Coast Guard shifts cutter squadron from Middle East to Pacific

Six Coast Guard fast-response cutters are now operating in the western Pacific after more than two decades in the Middle East, in the latest shift of forces to that theater.

Last week the Coast Guard announced that the six Sentinel-class cutters that made up Patrol Forces Southwest Asia are now on the other side of the world, with a mission to “protect the homeland and maritime approaches including Guam and the Pacific Islands.”

The ships are now operating out of Singapore and Subic Bay in the Philippines, Janes reported. The shift to the Pacific is meant to help bolster the American presence around the South China Sea and surrounding waters. The squadron comprises: USCGC Robert Goldman, USCGC Charles Moulthrope, USCGC Glen Harris, USCGC Emlen Tunnell, USCGC John Scheuerman and USCGC Clarence Sutphin Jr.

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“Coast Guard forces have always adapted to meet urgent national needs,” Adm. Kevin Lunday, Commandant of the Coast Guard, said in the service’s announcement. “The Expeditionary Cutter Squadron enhances the Coast Guard’s ability to deploy our forces in support of Combatant Commanders and national security objectives. Our expeditionary cutter forces provide Combatant Commands with uniquely capable maritime assets, leveraging the Coast Guard’s military and law enforcement authorities to advance U.S. national security objectives in the Western Pacific and Western Hemisphere.”

USNI News reported that the cutters had been spotted in the western Pacific earlier this year, before the Coast Guard’s announcement.

The shift ends the squadron’s lengthy mission in the Middle East. Patrol Forces Southwest Asia was set up in 2002 in the build up to the invasion of Iraq. For more than two decades Coast Guard cutters assigned to it patrolled the waters around the Persian Gulf, conducting interdiction missions, coastal defense operations and training with other members of the U.S. military. It had been based out of Bahrain, home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet. The United States plans to withdraw all troops from Iraq by the end of September, the Department of Defense announced earlier this month.

The deployment of the six ships is the latest move to strengthen the U.S. military’s presence in the western Pacific. Alongside boosting defense capabilities on Guam, the military has been deploying drone units, new rotational forces and testing new anti-ship missile systems around the Philippines, Japan and elsewhere in the region.

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