”? Does he still think that 11 aircraft carriers are too many “when no other country has more than one“?
Of course, when the United States prefers to charter commercial vessels to evacuate its citizens, rather than use its naval forces, perhaps it doesn’t need as large a capability. One can only hope that the next time this happens, the bureaucrat doing the chartering is willing to hire a bigger boat, one able to actually evacuate American citizens in a timely fashion.
I do not understand your logtic regarding more exploration and drilling. In my opinion no matter how much additional gasoline that is produced Wall Street and the commodities gamblers will continue to spike up oil prices.
Also you fail to mention measures to insure safer drilling measures.
Sincerely,
Mike Sigell
Want to solve our middle east problems. open up every American energy exploration project, release 103 oil leases for exploration, open up pumping from existing wells in Pacific Coast, open up Anwar, use coal, natural gas and shale oil production.
Stop buying foreign oil and cut $750 billion dollars from our enemies who sell us oil.
Bring our boys & girls home, put them on the borders north and south,
AND
tell the middle east to go pound sand.
Then put cream on the top and back the dollar with gold or some % of gold like the French Franc which is backed 40% by gold..
US should quietly buy gold and continue until we can back our dollar 100%.
This will also stop the Wall Street financial wizards like timothy geitner from playing around with the money supply.
Thank you for reading.
These excellent suggestions you listed here will never happen as long as Obamasan holds power.
Only Sarah Palin would put your suggestions into play. She is honest and has the guts to control the liars and thieves currently running our nation.
would libya attack the sixth fleet if it did could it sink enterprise with the weaponary it has?