The USS George Washington, a US Navy aircraft carrier that was deployed in the Pacific before being redeployed to the Middle East [Herald DB]
The USS George Washington, a US Navy aircraft carrier that was deployed in the Pacific before being redeployed to the Middle East [Herald DB]

Concerns are mounting that a genuine security vacuum is forming in the Pacific, as the US Navy has redeployed its Pacific-based aircraft carrier to the Middle East while scaling back joint exercises with South Korea. Even if no armed conflict breaks out immediately, China's push to expand its influence across the Pacific is expected to deepen regional allies' doubts about US security commitments.

The War Zone, a US military news outlet, reported Tuesday (local time) that the George Washington Carrier Strike Group, previously stationed in the Pacific, passed through the Strait of Singapore on Aug. 13 and is heading to the Middle East. The move is intended to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, which has been conducting maritime operations in the region.

The Lincoln has been at sea for nine months, leaving its crew worn out — a problem that lawmakers have recently flagged. Reports indicate that some sailors, unable to endure the stress of nine months without setting foot on land, have jumped overboard.

The US military denied those accounts but ultimately decided to have the George Washington take over the Lincoln's mission. The George Washington is a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered carrier homeported at Yokosuka, Japan, where it has been permanently stationed since 2008.

With the George Washington's departure for the Middle East, the Pacific now has no US carrier present. The military made a similar move in August 2024, also pulling its carrier from the Pacific amid rising tensions in the Middle East.

Before that, a carrier-free Pacific had never been a reality. As US-China rivalry intensifies, the absence of an aircraft carrier — the symbol of American naval power — from the Pacific raises the prospect that China will seize the opportunity to expand its influence in the region.

Axios, the US political news outlet, said the carrier's absence compounds an already troubling picture: President Donald Trump has sharply reduced joint US-South Korea military exercises with an eye toward resuming talks with North Korea, and is set to hold a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping next month. Together, Axios said, these moves could strengthen China's argument that US security commitments are not credible.

If the Iran war drags on and the George Washington's Middle East deployment is extended, the Pacific could go without a US carrier for months.

Retired US Marine Corps Col. Mark Cancian told Axios that while a full-scale Chinese invasion remains unlikely, Beijing "could use the gap to increase its presence in the Pacific."

Brian Clark, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, said Taiwan, the Philippines and Japan would be watching China demonstrate its military capabilities without the United States present. "If this pattern continues, they will start to question whether the US will actually come to their support in a crisis," he said.

Clark added that China would not even need to go to war if it could convince neighboring countries that the United States would not protect them. Deepening doubts about US security commitments, he said, could naturally pull those countries toward China's orbit even without Beijing flexing its military muscle.

In an editorial published Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal said Trump had ordered the reduction of joint US-South Korea exercises as a conciliatory gesture toward North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, and had criticized South Korea for allegedly refusing to join efforts on Iran's denuclearization. The paper said these moves "will further reinforce the perception in Asia and Europe that America is becoming an unreliable ally."

The editorial also said calls for South Korea to develop its own nuclear arsenal could grow louder, and criticized Trump for causing the world to question US capabilities, even if unintentionally. The Journal added that China is welcoming the George Washington's move to the Middle East and is using it to argue to neighboring countries that they cannot rely on the United States for their defense.


kate01@heraldcorp.com