Word: nimitz
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...stood firm. He denied "naval movement of any kind" and insisted that four AWACS radar planes had flown to Egypt only for routine "training exercises." But Administration officials had earlier leaked two disclosures: the planes were sent in response to anxiety about a Libyan military threat, and the U.S.S. Nimitz aircraft carrier, chaperoned by three escort vessels, had sailed away from Lebanon and toward Egypt. This was the same Nimitz from which, in August 1981, U.S. F-14 fighters had shot down two Libyan aircraft in the Gulf of Sidra...
...minor, but another apparently was not: a series of Gaddafi moves that the Administration perceived as a threat to neighboring Sudan. Reagan decided this was a timely moment for temporary exercises; the visit of the AWACS would silently, but eloquently, reassure U.S. allies and chasten Gaddafi. Moreover, the Nimitz and its planes have entered neither Libyan waters nor disputed airspace. If they do, swore a typically bellicose Gaddafi, the waters will become a "red gulf of blood...
Navy Secretary John Lehman defended the Administration's plan to build 110 new surface ships, including spending $7 billion for two 90,000-ton Nimitz-class nuclear aircraft carriers. The sinking of the Sheffield, said Lehman, showed that relying on smaller aircraft carriers, as proposed by Colorado Democrat Gary Hart and other military reformers, would be dangerous. Only large carriers can transport airborne defenses, including F-14 "Tomcat" fighters and surveillance planes, that will adequately protect fleets against modern missiles. The Argentine plane carrying Exocet missiles "would not have gotten anywhere near one of our battle groups," he claimed...
Hart responded that the smaller 40,000-ton carriers he proposes would, like the Nimitz, still be able to carry F-14s for their defense. In a letter to his fellow Senators, Hart argues that the sinking of the two warships near the Falklands shows how vulnerable surface ships are to modern missiles and submarines. It is wiser, he contended, to rely on a larger number of less expensive ships than to put too many eggs in one basket. Military reformers believe that the current state of technology gives an edge to those trying to destroy, rather than defend...
...Nimitz-class aircraft carriers. Military experts often describe these wide-deck nuclear-power carriers as "sitting ducks." Retired Adm. Hyman Rickover has said they would survive "about two days" in a war with the Soviet Union. Yet the Pentagon wants three new ones at a cost of $3.6 billion a piece. When fully equipped with fighters, helicopters, cruisers and other escort vessels, the price rises to $17 billion each. Manpower and operational costs would bring the total to $30 billion by some estimates...