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The US could struggle to deter Iran and protect its forces and allies in the current Middle East crisis due to rising global commitments, military experts have told The National.
American forces are stretched in Europe, in the midst of the Ukraine crisis, and in the Pacific, where the US has stepped up efforts to counter China’s growing influence.
In October, at the start of the Israel-Gaza war, the US rushed two aircraft carriers to the region. The carriers are the centrepiece of American naval power, each protected by several powerful warships.
The USS Dwight D Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group extended its Middle East deployment and was reinforced by the USS Gerald Ford Carrier Strike Group.
As a regional war loomed – a conflict joined by the Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and militias in Iraq – the US Navy was briefly capable of launching 200-500 air missions per day from its two carriers.
Ten months later, the effort to keep the Red Sea open following the Houthi blockade – a critical US Navy mission – has floundered.
Elsewhere, militias continue to attack American forces in Iraq and Syria, as well as allied Kurdish groups, and have been hit sporadically with US air power.
The Red Sea, transit point for about 12 per cent of global maritime trade, has seen a drop in shipping of more than 60 per cent, despite a US and UK-led air campaign to strike Houthi drones and missiles on the ground or shoot them down, alongside a supporting EU-led mission purely aimed at intercepting the weapons.
Meanwhile, additional warships and air defences that could signal to Iran to halt regional attacks have been deployed, but experts say more needs to be done.
A squadron of F-22 stealth jets – sometimes described as America's most capable fighters – has been deployed, but the same measure was taken last June, with the professed aim of deterring Iran.
Stalling sea power
“I think the way the US Navy has been deployed is sending a mixed message,” says Salvatore Mercogliano, maritime historian at Campbell University in North Carolina and former US army marine.
“Since 1990, we have used naval strength to support military operations ashore in a power projection role,” he says.
Right now, the US has several thousand troops scattered across bases in Iraq, Syria and Jordan, often remote outposts under regular attack.
Overwhelming air power is critical for their defence.
“Last December, we sent the Navy into the Red Sea to protect the 'Freedom of the Seas', but the result was the diversion of over half the ships that normally transit the area,” says Mr Mercogliano, who runs the What's Going on with Shipping? YouTube channel.
“Now, we have sent the Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Group into the Persian Gulf, the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Group is on the way and the Harry Truman Carrier Group will be going to the Med … but there will be no forces dealing with the Houthis.
“This, to me, sends a message of short-term focus and loss of mission. We have surrendered the Red Sea to the Houthis and it is not clear if the US will use force in the same way that the Israelis did against the Houthis in July,” he says, referring to a devastating long-range Israeli air strike on oil storage in Houthi-controlled Hodeidah.
One of the reasons for this challenge, Mr Mercogliano says, is that the US Navy is overstretched, despite a record budget.
“Now with [aircraft carrier] Nimitz deactivating, the USS Kennedy late in delivery and material issues as we saw with [amphibious assault ship] Boxer, it raises questions about the effectiveness of our forces and resolve.
“It sends a mixed message and that is best demonstrated by the different deployments of the Eisenhower and the Roosevelt. How do we go from the most intense combat any naval ship has experienced since the First World War [in the Red Sea] to no presence at all?”
On Monday, the US confirmed it will start decommissioning USS Nimitz, its oldest nuclear-powered carrier launched in 1975 and one of 10 vessels in its class.
The USS John F Kennedy, one of 10 planned Ford class carriers, is now running three years behind schedule and will not be in service until mid-2025.
Other carriers in the class, including the USS Enterprise, are also running behind schedule for delivery.
The US has about 11 carriers, but only three or four are operational at a given time.
This has caused concerns of global gaps in carrier coverage, because of the immense challenge of keeping the huge nuclear-powered ships at sea and their high burden of maintenance.
Interceptors and challenging China
In the 2025 US defence budget request, the navy has asked for $10 billion dedicated to the Pacific Deterrence Initiative, to counter the “multi-domain challenge posed by the People's Republic of China”.
Experts say current Middle East commitments, without new carriers or more funding to rapidly move US forces across the ocean, can be sapped without new investment. Keeping America’s 11 carrier groups operational at sea can cost more than $20 billion per year.
In the air defence realm too, the US is seen as lagging, despite a rapid effort to catch up.
Central to that effort is the Patriot system, optimised to shoot down ballistic missiles that plunge from high altitude at several times the speed of sound.
Demand for the latest variant, which carries the PAC-3 interceptor, has soared, particularly since it has proven its worth over Ukraine and with several interceptions over the Gulf.
Currently, Lockheed Martin has ramped up efforts to produce 650 interceptor missiles per year.
To illustrate demand, Israel is a customer for the system, and Iran fired at least 120 ballistic missiles at the country in a single attack in April – almost all shot down – while Ukraine has endured attacks on a similar scale.
At sea, there has been a scramble for cheaper solutions to shoot down low-cost Houthi drones, because SM-6 interceptor missiles cost around $4 million each.
“We're in a munitions global shortage. That's just something that we're dealing with right now. There's no way that we could have predicted that the demand for interceptors and for 155mm artillery shells would have gone up to this degree a few years ago. And so production was never increased to account for that. Production and rebuilding inventories can take years," says Elizabeth Dent, a military analyst with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank.
In this context, the US said in June that deliveries of the Patriot system to some countries would be delayed to prioritise Ukraine’s air defences, and has been in talks to transfer some of Israel’s Patriots to Ukraine – in part due to Israel’s robust local air defence production.
In August, however, priorities shifted again, with US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin saying additional air defences had been sent to the Middle East ahead of an expected massive Iranian strike on Israel.
“I do think we'll come out of it at some point," Ms Dent says of the munitions shortage.
"But I think the bigger issue is the fact that we're using these interceptors that cost millions of dollars to shoot down Houthi drones that cost a fraction of that, in the thousands, so that's just not a sustainable model.”
The US and allies are currently in the early stages of fielding laser energy weapons that can shoot down drones and potentially even cruise missiles for dollars per shot. There are also drones that hunt drones in the works - but much of the technology is still being tested.
“I think it's about having more precise, less expensive options for us to utilise,” Ms Dent said.
“Even if we were to increase the amount of vessels in the region, whether it's carriers, frigates, or cruiser destroyers, that doesn't necessarily mean greater deterrence against the Houthis. The shipping companies will likely feel more comfortable because they'll have a cruiser destroyer closer to them with intercept capabilities than they would have had with fewer ships in the region," she added.
"More of those capabilities aren’t necessarily the answer in the long run.”
