WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. will move a fighter jet squadron to the Middle East and maintain an aircraft carrier in the region, the Pentagon said Friday, beefing up the American military presence to help defend Israel from possible attacks by Iran and its proxies and safeguard U.S. troops.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has also ordered additional ballistic missile defense-capable cruisers and destroyers to the European and Middle East regions and is taking steps to send more land-based ballistic missile defense weapons there, the Pentagon said in a statement Friday evening.
The shifts make good on a promise President Joe Biden made to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In a call Thursday afternoon, Biden discussed new U.S. military deployments to protect against possible attacks from ballistic missiles and drones, according to the White House. In April, U.S. forces intercepted dozens of missiles and drones fired by Iran against Israel and helped down nearly all of them.
U.S. leaders worry about escalating violence in the Middle East in response to recent attacks by Israel on Hamas and Hezbollah leaders, which triggered threats of retaliation. Iran also has threatened to respond after Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran on Wednesday, a day after senior Hezbollah commander Fouad Shukur was killed in Beirut.
Israel has vowed to kill Hamas leaders over the group’s Oct. 7 attack, which sparked the war in Gaza.
Austin is ordering the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group to the Middle East to replace the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group, which is in the Gulf of Oman but scheduled to come home later this summer. That decision suggests the Pentagon has decided to keep a carrier consistently in the region as a deterrent against Iran at least until next year.
The Pentagon did not say where the fighter jet squadron was coming from or where it would be based in the Middle East. A number of allies in the region are often willing to base U.S. military forces but don’t want it made public.
The Pentagon has options to provide additional land-based ballistic missile defense, such as the Patriot or the terminal high altitude area defense, known as THAAD, both of which launch interceptor missiles from specialized trailer-based mobile launching systems. The Pentagon did not identify what system it would be deploying to augment defenses in the region.
The White House in a statement said Biden “reaffirmed his commitment to Israel’s security against all threats from Iran, including its proxy terrorist groups Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis.”
Earlier Friday, Sabrina Singh, Pentagon spokeswoman, told reporters that moves were in the works. She said Austin “will be directing multiple” force movements to provide additional support to Israel and increase protection for U.S. troops in the region.
Military and defense officials have been considering a wide array of options, from additional ships and fighter aircraft squadrons to added air defense systems or unmanned weapons. In many cases the U.S. does not provide details because host nations are very sensitive about the presence of additional U.S. forces and don’t want those movements made public.
It’s unclear what new ships would move to the Middle East.
The U.S. has had a consistent warship presence there and in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, including two Navy destroyers, the USS Roosevelt and the USS Bulkeley, as well as the USS Wasp and the USS New York. The Wasp and the New York are part of the amphibious ready group and carry a Marine expeditionary unit that could be used if any evacuation of U.S. personnel is required.
In addition, a U.S. official said that two U.S Navy destroyers that are currently in the Middle East will be heading north up the Red Sea toward the Mediterranean Sea. At least one of those could linger in the Mediterranean if needed. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss troop movements.
President Joe Biden arrives at the Delaware Air National Guard Base in New Castle, Del., Friday, August. 2, 2024. Biden is spending the weekend at his Delaware home. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin smiles while answering a question during a press briefing at the Pentagon on Thursday, July 25, 2024 in Washington. (AP Photo/Kevin Wolf)
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stock indexes are drifting higher Tuesday following a mostly encouraging batch of profit reports from big companies.
The S&P 500 was 0.6% higher in early trading, as many markets around the world took tentative steps following Donald Trump’sreturn to the White House on Monday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 188 points, or 0.4%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% higher.
Trump has promised sweeping moves to reshape global trade and the economy, often at the expense of other countries, but stock indexes in Asia and Europe were mixed amid mostly modest moves. U.S. Treasury yields eased in the bond market, giving back some of the big gains made in recent months that cranked up the pressure on stock markets worldwide.
In the foreign-currency market, the values of both the Mexican peso and Canadian dollar sank after Trump said he expects to put 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico starting on Feb. 1. The peso fell 1% against the U.S. dollar, and the Canadian dollar slipped 0.6%.
Trump had threatened to place even stiffer tariffs on Chinese imports during his campaign, but he said Monday he wanted to have more discussions with the leader of the world’s second-largest economy.
On Wall Street, 3M helped lead the market higher and climbed 3.6% after reporting profit and revenue for the end of 2024 that edged past analysts’ expectations The company behind Scotch tape and Command strips also gave forecasts for financial results in 2025 that were roughly in line with analysts’ expectations.
Charles Schwab jumped 6% after likewise delivering a better profit report for the end of 2024 than analysts expected. It credited clients pouring more dollars in, as its total client assets rose 19% from a year earlier to $10.10 trillion.
They helped offset a 7.9% drop for Walgreen Boots Alliance. The U.S. Justice Department accused Walgreens late Friday of filling millions of prescriptions without a legitimate purpose, including for dangerous amounts of opioids. In the lawsuit, the government says the drugstore chain’s pharmacists filled controlled substance prescriptions with clear red flags that indicated they were highly likely to be unlawful.
Walgreens, one of the country’s largest pharmacy chains with over 8,000 locations, said in a statement that it stands behind its pharmacists and “will not stand by and allow the government to put our pharmacists in a no-win situation, trying to comply with “rules” that simply do not exist.”
In the bond market, Treasury yields eased to give back some of the big gains they’d made in recent months amid worries about higher inflation.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.57% from 4.62% late Friday. Like the U.S. stock market, bond trading had been closed on Monday in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
In stock markets abroad, indexes were rising slightly across Europe after finishing mixed in Asia.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index rose 0.9% after embattled Chinese property developer Country Garden got a reprieve on its deadline for working out an agreement with its creditors.
AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed.
A staff member walks past a monitor showing Donald Trump delivering a speech at the inauguration ceremony as President of the United States, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025, at a foreign exchange trading company in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
An electronic stock board shows Japan's Nikkei index as a monitor shows Donald Trump delivering a speech at the inauguration ceremony as President of the United States, at a securities firm Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
A monitor near a Japanese and the U.S. flags shows Donald Trump delivering a speech at the inauguration ceremony as President of the United States, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025, at a foreign exchange trading company in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)