Page 65 - Air Forces Monthly - September 2017

Watch, Allied Force, Enduring Freedom, Iraqi
Freedom, and New Dawn. But he admitted
that Moscow’s recent involvement in the
region has changed the parameters: “Since
the early ’90s a large amount of our effort
has been about the Middle East and that
remains important. But, as we can see with
the resurgence of Russia, it is important that
we devote time here in the Mediterranean.”
CAPT Pennington also noted some
advantages and disadvantages of the
Mediterranean as a base for carrier
operations: “The weather here is a lot
nicer. Oftentimes in the Arabian Sea we
see a lot of dust, which means some of
the aircraft sensors and other electronic
equipment doesn’t work properly. We don’t
have that here. And this is a larger body
RADM Kenneth Whitesell returns to the carrier of water; the traffic is reduced, so we have
after fl ying a training mission in unarmed F/A-18F more flexibility to manoeuvre. One of the
166639/’AJ-213’ from VFA-213 ‘Blacklions’.
disadvantages is that since we have been in
journey home from the Mediterranean
to the US, via an exercise off the coast
of the United Kingdom. This was
the Bush’s third deployment, and
began when the carrier strike group
departed US ports on January 21.
The CSG-2 commander was confident
that the military campaign to defeat IS
was nearing its endgame. “From the
structure of ISIS and their capabilities and,
more importantly, the geographic areas
of the caliphate, we are close to the end.
When it comes to physically removing
the caliphate in the cities of Raqqa and
Mosul, it is difficult to say because it
is difficult to change an ideology. It is
not a military task and it is something
that politicians have to figure out.”
Complex mission
The commanding officer of CVN 77, CAPT
Will Pennington has plenty of experience in
the Middle East theatre of operations, with
more than 3,500 flight hours in F-14s and
F/A-18s supporting Operations Southern
Above: The modern carrier air wing is dominated by the Hornet and its derivatives. F/A-18E 168914/‘AJ-304’
from VFA-87 ‘Golden Warriors’ is fl anked by jets from sister squadrons VFA-37 and VFA-213. Left: F/A-18E
166784/’AJ-110’ from VFA-31 ‘Tomcatters’ prepares for a catapult launch to begin another air-to-air
refuelling mission. Below: VFA-31 ‘Tomcatters’ F/A-18E 166779/’AJ-103’ returns to the carrier with a load of
AIM-120D AMRAAM and AIM-9X Sidewinder air-to-air missiles. A combination of AIM-9X and AMRAAMs was
used to down the Syrian Su-22M-4 on June 18 and the latest D-model ‘Slammer’ is now regularly carried.

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