United States Sixth Fleet

And NATO came in.

And together with NATO came eventually the US 6th Fleet and also using the runways for the Royal Air Force and for the US Air Force, taking the little bits of land in Malta from the farmers also to build these.

So that actually, that kind of... stealth actually helped to fuel the independence movement.

And that independence wasn't just sovereignty, but also getting rid of the military and naval bases.

So it was kind of a couple of weeks, but a lot of people got killed.

And, uh, yeah, I mean, I was glad to be a, a part of that Sixth Fleet.

The Sixth Fleet, and uh, it ended up the US had shipped over all kinds of weapons for Israel to, you know, to keep its sovereignty or whatever.

So I feel in a way I was a somewhat a little part of that with, uh, with going over there and, uh, being ready to be deployed if necessary.

Yeah.

"But after the injustice was so much, after we saw the transgression and the coalition between Americans and the Israelis against our people in Palestine and Lebanon, it occurred to my mind that we deal with the towers.

And these special events that directly and personally affected me go back to nineteen eighty-two and what happened when America gave permission for Israel to invade Lebanon, and assistance was given by the American Sixth Fleet.

During those crucial moments, my mind was thinking about many things that are hard to describe, but they produced a feeling to refuse and reject injustice, and I determine, and I had determination to punish the transgressors.

And as I was looking to those towers that were destroyed in Lebanon, it occurred to me that we have to punish the transgressor with the same, and that we had to destroy the towers in America so that they taste what we tasted, and they stopped killing our women and children." So again- I don't buy that in the sense that I agree with it, but it makes sense.

I remember having, uh...

I was working for the commander of the 6th Fleet in Italy, and my lieutenant was a former enlisted Marine, uh, commissioned as a Navy officer.

And it's just one of those things where you, you, you never lose the, the branch you came up in, right? It's still, it's like where you come from, right? So-

Sure

Y ya nos pusimos ahí.

Ahora dice: "Pues tú me mandas un barco de guerra, pues yo te mando aquí la, la Sexta Flota con el USS Eisenhower".

Y claro, me mandó un tal, me empezó a atacar y ahora me atacó una isla de las mías.

Me atacó una isla de las mías y ya, pff, ya sí, ¡buu! Sonaron las sirenas de alarma por todo el archipiélago y mandé a, bueno, mandé a la Quinta Flota allí y me hizo gracia porque le, l-le gané y le eché de la isla, ¿no? Porque además, por el orden de turno, como yo iba primero, el orden de turno es importantísimo.

Towards the end of my time in active duty, I was the TLAM officer.

Tomahawk cruise missiles, I helped to run them out of Sixth Fleet.

And there was a destroyer captain, a guy that had come out of the surface Navy, and he was talking about how he was going to be moving his forces around in order to keep the opponent from being able to understand how he might be able to tactically employ Tomahawks.

I mean, it's dumb because you can be a thousand miles away.

And then we're now 30 days away from the U.S. midterm elections.

So by the time that gets there, I think... based on the timing and the deployment of troops and what assets are going to be in theater, that it's very likely that the USS Theodore Roosevelt will not replace the USS George Washington, but add to the fleet under the combined joint force of Fifth and Sixth Fleet under Central Command in the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman.

And that would give now the USS Theodore Roosevelt.

And I'm not saying that it would stay there indefinitely in terms of another forward rotation, but we could see operational overlap, which if you consider then the composition and disposition of forces, we'll have the USS Theodore Roosevelt, we'll have the USS George Washington, we'll have the USS Bush, and we'll have the USS Boxer, and we'll have the USS Macon, which is now deploying with a fresh Marine Expeditionary Unit.