NYN | News
The former commander of the U.S. aircraft carrier group “Eisenhower,” Mark Miguez, confirmed that he had to move the carrier multiple times in the Red Sea to protect it from attacks by Sana’a government forces. Miguez explained that the scale of the Yemeni drone attacks was surprising and unexpected, noting that American ships and their crews had not previously trained for this type of threat.
The American maritime affairs magazine “Maritime Executive” reported that protecting the “USS Dwight D. Eisenhower” from attack posed a significant challenge. According to the report, the carrier maintained at least two fighter jets in the air at all times to perform air defense missions. When it could not keep its fighter jets airborne, the U.S. Air Force was called upon to send aircraft to carry out similar protective missions.
The report added that while the “Eisenhower” initially enjoyed freedom of movement within the operational area, the evolution of Houthi attacks forced Miguez to reposition the carrier to make it a more difficult target.
The report quoted Miguez as saying, “To protect the force, I had to move the carrier multiple times.” Miguez’s remarks were made during an interview on YouTube with Ward Carroll, a former U.S. Navy officer.
The report highlighted that the “Eisenhower” was launching fighter jets around nine times a day, with its pilots logging over 30,000 flight hours and firing more than 60 air-to-air missiles. The accompanying destroyers used significant amounts of missiles, necessitating the establishment of a replenishment operation at the dockside in Yanbu, Saudi Arabia.
The report also mentioned that Miguez confirmed that “all of these operations were part of crew training, except for the unexpected scale of Houthi drone attacks.”
Miguez emphasized that “the number of engagements with drones was immense, and the crew had not been trained to confront them at this scale,” according to the report.
Miguez’s command of the “Eisenhower” group ended on June 16, coinciding with its withdrawal from the Red Sea. His remarks about repositioning the carrier for its protection align with the claims made by Sana’a government forces regarding their pursuit of the “Eisenhower” with multiple missile and aerial strikes, as indicated by carrier tracking data confirming its repositioning multiple times towards the northern Red Sea before its withdrawal.
