- LONDON (Reuters) - The U.S.
Navy has booked a large ship to carry tanks and heavy armor to the Gulf
this month as the Pentagon presses home a case for ousting Iraqi President
Saddam Hussein, shipping sources said on Wednesday.
The U.S. Military Sealift Command chartered a U.S. flagged general cargo
ship to sail from the southeast U.S. coast to an unspecified Middle Eastern
port in the Gulf for discharge in late September, they said.
This is the third shipment of arms and military hardware in a month using
commercial shipping, which military analysts say shows the U.S. Navy has
probably exhausted the capacity of its own fleet and resorted to the open
market.
The formal tender document, seen by Reuters, shows the ship will carry
67 separate pieces of "track general cargo, containerized cargo and
rolling stock" measuring 56,000 square feet, slightly larger than
a soccer pitch.
Military experts say the dimensions and weight of the pieces specified
in the document match almost exactly those of the standard U.S. Abrams
battle tank.
"This ship can easily carry tanks," said a shipping industry
source familiar with the U.S. military tendering process.
Military analysts say that the movement of heavy armor from the U.S. southeast
coast to the Gulf mirrors similar movements ahead of the 1991 Gulf War
and is a key signal that the superpower is building up fire power in the
region ahead of a possible military strike.
In mid-August Reuters reported that the Navy booked a large ship to carry
helicopters, ammunition and assorted "rolling stock" to the Red
Sea.
The story was initially denied by the U.S. Navy, but a Military Sealift
Command spokeswoman later retracted the denial when confronted with documentary
evidence.
The Pentagon has said the shipments of military hardware in August were
to support exercises in Jordan that have been planned for two years.
Shipping sources doubted it.
"Why jump into the commercial market in August when you knew the exercises
were planned -- it just doesn't make sense," one shipping source said.
President Bush was set to meet congressional leaders on Wednesday to discuss
the case for overthrowing Saddam.
(Additional reporting by Tom Ashby)
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