France is sending its aircraft
carrier to the Persian Gulf to serve a support role in the country's
bombing campaign against ISIS in Iraq, the AFP reported on January 6.
The decision to deploy the
Charles de Gaulle was made before the attack on the satirical magazine
Charlie Hebdo and the subsequent hostage crises that claimed 17 lives
and shook the nation last week.
But in light of French defense minister Jean Yves Le-Drain's assertion this week
that "ISIS must be wiped out," the deployment looks to be part of a
long-term engagement in the Middle East for what is Europe's largest
military force.
"Thanks to the Charles de Gaulle
we will have intelligence ... we may also conduct operations in Iraq,"
President François Hollande told military personnel in the annual
presidential address from aboard the 38,000-ton carrier on Wednesday.
Here's a look at the French navy's flagship.
Jacky Naegelen/Reuters French sailors stand guard during the visit of
the French president and other government members to the new nuclear
aircraft carrier's inauguration on May 7, 1994.>
Construction on France's first
nuclear-powered carrier began in 1987. Budget constraints halted the
process on four occasions in the early '90s until the Charles de
Gaulle's inauguration in 1994. But the ship would only be launched in
2001.
During final seaworthiness tests
in the Bermuda triangle in November 2000, part of the blade from one of
the carrier's 19-ton propellers (below on the left) broke off. The
Telegraph called
the incident a "further twist" in one of "the most embarrassing sagas
in French maritime history," considering the ship's dragged-out
operational record.
The repair took months to
complete, during which critics of the project pointed out that for the
first time since World War II, France was left without a functioning
aircraft carrier.
> Reuters The Charles de Gaulle, dry-docked at a naval base in Toulon on Dec. 18, 2000.
But the Charles de Gaulle soon
saw action with a deployment to the Indian Ocean in 2001. It was
accompanied by a French nuclear attack submarine and a frigate.
> Amr Nabil/AP The Charles de Gaulle sails through the Suez Canal near the city of Ismailia, as Egyptians stand watching on deck of a ferry on Dec. 11, 2001.
For the next 6 months, the carrier played a support role for the US-led invasion of Afghanistan.
>
Rabih Moghrabi/AFP/Getty Images French crew members talk in front of a
Rafale fighter plane aboard the Charles de Gaulle in the Arabian Sea,
Feb. 1, 2002. Before the Charles de Gaulle was first deployed, the
French navy decided to set a quota assuring that part of the ship's crew
be female.
The flattop has a capacity of forty aircraft, and is capable of launching a plane every thirty seconds.
At 860 feet in length, France's carrier is smaller than those of the
United States, which are almost 1,100 feet long. It can carry up to 30
aircraft, along with a crew of nearly 2,000.The ship has two aircraft strips for takeoff in the front and one for landing in the back. Here's a Reuters breakdown of the vessel published when it deployed to assist the NATO mission in Libya in 2011:
>
Reuters
In 2004, the French navy
organized seafaring maneuvers to mark the 60th anniversary of Operation
Dragoon, a post-D-Day campaign that saw the Allies land troops on the
Mediterranean coast of occupied France.
> Eric Estrade/AFP/Getty Images French president Jacques Chirac and heads of state from a number of African nations watched the proceedings from on board the aircraft carrier. The Charles de Gaulle plays a central role in the Varuna series — naval exercises periodically held between France and India.
>
Sebastian D'souza/AFP/Getty Images A Super Etendard SEM fighter aircraft takes off from the deck of the Charles De Gaulle as part of 'Varuna Series 2004' off the coast of Goa, on April 14, 2004.
In 2005, the Charles de Gaulle
joined ships from 35 countries in Portsmouth Harbour, England, to mark
the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, a decisive naval
engagement of the Napoleonic Wars.
> John D McHugh/AFP/Getty Images The Charles de Gaulle and numerous other ships on June 27, 2005. In 2007, the Charles de Gaulle docked at its home port in Toulon for a tune up that lasted over a year.
>
Anne-Christine Poujolat/AFP/Getty Images The Charles de Gaulle at a maintenance site in Toulon on Sept. 6, 2007.
In January 2014, the carrier made a port call in Abu Dhabi.
> Ben Job/Reuters The flight deck of the French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle in Abu Dhabi on Jan. 8, 2014.
France sent its flagship off the
coast of Libya to support the bombing campaign that contributed to the
ousting of Libyan president Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.
>
Benoit Tessier/Reuters A Mica missile is installed on a Rafale fighter
jet on the flight deck of France's flagship Charles de Gaulle aircraft
carrier on March 27, 2011. The Charles de Gaulle ran sorties against
targets in Libya in participation with a no-fly zone imposed by NATO.
The carrier has been ordered into the Persian Gulf, along with a French nuclear submarine, putting it back in action in the Middle East.
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