America just sent a third aircraft carrier toward Iran and bombing could resume after the midterms
1 hour ago · 2 October 2026Share
The U.S. Navy aircraft carriers USS Nimitz, USS Theodore Roosevelt and USS Ronald Reagan underway in the Western Pacific in November 2017. File photo. U.S. Navy photo by Lt. j.g. James Griffin · Public domain
He told Time magazine that heavy bombing of Iran could start again after the November midterm elections, if there's no deal with Tehran by then.
Here's his exact line about the war so far. He says quote "by annihilating Iran, we've created peace in the world" and that with Iran, he doesn't think peace is possible at all.
That interview happened in the Oval Office. It ran 75 minutes. Time published it two days ago.
So how long has this war even been going? It started on 28 February this year, under the codename Operation Epic Fury. That's seven or eight months, depending which report you read.
And the cost so far is brutal. 19 US troops are dead. More than 800 are wounded. Back in April it was 13 dead and under 400 wounded. The war has already cost America more than $25 billion.
Trump also told Time that some ammunition has been running low. So he's made deals with Raytheon and Lockheed Martin to restock it, including new Patriot and THAAD missile production.
Now here's the twist. While Trump was saying all this, ships were already moving.
The USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group left San Diego five days ago. It's got its air wing, destroyers and the guided-missile cruiser USS Chosin with it.
A day later, the USS Makin Island group sailed too, carrying around 2,000 Marines from the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit.
Put those two together and you get more than 7,000 sailors and roughly 2,000 Marines. Different reports put the total at 9,000 to 10,000 people.
And a US official told Al Jazeera that American naval power around Iran is about to grow again. Two more carriers and two landing groups are expected in the region by the end of November.
Two carriers, the USS George H.W. Bush and the USS George Washington, are already in the Arabian Sea. The USS Boxer amphibious group and several destroyers are out there with them.
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Contains modified NASA satellite imagery showing the Persian Gulf region. File photo.NASA · Public domain
So if all three carriers end up in the region at once, that's the first time since April that three US carrier strike groups have been in the Middle East together. The last time that happened, a ceasefire was about to collapse. Fighting started back up in late summer.
So why now?
US officials told the Wall Street Journal this is about giving Washington more military options if talks with Iran fail. Some aides have privately floated resuming strikes in November, right after the vote.
The White House's public line is that these are just routine rotations.
But three carrier groups overlapping at once isn't routine. It's happened once before this year. In April. Right before the ceasefire fell apart.
Trump also said he turned down a recent Iranian proposal. It would have reopened the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for the US ending a port blockade or easing oil sanctions.
So that's Trump walking away from a deal that would have calmed the one chokepoint this whole war keeps circling back to.
There's tension closer to home too. Trump's relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's Prime Minister, has gotten rockier. A senior administration official says Netanyahu pushed Trump toward war in the first place, but has since bombed Hezbollah targets in Lebanon against Trump's wishes.
And politically, Trump isn't in a strong spot. A Reuters and Ipsos poll in September put his approval rating at 32 per cent. That's the lowest of his entire political career. The midterms will decide who controls Congress.
Markets felt it immediately. Brent crude jumped 4.4 per cent to settle at $102.31 a barrel the day the deployment news broke. US crude, West Texas Intermediate, climbed 2.7 per cent to $92.87 a barrel.
Iran hasn't said anything publicly yet, not about Trump's comments, not about the ships.
So here's what we don't know. Whether Trump actually orders new strikes. How Iran responds if he does. Whether the midterm result changes his mind either way. And whether Gulf allies like Saudi Arabia and the UAE have even been told about the timing.
Right now, the ships are moving. And the clock is set for after the vote.
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