The Italian carrier ITS Cavour sails alongside the USS Abraham Lincoln somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, Aug. 9, 2024. (Valerie Morrison/U.S. Navy)
Two Italian warships pulled into Guam’s Apra Harbor on Sunday, the Italian navy’s inaugural visit to the island, just days after its first-ever drill with the U.S. Navy in the region.
Italy’s strike group, composed of the carrier ITS Cavour and frigate ITS Alpino, stopped by the U.S. territory as they transit from Darwin, Australia, to Japan later this month, Cavour spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Rosario Naimo said by email Monday.
The ships and their crews — approximately 1,200 sailors — are at Naval Base Guam and scheduled to leave for Japan on Wednesday, he wrote. They’re slated to arrive at Yokosuka Naval Base on Aug. 22.
“While on this beautiful island, crew members of both ships will have the opportunity to rest and participate in local tours, getting ready for the next ride to Japan,” Naimo said, adding that the sailors are under no restrictions.
The Italian ships arrived two days after drilling with the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and its strike group in the Pacific Ocean in what the U.S. Navy described as a “Multi-Large Deck Event,” according to a Saturday news release from the Abraham Lincoln.
The two strike groups, totaling more than 7,500 sailors and Marines, practiced joint communications, air warfare training and cross-deck flight operations.
“This was a great opportunity to operate with our close NATO Ally, Italy, in the Indo-Pacific,” Rear Adm. Adan Cruz, commander of Carrier Strike Group 3, said in the release. “Our efforts are critical in ensuring a free and open Indo-Pacific region.”
U.S. and Italian navy aircraft fly in formation over the Pacific Ocean, Aug. 9, 2024. C (Valerie Morrison/U.S. Navy)
The U.S. and its allies continued to see the Indo-Pacific region as a high priority, with their main concerns being Chinese aggression in the South China Sea and North Korean missile launches.
The exercise was a first for the Italian and U.S. navies in the Indo-Pacific, but the two often train elsewhere in the world. The Cavour recently joined the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower for a drill in the Red Sea, Naimo said.
The Abraham Lincoln strike group, which completed its own four-day stop on Guam and nearby Saipan on Thursday, is en route to the Middle East to relieve the USS Theodore Roosevelt strike group.
U.S. carriers have routinely operated in the Red Sea over the past year, where they aim to defend commercial shipping vessels and allied warships from near-daily drone and missile attacks by Houthi militants acting against Israel in retaliation for the Israel-Hamas war.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Sunday told Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant that he’s ordered the Abraham Lincoln Strike Group to “accelerate its transit” to the Middle East, according to a Defense Department statement that day. It said Austin also sent the Ohio-class ballistic-missile submarine USS Georgia to the region.
Austin ordered the strike group and other guided-missile warships to U.S. European Command and U.S. Central Command theaters on Aug. 2, along with promises to “increase our readiness to deploy land-based ballistic missile defense,” the Defense Department said in a news release that day.
