The USS George HW Bush has been ordered into the Persian Gulf, from which it could send manned aircraft to strike jihadist positions. Photograph: US navy/Reuters
The US is sending an aircraft carrier and two guided missile ships into the Persian Gulf, bolstering sea and airpower before a possible US strike on the jihadist army in Iraq in the coming days.
Defense secretary Chuck Hagel ordered the USS George HW Bush into the Gulf on Saturday, a day after President Barack Obama indicated he would soon decide on air strikes against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isis), whose seizure of Sunni Iraqi cities has violently upended the region.
The 103,000-tonne warship and its air wing, which had been patrolling the North Arabian Sea and earlier this year were used in the Mediterranean following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, gives Obama airstrike options in addition to air force assets on land in bases used by the US, like Qatar's al-Udeid.
Rear Admiral John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary, said the Bush would be accompanied by the guided-missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea and the guided-missile destroyer USS Truxton. The ships are expected to arrive in the Gulf this evening.
Iraqi officials told the Guardian on Saturday that Iran had sent 2,000 advance troops across the border to help the Shiite government of Iraq defend itself after the Iraqi army ran from Isis in Mosul this week. In a move unthinkable during the Saddam Hussein era, Iran has sent the commander of its feared Qods Force, General Qassem Suleimani, to coordinate the defense of Baghdad.
The State Department did not immediately respond to queries about US and Iranian forces possibly fighting alongside one another by default in Iraq.
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