Extended tours strain air defenders and destroyer crews
President Trump is privately weighing whether to declare the war with Iran over while Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has extended U.S. troop deployments in the Middle East into 2027 to keep military options open, according to people familiar with the matter. The extensions come as a sign that the conflict could drag well into next year, according to people familiar with the matter — a contrast with the quick, decisive blow Hegseth promised when the U.S. campaign against Iran began six months ago.
The extensions are part of an open-ended military strategy designed to give Trump flexibility and options in the war, the people said. The deployment of 19 warships, air-defense units, fighter squadrons and paratroopers is straining servicemembers and their families and creating a maintenance backlog that the people familiar with the matter said could take years to unwind.
Trump has sent mixed signals on what might happen next. He has embraced an economic pressure campaign in recent weeks aimed at forcing Iran to the negotiating table. Privately, Trump tells aides he believes sticking with economic pressure will eventually force Iran to either dismantle its nuclear program or collapse, U.S. officials said. Aides are advising Trump that further escalation could endanger Republican prospects in the November midterm elections; Trump has said he is not taking electoral consequences into account. A Pentagon official declined to comment on troop deployments, saying the department provides options for the commander in chief. U.S. Central Command declined to comment, citing operational security. The White House pointed to Trump’s public comments.
The U.S. military is keeping about 50,000 troops in the region in part to preserve presidential flexibility on next steps, according to people familiar with the matter. Current missions include intercepting Iranian missiles, providing cover for commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz and blockading Iranian ports and coastal areas. U.S. forces also stand ready to launch larger offensive attacks should Trump choose to escalate. Last month he received briefings on fresh war options including stepped-up airstrikes, sending in ground forces to seize Iranian islands near the strait and bombing a fortified site called Pickaxe Mountain that officials said could be used for covert nuclear work.
The strain is concentrated in specific units. Army air defenders, who work under pressure to bat down Iranian missiles and drones, have seen their standard deployment timeline shift from nine months to twelve, one of the people familiar said. Some units that moved to the Middle East from planned posts in Europe and the Pacific have already been deployed for more than a year, according to the people. “The operational tempo for air defense units before this war was already among the highest of the joint force,” said Tom Karako, director of the Missile Defense Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He said the extended deployments risk wearing out troops, delaying maintenance and hampering longer-term modernization.
The Navy is bearing its share. Of the 19 U.S. warships in Middle East waters, 13 are guided-missile destroyers and two are aircraft carriers, a Navy official said. Several destroyers — including the USS Delbert D. Black and the USS Spruance, which were sent to the region for the opening salvos of the war — are now sailing for several months at a time instead of taking breaks every month or so, some of the people said.
The conflict has produced some of the longest Navy deployments in modern history. The USS Gerald R. Ford was at sea for 11 months before returning home in May, becoming the longest-deployed aircraft carrier since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The USS Abraham Lincoln is making its way home after another extended deployment marked by challenging conditions. The crew of the USS Theodore Roosevelt is preparing for a longer-than-normal deployment, and Navy officials have indicated it could head to the Middle East and remain well into spring. The plan to keep aircraft carriers in the region signals the Trump administration wants to maintain strong offensive capability should fighting escalate, said Bryan Clark, a former senior U.S. Navy official now a senior fellow with the Hudson Institute. “They’re setting it up to be sustained over the long haul, meaning well into next year,” Clark said. “But to sustain it at this level, it means you’re giving up presence in other regions. So you’re kind of going all in on Iran being the focus of military posture over the next year.”
Logistics have grown harder as the fighting has prevented the Navy from resupplying in the Middle East, forcing reliance largely on the remote island of Diego Garcia, a U.S.-U.K. base in the Indian Ocean, according to the people familiar. That has produced a sharp decline in mail, care packages and time away from the confines of the ships, the people said, and analysts warned the long distances and extended deployments will put significant strain on ship maintenance in the future.
The Pentagon could also keep elements of the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division in the Middle East well into 2027, according to a letter sent by military leaders to families and viewed by The Wall Street Journal. “We do not share that lightly, and we understand that a longer tour weighs heavily on every household, including our own,” the letter said.
Trump told reporters on Wednesday that the U.S. military would remain prepared to launch more strikes “any time we want,” as it did this week after Iran tried to lay new mines in the Strait of Hormuz. “We see everything that they’re doing,” Trump said. “They can’t go to the bathroom without us seeing it.” On social media he wrote: “I like our position now much better, with almost total control of the Hormuz Strait, and their economy totally collapsing. They are just playing out the inevitable. When are the Iranian people going to rise up and fight?”