Daily News (New York) April 15, 2003
Scaling Back U.S. Presence
By James Gordon Meek With Thomas M. DeFrank
WASHINGTON - Everything from B-2 bombers to aircraft carriers are heading home from the Persian Gulf now that the Pentagon has declared the worst of the fighting over in Iraq.
"Today was the last day that aircraft from all five carrier battle groups will fly missions into Iraq," said Maj. Gen. Stanley McChrystal of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Yesterday saw only 700 combat flights and 200 smart bombs dropped, he added.
The carriers Kitty Hawk and Constellation - the oldest flattops in the Navy's fleet - are joining Air Force Stealth aircraft that have headed home after helping to smash Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's regime.
Only one carrier remains in the gulf, the Nimitz. The Theodore Roosevelt or the Harry S. Truman battle groups in the Mediterranean may be sent home soon, too.
In Israel, the U.S. Army's Patriot crews are packing up because the threat from Iraqi missiles has been nullified, officials said.
The Air Force has sent four B-2 Stealth bombers home to Missouri from the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia and from Fairford air base in Britain.
Six F-117 Stealth fighters are also en route to their base in New Mexico, sources said, and the last two U.S. planes enforcing the 12-year-old no-fly zone over northern Iraq left Turkey this week.
The Kitty Hawk will steam to its homeport in Yokosuka, Japan, to resume deterring an emboldened North Korea, said defense analyst Patrick Garrett of GlobalSecurity.org.
The next positive sign will come "when Central Command believes they don't need 60,000 Marines on the ground," he said. But the Pentagon still plans to send part of the Army's 1st Armored Division overseas to Iraq, where elements of the 4th Infantry Division recently arrived.
Copyright © 2003, Daily News, L.P.
