The U.S. Navy released imagery yesterday of a Navy P-8A patrol aircraft being armed with AGM-84D Harpoon anti-ship missiles while operating “in the 5th Fleet area of operations” in the Persian Gulf. The base where the aircraft was being loaded was not named, but the forward operating base for the P-8s in the Persian Gulf is at Isa Air Base in southern Bahrain. Rome-based aviation blogger David Cenciotti said in a blog post yesterday that this is the first time P-8s have been spotted in that part of the world armed with the Harpoon. Cenciotti hints that the imagery was likely released as another “message” to Iran, like the B-52 flight a couple of days earlier.
At about the same time, posts appeared reporting that the USS Eisenhower aircraft carrier strike group has passed through the Strait of Gibraltar into the Mediterranean about two weeks after departing from its base in Norfolk, Virginia. The Navy won’t say where the Eisenhower is heading, but there is currently no aircraft carrier present in the waters of Southwest Asia.