Austin said that passing a continuing resolution that caps spending at 2024 levels, rather than taking action on the proposed 2025 budget will hurt thousands of defense programs, and damage military recruiting just as it is beginning to recover after the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Asking the department to compete with (China), let alone manage conflicts in Europe and the Middle East, while under a lengthy CR, ties our hands behind our back while expecting us to be agile and to accelerate progress,” said Austin in the letter to leaders of the House and Senate appropriations committees.

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson has teed up a vote this week on a bill that would keep the federal government funded for six more months. The measure aims to garner support from his more conservative GOP members by also requiring states to obtain proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, when registering a person to vote.

Congress needs to approve a stop-gap spending bill before the end of the budget year on Sept. 30 to avoid a government shutdown just a few weeks before voters go to the polls and elect the next president.

Austin said the stop-gap measure would cut defense spending by more than $6 billion compared to the 2025 spending proposal. And it would take money from key new priorities while overfunding programs that no longer need it.

Under a continuing resolution, new projects or programs can’t be started. Austin said that passing the temporary bill would stall more than $4.3 billion in research and development projects and delay 135 new military housing and construction projects totaling nearly $10 billion.

It also would slow progress on a number of key nuclear, ship-building, high-tech drone and other weapons programs. Many of those projects are in an array of congressional districts, and could also have an impact on local residents and jobs.

Since the bill would not fund legally required pay raises for troops and civilians, the department would have to find other cuts to offset them. Those cuts could halt enlistment bonuses, delay training for National Guard and Reserve forces, limit flying hours and other training for active-duty troops and impede the replacement of weapons and other equipment that has been pulled from Pentagon stocks and sent to Ukraine.

Going forward with the continuing resolution, said Austin, will “subject service members and their families to unnecessary stress, empower our adversaries, misalign billions of dollars, damage our readiness, and impede our ability to react to emergent events.”

Noting that there have been 48 continuing resolutions during 14 of the last 15 fiscal years — for a total of nearly 1,800 days — Austin said Congress must break the pattern of inaction because the U.S. military can’t compete with China “with our hands tied behind our back every fiscal year.”

Johnson’s bill is not expected to get support in the Democratic-controlled Senate, if it even makes it that far. But Congress will have to pass some type of temporary measure by Sept. 30 in order to avoid a shutdown.

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.

Before his policing career began with six jobs in four years — the first three of which were part time — 30-year-old Sean Grayson was convicted twice within a year of driving under the influence, which cost him his hitch in the military.

The convictions plus his previous employment record should have raised serious questions when the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Department hired him in May 2023, law enforcement experts say.

Grayson, who has since been fired, is charged with first-degree murder, aggravated battery with a firearm and official misconduct in the death of Massey, a 36-year-old Black woman who had called 911 about a suspected prowler at her home in Springfield, 200 miles (320 kilometers) southwest of Chicago. Grayson, who is white, has pleaded not guilty.

“Six jobs in four years should have raised a red flag. And you would ask why he wasn’t hired full time in any of those (part-time) jobs,” said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. “Combined with a track record of DUIs, it would be enough to do further examination as to whether or not he would be a good fit.”

Grayson, who enlisted in the Army in 2014, was charged with DUI in Macoupin County, just south of Sangamon County, after traffic stops on Aug. 10, 2015, and again on July 26, 2016.

The first DUI led to his discharge from the military in February 2016 for “serious misconduct,” according to a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel information, adding that Grayson had an unregistered gun in his vehicle.

Macoupin County State’s Attorney Jordan Garrison confirmed that police found a gun in the center console, but Grayson did not face a weapons charge because he was a resident of Fort Riley, Kansas. Kansas has an open-carry firearms law.

Grayson received a general discharge under honorable conditions — rather than an honorable discharge — because he was charged by a civilian law enforcement agency and his military service otherwise was good.

His attorney, Daniel Fultz, declined to comment Monday.

A misdemeanor DUI charge doesn’t by law preclude someone from serving in law enforcement, said Sean Smoot, chairman of the Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board, but a hiring agency can certainly consider it.

“Some police departments would not have hired someone with one DUI,” Smoot said. “I am shocked an agency would hire someone with two DUIs, but multiple agencies apparently did.”

Massey’s father, James Wilburn, has demanded the resignation of Sangamon County Sheriff Jack Campbell. “He does not intend to step down,” Campbell spokesman Jeff Wilhite said.

A statement from Campbell’s office indicated that the county merit commission and state law enforcement board recommended Grayson’s certification as an officer despite the DUIs, and he passed a drug test, criminal background check, psychological evaluation and 16-week academy course.

Body-worn camera video of the killing released last week has unnerved the capital city, where a 1908 race riot prompted the creation of the NAACP a year later.

“Black women are under attack,” said Teresa Haley, a consultant and founder of Visions 1908, a social and economic justice and education advocacy group. “As I watched the video, I thought, ‘This is not murder. This is an assassination.’”

In the video, Grayson and another officer search outside Massey’s house for a prowler before knocking on her front door. Several minutes pass before Massey answers, during which time Grayson makes a comment that she’s dead inside and calls impatiently for her.

When she does, Massey, who had suffered mental health issues, says, “Don’t hurt me,” acts confused and repeats, “Please, God.” Grayson responds in a condescending manner when asking if there’s anything else he can do for her. As he tries to get her name for a report, he enters the house.

“His conduct before, during and after suggests that this guy was a loose cannon, and that’s being polite,” said Kalfani Ture, a former police officer, now assistant professor of criminal justice at Widener University in Chester, Pennsylvania, and an instructor in the New York Police Department’s academy.

Inside Massey’s home, video shows Grayson directing that a pan of water be removed from a flame on the stove. Massey appears to set it near the sink. After the two joke about Grayson moving away from her “hot, steaming water,” Massey inexplicably says, “I rebuke you in the name of Jesus.”

That prompts Grayson to pull his gun. Massey apologizes and ducks behind a counter, but when Grayson yells at her to drop the pot, she comes back up and appears to pick it up again. Grayson fires three times, striking her in the face. He then discourages his partner from getting his medical kit. After relenting and retrieving his own, he returns to find emergency medical providers on the scene, drops it on the floor and says he won’t “waste my med stuff.”

“That’s not characteristic of an officer. That is characteristic of someone who has a depraved indifference to human life,” Ture said. “And this incident is not an aberration. Someone like this is pretty consistent in in their display of this type of profile.”

Ture said Massey probably picked up the pot again because she had already put it down when Grayson told her to do so and was confused by his aggressive orders. He moved quickly to lethal force despite having cover from the threat — substantial distance from Massey and a counter separating them — and he had other options, including using a stun gun, chemical spray or easily overpowering the diminutive woman, Ture said.

Pulling his weapon escalated the incident, Wexler said.

“He should have slowed things down, communicate, have a plan B and know where the door is to get out of the house, not put himself in a position where he had no alternative but to use deadly force by standing still, pulling out his gun and barking orders,” Wexler said.

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Baldor reported from Washington, D.C.

Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, deputy commander at U.S. Central Command, told reporters in a Pentagon briefing on Wednesday that the pier achieved its intended effect in what he called an “unprecedented operation.”

As the U.S. military steps away from the sea route for humanitarian aid, questions swirl about Israel’s new plan to use the port at Ashdod as a substitute. There are few details on how it will work and lingering concerns about whether aid groups will have enough viable land crossings to get assistance into the territory besieged by war between Israel and Hamas. But Cooper said the Ashdod corridor will be more sustainable.

Critics call the pier a $230 million boondoggle that failed to bring in the level of aid needed to stem a looming famine. The U.S. military, however, has maintained that it served as the best hope as aid only trickled in during a critical time of near-famine in Gaza and that it got close to 20 million pounds (9 million kilograms) of desperately needed supplies to the Palestinians.

President Joe Biden, who announced the building of the pier during his State of the Union speech in March, expressed disappointment that it didn’t do as well as hoped.

“I’ve been disappointed that some of the things that I put forward have not succeeded as well — like the port we attached from Cyprus,” Biden, a Democrat, said during a news conference last week. “I was hopeful that would be more successful.”

Planned as a temporary fix to get aid to starving Palestinians, the project was panned from the start by aid groups that condemned it as a waste of time and money. While U.S. defense officials acknowledged that the weather was worse than expected and limited the days the pier could operate, they also expressed frustration with humanitarian groups for being unable and unwilling to distribute the aid that got through the system, only to have it pile up onshore.

A critical element that neither the aid groups nor the U.S. military could control, however, was the Israeli defense forces whose military operation into Gaza put humanitarian workers in persistent danger and in a number of cases cost them their lives.

As a result, the pier operated for fewer than 25 days after its installation May 16, and aid agencies used it only about half that time due to security concerns.

Stuck in the middle were the more than 1,000 U.S. soldiers and sailors who largely lived on boats off the Gaza shore and struggled to keep the pier working but spent many days repairing it or detaching it, moving it and reinstalling it due to the bad weather.

The tensions played out until the final moments, as senior Biden administration officials signaled the end of the pier project days ago but U.S. Central Command balked, holding out hope the military could reinstall it one last time to move any final pallets of aid ashore.

Most would agree that use of the maritime route and what is known as the Army’s Joint Logistics Over the Shore capability, or JLOTS, fell short of early expectations. Even at the start, officials warned of challenges because the sea is shallow, the weather is unpredictable and it was an active war zone.

The U.S. also had to train Israeli troops and others on how to anchor the pier to the shore because no U.S. troops could step foot on Gaza soil, a condition Biden has had since the beginning of the Hamas-Israel conflict in October.

However, enough aid to feed 450,000 people for a month flowed through the pier, according to the United States Agency for International Development, which coordinated with the United Nations and others to get supplies to people in need. As important, humanitarian leaders say, the pier operation laid the groundwork for a coordination system with the Israeli government and military that they can expand on.

The one place where deconfliction with the Israeli military worked well was at the pier, which came online at a time of some of the greatest despair and food shortages, USAID Administrator Samantha Power said. She said Israel and the military have now agreed to extend that coordination plan to “all of Gaza.”

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Tuesday that a new Pier 28 will soon be established at Israel’s Ashdod port for delivering aid to the Gaza Strip as a replacement for the U.S. military-built pier. He did not say when it would start operating.

Other aid groups, however, slammed the U.S. military pier as a distraction, saying the U.S. should have instead pressured Israel to open more land crossings and allow the aid to flow more quickly and efficiently through them.

Everyone has agreed all along that land crossings are the most productive way to get aid into Gaza, but the Israeli military routinely has blocked routes and slowed deliveries due to inspections. Aid groups also were terrorized by attacks, from Hamas, gunmen who stripped convoys of supplies and the Israeli military. More than 278 workers have been killed in the conflict, Power said.

As the Pentagon and the Army take stock of how the pier did, questions will loom about whether officials underestimated the persistent weather challenges and security hurdles that hindered the operation.

The system is run by the Army’s 7th Transportation Brigade (Expeditionary) at Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Virginia. And it’s like a huge LEGO system — an array of 40-foot-long (12-meter-long) pieces of steel that can be locked together to form a pier and causeway.

It’s unclear if U.S. forces were adequately prepared for the unpredictable and turbulent weather in the Gaza region. Nine days after the pier was installed on the Gaza shore, bad weather broke it, forcing troops to dismantle it and take it to the Israeli port at Ashdod for more than two weeks for repairs.

Weather forced troops to detach the pier from the shore two more times and move it to Ashdod. It was detached for the final time on June 28, and poor weather prevented the U.S. from reinstalling it.

Aid groups struggled to distribute the supplies from the pier into Gaza, and their efforts came to an abrupt halt after a June 8 Israeli military raid that rescued four hostages but killed hundreds of Palestinians.

Troops used an area near the pier to land a helicopter and fly out the hostages. To have even a small part of an Israeli military operation so close to the pier creates problems for aid groups who rely on being independent and separate from troops to remain safe.

As a result, the U.N. suspended all World Food Program deliveries while it conducted a review, which has not been released. WFP personnel have not distributed aid from the pier since but hired contractors to move aid that piled up on shore to warehouses so it would not spoil.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Battling rough seas around Gaza, the U.S. now is considering abandoning efforts to reinstall the pier that has been used to get badly needed humanitarian aid to starving Palestinians, two U.S. officials said Thursday.

The White House and the Defense Department both said Thursday that the pier will cease operations “soon” but would not specify timing. But other U.S. officials said the Pentagon and U.S. Central Command were actively discussing an early end to pier operations because weather and some maintenance problems make it far less desirable to reconnect it for just a short time.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said there is no final decision yet — and if the weather calms for a bit there is a slim chance they could reattach it for a short time.

The initial plan earlier this week had been to reinstall the pier for a few days to move the final pallets of aid onto the shore and then permanently remove it, but rough seas have prevented the reinstallation.

Across Washington, officials were signaling the end of what has been a mission fraught with weather and security problems, but which also has successfully gotten more than 19.4 million pounds (8.6 million kilograms) aid to starving residents in Gaza as the nine-month-long war drags on.

“I do anticipate that in relatively short order we will wind down pier operations,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington on Thursday. ”The real issue right now is not about getting aid into Gaza. It’s about getting around Gaza effectively.”

Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, Pentagon press secretary, acknowledged in a statement that U.S. military personnel “were unable to re-anchor the pier to the shore” as planned this week, and that a date to reattach it has not been set. “The pier will soon cease operations,” he said, but provided no timeline.

Some aid still remains off shore and in Cyprus, but officials said they are looking at alternative plans to take the aid to the Israeli port at Ashdod. The port has been eyed as a likely replacement option for the movement of supplies from Cyprus to Gaza.

Despite the issues with the pier, Sullivan called the project a success.

“Look, I see any result that produces more food, more humanitarian goods, getting to the people of Gaza as a success,” Sullivan said. ”It is additive. It is something additional that otherwise we would not have gotten there when it got there. And that is a good thing.”

That total amount of aid delivered, said Ryder, “represents the largest amount of aid transported by the U.S. military over a three-month period and the largest humanitarian response in the Middle East region.”

The continuing weather problems have forced the military to temporarily remove the pier three times since it was installed in May. And the project has also been hampered by security threats that prompted aid agencies to halt distribution of the food and other supplies into Gaza. Aid had been piling up in the secure area on the beach, but the World Food Program hired contractors to move it into storage areas for further distribution in recent days.

The Pentagon insisted all along that the pier — an Army system known as the Joint Logistics Over-the-Shore, or JLOTS, capability — was only meant to be a temporary fix. Distribution of aid through land routes has long been considered the best option, but those entry points have been blocked for periods of time by Israeli forces.

Humanitarian aid groups stopped distributing supplies that arrived by sea on June 9 due to security concerns and have not started again. U.S. officials say the pier may not be reinstalled unless aid agencies reach an agreement to begin distributing the aid again. Meanwhile, food and other provisions shipped from Cyprus are piling up on shore, and soon the the secure area on the beach in Gaza will reach capacity.

It’s been a long and difficult road for the pier, which has been battered by weather and troubled by security problems. Here’s a look at how it started and where it is now.

March: announcement and prep

MARCH 7: President Joe Biden announces his plan for the U.S. military to build a pier during his State of the Union address.

“Tonight, I’m directing the U.S. military to lead an emergency mission to establish a temporary pier in the Mediterranean on the coast of Gaza that can receive large shipments carrying food, water, medicine and temporary shelters,” he said.

But even in those first few moments, he noted the pier would increase the amount of humanitarian aid getting into Gaza but that Israel “must do its part” and let more aid in.

MARCH 8: Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, Pentagon spokesman, tells reporters it will take “up to 60 days” to deploy the forces and build the project.

MARCH 12: Four U.S. Army boats loaded with tons of equipment and steel pier segments leave Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Virginia and head to the Atlantic Ocean for what is expected to be a monthlong voyage to Gaza.

The brigade’s commander, Army Col. Sam Miller, warns that the transit and construction will be heavily dependent on the weather and any high seas they encounter.

LATE MARCH: U.S. Army vessels hit high seas and rough weather as they cross the Atlantic, slowing their pace.

April: construction and hope

APRIL 1: Seven World Central Kitchen aid workers are killed in an Israeli airstrike as they travel in clearly marked vehicles on a delivery mission authorized by Israel.

The strike fuels ongoing worries about security for relief workers and prompts aid agencies to pause delivery of humanitarian assistance in Gaza.

APRIL 19: U.S. officials confirm that the U.N. World Food Program has agreed to help deliver aid brought to Gaza via the maritime route once construction is done.

APRIL 25: Major construction of the port facility on the shore near Gaza City begins to take shape. The onshore site is where aid from the causeway will be delivered and given to aid agencies.

APRIL 30: Satellite photos show the U.S. Navy ship USNS Roy P. Benavidez and Army vessels working on assembling the pier and causeway about 11 kilometers (6.8 miles) from the port on shore.

May: The pier opens … then closes

MAY 9: The U.S. vessel Sagamore is the first ship loaded with aid to leave Cyprus and head toward Gaza and ultimately the pier. An elaborate security and inspection station has been built in Cyprus to screen the aid coming from a number of countries.

MAY 16: Well past the 60-day target time, the construction and assembly of the pier off the Gaza coast and the causeway attached to the shoreline are finished after more than a week of weather and other delays.

MAY 17: The first trucks carrying aid for the Gaza Strip roll down the newly built pier and into the secure area on shore, where they will be unloaded and the cargo distributed to aid agencies for delivery by truck into Gaza.

May 18: Crowds of desperate Palestinians overrun a convoy of aid trucks coming from the pier, stripping the cargo from 11 of the 16 vehicles before they reach a U.N. warehouse for distribution.

May 19-20: The first food from the pier — a limited number of high-nutrition biscuits — reaches people in need in central Gaza, according to the World Food Program.

Aid organizations suspend deliveries from the pier for two days while the U.S. works with Israel to open alternate land routes from the pier and improve security.

MAY 24: So far, a bit more than 1,000 metric tons of aid has been delivered to Gaza via the U.S.-built pier, and USAID later says all of it has been distributed within Gaza.

MAY 25: High winds and heavy seas damage the pier and cause four U.S. Army vessels operating there to become beached, injuring three service members, including one who is in critical condition.

Two vessels went aground in Gaza near the base of the pier and two went aground near Ashkelon in Israel.

MAY 28: Large portions of the causeway were pulled from the beach and moved to an Israeli port for repairs. The base of the causeway remains at the Gaza shore.

June: big crises for the pier

JUNE 7: The damaged causeway was rebuilt and reconnected to the beach in Gaza.

JUNE 8: The U.S. military announced that deliveries resumed off the repaired and reinstalled dock.

The same day, Israel rescued four hostages taken by Hamas during the Oct. 7 attacks in an operation that killed 270 Palestinians.

JUNE 9: World Food Program chief Cindy McCain announced a “pause” in cooperation with the U.S. pier during a TV interview, citing the previous day’s “incident” and the rocketing of two WFP warehouses that injured a staffer.

JUNE 10: WFP said the U.N. would conduct a security review to assess the safety of its staff in handling aid deliveries from the pier. In the meantime, the U.S. military said it would stockpile aid shipments on a secure beach in Gaza.

Ryder, the Pentagon spokesman, said no aspect of the pier or its equipment had been used in Israel’s rescue operation. The Pentagon says an area south of the pier was used for the return of the freed hostages back to Israel.

JUNE 14: The pier was detached from the beach in Gaza to prevent damage during rough seas and allow the military to reattach it more quickly later, U.S. officials said.

JUNE 19: The pier was re-anchored in Gaza and more than 656 metric tons, or 1.4 million pounds, of aid was delivered in the hours after it resumed operations, Ryder said.

Aid agencies, however, did not restart their distribution of the aid, so workers have been storing it in the secure area.

JUNE 28: The pier is removed due to weather, and the U.S. is considering not putting it back unless aid begins heading again to Palestinians in need, several U.S. officials said.

As the jet sits on the deck of the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea, its markings illuminate the enemy targets that it’s destroyed in recent months and underscore the intensity of the fight to protect commercial shipping from persistent missile and drone attacks by the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.

But they also hint at the fatigue setting in, as the carrier, its strike group and about 7,000 sailors close in on their ninth month waging the most intense running sea battle since World War II. That raises difficult questions about what comes next as U.S. military and defense leaders wrangle over how they will replicate the carrier’s combat power if the ship returns home to Norfolk, Virginia.

Already, the carrier’s deployment has been extended twice, and sailors post dark memes around the ship about only getting one short break during their steadily growing tour. Some worry they could be ordered to stay out even longer as the campaign drags on to protect global trade in the vital Red Sea corridor.

At the Pentagon, leaders are wrestling with what has become a thorny but familiar debate. Do they bow to Navy pressure to bring the Eisenhower and the other three warships in its strike group home or heed U.S. Central Command’s plea to keep them there longer? And if they bring them home — what can replace them?

U.S. officials say that they’re weighing all options and that a decision is expected in the coming weeks.

U.S. commanders in the Middle East have long argued that they need an aircraft carrier in the volatile region. They say that it’s an effective deterrent to keep Iran in check and that the ship gives them critical and unique war-fighting capabilities against the Houthis, who say their attacks are aimed at bringing an end to the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.

The massive ship is a flexible, floating flight line that can launch fighter jets on a moment’s notice, without any of the limits that host nations in the Middle East can place on Air Force aircraft taking off from bases on their soil. And those carrier-based jets can get within striking distance of Houthi weapon systems quickly without crossing borders.

“What the carrier brings is an offensive platform that’s mobile, agile and doesn’t have any access, basing or overflight restrictions,” said retired Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, who headed U.S. Central Command for three years, ending in 2022. “It’s sovereign U.S. territory. You can do as you want with those airplanes on that carrier. So that gives you enormous flexibility when you consider response options across the region.”

Rear Adm. Marc Miguez — who commands Carrier Strike Group Two, which includes the Eisenhower and supporting ships — agrees that the aircraft carrier is crucial to America’s military.

“Every time that there’s a crisis on the globe, what’s the first thing the president asks? ‘Where are the U.S. aircraft carriers?’” Miguez told The Associated Press during a visit to the Eisenhower and the USS Laboon, one of the guided-missile destroyers accompanying it.

On any given day, Navy F/A-18s roar off the Eisenhower and take out Houthi missiles or drones preparing to launch. The U.S. warships have fired volleys of Tomahawk missiles into Yemen to destroy warehouses of weapons, communications facilities and other targets.

Pentagon leaders worry that without the Eisenhower, they will need to tap more Air Force fighter jets based in surrounding countries, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

But many Arab nations place flight or other restrictions on the types of offensive strikes the U.S. can do from their land because of regional sensitivities. Others worry about triggering another war between Saudi Arabia and Yemen or inflaming tensions with Iran.

U.S. military leaders say the U.S. can adapt and get forces where they need to be. But that can require longer fighter jet flights from distant bases, requiring refueling capabilities and presenting other hurdles.

Extending the Eisenhower’s deployment again is an option — but for many, it’s the least desirable.

Navy leaders worry about the sailors, who actually have been able to see incoming Houthi-launched missiles seconds before they are destroyed by the ship’s defensive strikes. And officials in the Pentagon are talking about how to care for the sailors when they return home, including counseling and treatment for possible post-traumatic stress.

Miguez also notes the strain on the ships themselves.

“We are constantly reminding the Department of Defense that we’re going to need to take a respite and a break, to try and get back to maintenance,” he said. “These ships are floating around in seawater. They’re steel, and they require a lot of maintenance. And when you run them past red lines, when you run them past scheduled maintenance activities, you have to pay those off somewhere down the line.”

A third option would be sending other ships — perhaps another carrier — to take the Eisenhower’s place. But the massive ships are relatively rare. The U.S. operates 11, which is about 40% of the total number worldwide. Other countries have only one or two.

The U.S. could turn to France or the United Kingdom, which each have one, for at least a temporary stint in the Red Sea. U.S. officials have insisted that protecting the sea lanes is a multinational effort and having an ally take a turn could reinforce that message. It could give the U.S. enough breathing room to get another American carrier there, perhaps late this year.

Of the 11 U.S. carriers, four are deployed, three are in training and preparing to deploy, and four are in routine maintenance and repair, which usually lasts about a year or more.

The USS John C. Stennis, however, is undergoing its major, mid-life overhaul, which can last about four years and calls for the replacement and upgrading of the ship’s nuclear propulsion system and other critical radar, communications, electronics and combat components. A carrier’s lifespan is about 50 years.

One carrier is always based in Japan and does regional patrols and exercises, and another is generally deployed to the Asia-Pacific. That focus on Asia reflects the long-stated belief that China is America’s top strategic challenge, and 60% of U.S. naval forces are based in the Pacific. The rest are Atlantic-based.

A third carrier is off South America’s west coast, heading toward Japan, leaving the Eisenhower as the only one in the Middle East or Europe.

Lacking a carrier, another option would be to deploy the USS Wasp, a large amphibious assault ship now in Europe that carries F-35 fighter jets. Those jets do short takeoffs and vertical landings, so they can do strike missions off smaller ships.

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Baldor reported from Washington.

U.S. Southern Command said the Norfolk-based USS Helena, a nuclear-powered fast attack submarine, pulled into the waters near the U.S. base in Cuba on Thursday, just a day after a Russian frigate, a nuclear-powered submarine, an oil tanker and a rescue tug crossed into Havana Bay after drills in the Atlantic Ocean.

The stop is part of a “routine port visit” as the submarine travels through Southern Command’s region, it said in a social media post.

Other U.S. ships also have been tracking and monitoring the Russian drills, which Pentagon officials say do not represent a threat to the United States.

“This is not a surprise. We’ve seen them do these type of port calls before,” Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said Wednesday when asked about the Russian drills. “We of course take it seriously, but these exercises don’t pose a threat to the United States.”

The exercises, however, come less than two weeks after President Joe Biden authorized Ukraine to use U.S.-provided weapons to strike inside Russia to protect Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city. Russian President Vladimir Putin then suggested his military could respond with “asymmetrical steps” elsewhere in the world.

Singh said it wouldn’t be a surprise to see more Russian activity around the United States in such global exercises. The drills are in international waters, and U.S. officials expect the Russian ships to remain in the region through the summer and possibly also stop in Venezuela.

Russia is a longtime ally of Venezuela and Cuba, and its warships and aircraft have periodically made forays into the Caribbean.

Russian ships have occasionally docked in Havana since 2008, when a group of Russian vessels entered Cuban waters in what state media described as the first such visit in almost two decades. In 2015, a reconnaissance and communications ship arrived unannounced in Havana a day before the start of discussions between U.S. and Cuban officials on the reopening of diplomatic relations.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin signed the order last week to extend the four ships’ deployment for a second time, rather than bring the carrier, the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, and its three warships home. The other ships in the strike group are the USS Philippine Sea, a cruiser, and two destroyers, the USS Gravely and the USS Mason. All together they include about 6,000 sailors.

The decision means the sailors and the carrier’s Air Wing won’t be home until the middle of the summer, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a decision not made public. The officials declined to provide exact dates.

A normal ship deployment lasts for about seven months, and the ships left their homeport of Norfolk, Virginia, in October. Austin approved the first order to extend their deployment about four weeks ago.

Austin had weighed the decision for a further extension for some time. Navy leaders routinely press to bring ships home in order to maintain a repair schedule and give sailors a needed break. But U.S. Central Command leaders have long argued that having a carrier in the region is critical for international security, including as a deterrent to Iran.

In recent months, the ships have played a critical role in protecting commercial and military vessels from a dramatic surge in attacks in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden by the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen. And officials say that a significant U.S. naval commitment to the region sends a strong signal to the commercial shipping industry that vessels can get protection as they travel the crucial transit route through the Red Sea, from the Suez Canal to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.

About 12% of the world’s trade typically passes through the waterway that separates Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, including oil, natural gas, grain and everything from toys to electronics.

The Houthis have attacked ships since November, saying they want to force Israel to end its offensive in the Gaza Strip against Hamas. But the ships targeted by the Houthis have largely had little or no connection to Israel, the U.S. or other nations involved in the war. The rebels have also fired missiles toward Israel, though they have largely fallen short or been intercepted.

The Eisenhower and its strike group have been involved in routine operations against the Houthis all year. They also have participated in five major joint missions with British forces to target dozens of the militant group’s drones, missile launchers and other facilities and targets.

The ships are also spearheading Operation Prosperity Guardian, which was announced by Austin in December as a multinational mission to ensure security and freedom of navigation in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.

On Thursday, for example, F/A-18 fighter jets off the Eisenhower struck an array of targets in Yemen, in response to a recent increase in attacks by the group. And other ships in the strike group also launched missiles as part of the operation.

Any decision to bring the carrier home would leave the region without the ship-based fighter jets, and commanders would have to rely more heavily on land-based aircraft or other warships, which don’t have fighter jets, to take out Houthi drones or other munitions that are preparing to launch.

According to Lt. Cmdr. Lauren Chatmas, the strike group’s aircraft have flown more than 12,100 sorties, totaling over 27,200 flight hours, and they’ve launched more than 350 air-to-surface weapons and more than 50 air-to-air missiles. The warships have each traveled more than 55,000 miles, and they’ve launched more than 100 Standard and Tomahawk missiles. In all, the strike group has gone after about 430 either pre-planned or dynamic targets in its mission to defend U.S., coalition and merchant ships.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Trucks carrying badly needed aid for the Gaza Strip rolled across a newly built U.S. pier and into the besieged enclave for the first time Friday as Israeli restrictions on border crossings and heavy fighting hindered the delivery of food and other supplies.

The shipment is the first in an operation that American military officials anticipate could scale up to 150 truckloads a day, all while Israel presses in on the southern city of Rafah in its seven-month offensive against Hamas, which has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union.

But the U.S. and aid groups warn that the floating pier project is not a substitute for land deliveries that could bring in all the food, water and fuel needed in Gaza. Before the war, more than 500 truckloads entered the territory on an average day.

The operation’s success also remains tenuous because of the risk of attack, logistical hurdles and a growing shortage of fuel for the aid trucks due to the Israeli blockade of Gaza since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack. Terrorists killed 1,200 people and took 250 others hostage in that assault on southern Israel. The Israeli offensive since has killed more than 35,000 Palestinians in Gaza, local health officials say, while hundreds more have been killed in the West Bank.

Aid agencies say they are running out of food in southern Gaza and fuel is dwindling, while the U.S. Agency for International Development and the U.N. World Food Program say famine has already taken hold in Gaza’s north.

Troops finished installing the floating pier on Thursday, and the U.S. military’s Central Command said the first aid crossed into Gaza at 9 a.m. Friday. It said no American troops went ashore in the operation.

The Pentagon said no backups were expected in the distribution process. The U.S. plan is for the United Nations, through its World Food Program, to take charge of the aid once it leaves the pier. This will involve coordinating the arrival of empty trucks and their registration, overseeing the transfer of goods coming through the floating dock to the trucks and their dispatch to warehouses across Gaza, and, finally, handing over the supplies to aid groups for delivery.

The U.K. said some of its aid for Gaza was in the first shipment that went ashore, including the first of 8,400 kits to provide temporary shelter made of plastic sheeting. And it said more aid, including 2,000 additional shelter kits, 900 tents, five forklift trucks and 9,200 hygiene kits, will follow in the coming weeks.

“This is the culmination of a Herculean joint international effort,” said Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. “We know the maritime route is not the only answer. We need to see more land routes open, including via the Rafah crossing, to ensure much more aid gets safely to civilians in desperate need of help.”

Aid distribution had not yet begun as of Friday afternoon, said a U.N. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. The official said the process of unloading and reloading cargo was still ongoing.

The U.N. humanitarian aid coordinating agency said the start of the operation was welcome but not a replacement for deliveries by land.

“I think everyone in the operation has said it: Any and all aid into Gaza is welcome by any route,” Jens Laerke, spokesman of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told journalists in Geneva on Friday. Getting aid to people in Gaza “cannot and should not depend on a floating dock far from where needs are most acute.”

The U.N. earlier said fuel deliveries brought through land routes have all but stopped and that would make it extremely difficult to bring the aid to Gaza’s people.

“It doesn’t matter how the aid comes, whether it’s by sea or whether by land, without fuel, aid won’t get to the people,” U.N. deputy spokesperson Farhan Haq said Thursday.

Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh said the issue of fuel deliveries comes up in all U.S. conversations with the Israelis. She also said the plan is to begin slowly with the sea route and ramp up the truck deliveries over time as they work the kinks out of the system.

Israel fears Hamas will use fuel in the war, but it asserts it places no limits on the entry of humanitarian aid and blames the U.N. for delays in distributing goods entering Gaza. Under pressure from the U.S., Israel has opened a pair of crossings to deliver aid into the territory’s hard-hit north in recent weeks.

It has said that a series of Hamas attacks on the main crossing, Kerem Shalom, have disrupted the flow of goods. The U.N. says fighting, Israeli fire and chaotic security conditions have hindered delivery. There have also been violent protests by Israelis that disrupted aid shipments.

Israel recently seized the Rafah border crossing in its push against Hamas around that city on the Egyptian border, raising fears about civilians’ safety while also cutting off the main entry for aid into the Gaza Strip.

U.S. President Joe Biden ordered the pier project, expected to cost $320 million. The boatloads of aid will be deposited at a port facility built by the Israelis just southwest of Gaza City and then distributed by aid groups.

U.S. officials said the initial shipment totaled as much as 500 tons of aid. The U.S. has closely coordinated with Israel on how to protect the ships and personnel working on the beach.

But there are still questions about the safety of aid workers who distribute the food, said Sonali Korde, assistant to the administrator of USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance, which is helping with logistics.

“There is a very insecure operating environment,” and aid groups are still struggling to get clearance for their planned movements in Gaza, Korde said.

That concern was highlighted last month when an Israeli strike killed seven relief workers from World Central Kitchen whose trip had been coordinated with Israeli officials. The group had also brought aid in by sea.

Pentagon officials have made it clear that security conditions will be monitored closely and could prompt a shutdown of the maritime route, even if just temporarily. Navy Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, a deputy commander at the U.S. military’s Central Command, told reporters Thursday that “we are confident in the ability of this security arrangement to protect those involved.”

Already, the site has been targeted by mortar fire during its construction, and Hamas has threatened to target any foreign forces who “occupy” the Gaza Strip.

Biden has made it clear that there will be no U.S. forces on the ground in Gaza, so third-country contractors will drive the trucks onto the shore.

Israeli forces are in charge of security on shore, but there are also two U.S. Navy warships nearby that can protect U.S. troops and others.

The aid for the sea route is collected and inspected in Cyprus, then loaded onto ships and taken about 200 miles (320 kilometers) to the large floating pier off the Gaza coast. There, the pallets are transferred onto the trucks that then drive onto the Army boats, which will shuttle the trucks from the pier to a floating causeway anchored to the beach. Once the trucks drop off the aid, they return to the boats.

Gambrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press writers Jamey Keaten in Geneva, Julia Frankel in Jerusalem, Jill Lawless in London and Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed.