os Angeles-class nuclear-powered attack submarines Honolulu and Cheyenne were also assigned to the battle group. Within days, Carrier Air Wing Fourteen (CVW-14) had flown aboard and the battle group set course due west to commence the deployment.
Abe’s 2002 cruise occurred during a critical juncture in world history. Terrorists, at the direction of Osama bin Laden, had attacked America by striking the World Trade Center less than a year before; U.S. and allied forces had overthrown the Taliban and were well into an extended occupation of Afghanistan, and preparations were now underway for an invasion of Iraq. With the War on Terror being waged at full bore, it was easy to foresee Abraham Lincoln playing a critical role in the campaigns to come.
The first month-plus of CVN-72’s deployment took place in the Western Pacific, featuring port calls in Sasebo, Japan, Hong King, and Singapore. According to the ship’s official command history for 2002, the carrier then transited the Indian Ocean, relieving USS George Washington (CVN-73) on, coincidentally enough, September 11, and commenced air operations into Afghanistan from its station in the North Arabian Sea. Abe’s participation in Operation Enduring Freedom was uneventful and lasted little over a month, however; on Oct. 21, the battle group charted course for the Persian Gulf, where its first stop was Bahrain, headquarters of the Navy’s Fifth Fleet.
Come Oct. 28, Lincoln was patrolling the Gulf and her air wing commenced Southern Watch operations, the no-fly zone covering southern Iraq, which had now been in place for over a decade. Unlike in years past, however, the missions, this time around, constituted anything but uneventful airspace policing.
Three months earlier, in a major policy shift that went unnoticed by the public at the time, the U.S. and its Coalition partners decided to escalate the air war against Saddam Hussein. It was a response to an increasing number of no-fly zone violations and provocations by Iraq, but also a means of softening up Saddam’s defenses in preparation for an eventual ground offensive. Codenamed Southern Focus, this new effort was conducted under the guise of no-fly zone enforcement, even as it became clear the Bush administration was clearly on a path to war.
For the next month-plus, CVW-14 formed the spearhead of Southern Focus, joining forces with Air Force, Marine Corps, and British warplanes to tighten the noose around Baghdad and shape the battlefield. If it was not officially a war yet, it certainly appeared that way to the pilots. CVW-14’s commanding officer, Navy Capt. Kevin Albright, summed it up bluntly when he told the media, “They’re shooting a lot at us. It seems to me they’re really trying hard to shoot one of us down.”
Numerous strikes took place during Lincoln’s time on-station, with one of the more significant ones occurring on Nov. 6. That day, an air defense facility and surface-to-air missile sites near Al Kut were struck, almost 100 miles southeast of Baghdad. It was also the combat debut of the Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet, which had then been in active service for only a few years. Lts. Eric Doyle and John Turner, both assigned to Strike Fighter Squadron 115 (VFA-115) “Eagles,” each flew a single-seat Super Hornet on the strike, employing satellite-guided JDAM bombs against a command bunker, achieving direct hits. Despite being fired upon by Iraqi air defenses in response, both pilots returned safely to Lincoln.
Additional strikes followed. The dates vary depending on the source, but CVW-14 warplanes also struck an air defense command and control bunker at Tallil Air Base in the city of Nasiriyah in southeast Iraq. Later in the month, more strikes took place, including an exceptionally large one on either the 23rd or 24th (again, depending on the source). The following morning, a voice on the carrier’s main announcing circuit proclaimed that more bombs were dropped the night prior than ever before.
Operation Iraqi Freedom was still months away from commencement, but, for the pilots of CVW-14, they were already at war