losing international support<\/a> because of its \u201cindiscriminate bombing\u201d of Gaza.<\/p>\nThe secretary\u2019s remarks underscored the administration\u2019s effort to confine the war between Israel and Hamas to Gaza, and keep it from spilling over into a broader regional conflict.<\/p>\n
On Oct. 8, the day after the Hamas-led attacks on Israel that killed 1,200 people, Mr. Biden ordered the carrier to the eastern Mediterranean Sea, off the Israeli coast, in an effort to deter Iran and its proxies in the region from widening the war.<\/p>\n
So far, that deterrence has held, but just barely.<\/p>\n
Israel and Hezbollah have increasingly traded fire along Israel\u2019s northern border, threatening to open a second front in the war. Iran-backed militias have carried out more than 100 attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria, injuring nearly six dozen soldiers. And Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen have fired more than 100 missiles and drones at ships in the Red Sea, prompting the Pentagon this week to create a new naval task force to confront the threat.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cCertainly, we are concerned about the conflict, the crisis spreading to the wider region, but to date I think we\u2019ve done a really good job of preventing that from happening, and we\u2019ll stay focused on that,\u201d Mr. Austin told reporters after meeting with sailors in the ship\u2019s cavernous hangar bay.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Mr. Austin wrapped up a four-day trip to the Middle East this week with a 90-minute stop aboard the Ford, the newest and most technologically advanced carrier in the U.S. fleet.<\/p>\n
The carrier\u2019s six-month tour \u2014 a momentous maiden operational deployment \u2014 has already been extended three times because of the crisis in Gaza, and it is now in its eighth month at sea. The Ford was preparing to make a port call in France before heading home when it received the orders to rush to the eastern Mediterranean. Days later, its squadrons of F\/A-18 Super Hornets were within striking distance of Israel.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were the right ship at the right time,\u201d Capt. Rick Burgess, the Ford\u2019s commanding officer, said in an interview.<\/p>\n
Since then, the Ford\u2019s combat aircraft have flown more than routine training and presence 2,500 missions, though they have not flown any surveillance or other operational missions near Israel or Gaza, ship officials said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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On Wednesday, Mr. Austin thanked the carrier\u2019s 4,000-member crew for spending the holiday season far from home.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s hard for potential bad actors to take up the sea space here,\u201d said Captain Burgess, a Naval Academy graduate and fighter pilot, who said no other vessels, drones or other aircraft have challenged the ship since it arrived.<\/p>\n
Just before leaving the ship, Mr. Austin watched two Super Hornets roar off the flight deck, one after the other, hurled into the skies by a new electromagnetic launching technology on the Ford that replaced the steam-powered catapults used on all other Navy carriers for decades.<\/p>\n
The flight deck is the bustling hub of this nuclear-powered behemoth. Sailors in light helmets and goggles, mostly in their early 20s, scurry about in vests and long-sleeve shirts color-coded to their jobs \u2014 red shirts handle bombs, purple shirts handle fuel, yellow shirts handle the flights.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n