A look at the US military assets heading to the Middle East

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon has been sending U.S. military assets into the Middle East this week, including an aircraft carrier group and its thousands of troops, as President Donald Trump indicates he is maintaining the possibility of strikes on Iran amid its crackdown on protests.

“We have a massive fleet heading in that direction, and maybe we won’t have to use it,” Trump told reporters Thursday, saying they were going “just in case.”

Trump has threatened military action if Iran carried out mass executions of prisoners or killed peaceful demonstrators, but he recently backed away, claiming Iran halted the hangings of 800 detained protesters. He has not elaborated on the source of the claim, which Iran’s top prosecutor called “completely false.”

However, Trump appears to be keeping his options open, saying Thursday aboard Air Force One that his threatened military action would make last year’s U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear sites “look like peanuts” if the government proceeded with planned executions of some protesters.

Aircraft carrier heads to the Middle East

The aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and three accompanying destroyers left the South China Sea and began heading west earlier this week, a Navy official said. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military movements, said Friday that the Lincoln strike group was in the Indian Ocean.

When they arrive in the region, those warships would join three littoral combat ships, which were in port in Bahrain on Friday, as well as two other U.S. Navy destroyers, which were at sea in the Persian Gulf.

The arrival of the carrier strike group would bring roughly 5,700 additional service members. The U.S. has several bases in the Middle East, including Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, which hosts thousands of American troops and is the forward headquarters for U.S. Central Command.

Moving in the aircraft carrier comes after the Trump administration had shifted some resources from the region to the Caribbean Sea as part of a pressure campaign on former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

The world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, was ordered in October to sail from the Mediterranean Sea to the Caribbean along with several destroyers. The carrier USS Nimitz, which helped conduct the June strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites, also departed the region in October.

More aircraft also are going in

Central Command said on social media that the Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle now has a presence in the Mideast, noting the fighter jet “enhances combat readiness and promotes regional security and stability.”

Similarly, the U.K. Ministry of Defense said Thursday that it deployed its Typhoon fighter jets to Qatar “in a defensive capacity.”

Analysts of flight-tracking data have noticed dozens of U.S. military cargo planes also heading to the region.

The activity is similar to last year when the U.S. moved in air defense hardware, like a Patriot missile system, in anticipation of an Iranian counterattack following the bombing of three key nuclear sites. Iran launched over a dozen missiles at Al Udeid Air Base days after the strikes.

What’s happening in Iran

Iran has been gripped since late December by nationwide protests and demonstrations that were sparked by the Islamic Republic’s ailing economy. They have been putting new pressure on the theocracy that runs Iran and which has, in turn, responded with a deadly crackdown and shutting down the internet.

Activists say the overall death toll from the crackdown rose to at least 5,032 people, with more than 27,600 detained in a widening arrest campaign. The official Iranian death toll is far lower — only 3,117 dead.

Iranian officials signaled last week that suspects detained in the protests would face fast trials and executions while also promising a “decisive response” if the U.S. or Israel intervened.