11 US warships pass through the Suez...
 

Gulp... :oops:

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/138164

Well, this'll end well. :yep:

It's possible Obama has come off the fence...at last.

Why those many warships? A wolfpack of Type VIIs, und gut is' !

Bah, high tech gizmos, handful of longships'll send them running for their mummies :03:

Looks like "something" may hit the fan shortly.

11 ships sounds like a full CSG.

CSG:
1 CVN with Airwing
1 AOE
1 to 2 CGs (Tico Class)
2 to 3 DDGs (Burkes)
1 to 2 FFGs (OHP Class)
1 to 2 SSNs or SSGNs

Give or take a ship in each class and you get 11 warships. If I was Iran I would be worried if there were more because that would mean an ESG was riding shotgun.

EDIT: I think they are making something out of nothing, US CSGs transit the Suez all the time. Maybe they just wanted all the ships going though at once rather than in one big group (The flattop) and a few single ship transits.

It's a relief deployment. They are relieving another carrier battle group! This is typical every six to 12 months.

Source?

It seems to be not so typical that the whole armada then would pass through the Suez in one rush. The article says that.

I personally, if time is no critical factor, would even refuse to pass high value assets like carriers and cruisers through a narrow waterstreet at all, even at peacetimes. If mtime allows, let them sail around Africa - much reduced vulnerability that way. But this only on a sidenote.

TLAM,
did you miss my joke? :) Your reply was so terribly fact-oriented. :D

Was there an intentional pun there? :hmmm:

:hmmm: ?

No carrier
 

The article mentioned marines, so this is likely a Marine rapid reaction force, involving a smaller carrier for choppers and amphib landing units.

A show of force I think. This might also be an opportune time to relocate some assets to the med that would go there anyway.

'handful', 'longships' :03:

:damn: Ya gutter minded lot! :O: