In the hazy seas off the Lebanese coast, the huge fleet steamed slowly eastward. Composed of 20 fighting ships, the armada was led by two of the world's largest aircraft carriers, the nuclear-powered U.S.S. Nimitz and the John F. Kennedy. The presence of so large a force in the volatile eastern Mediterranean last week inevitably raised the question: Was the U.S. preparing to launch a military assault to free all or most of the 24 foreigners, including eight Americans, held hostage by Shi'ite radicals in Lebanon?
Though the U.S. had clearly ordered the Sixth Fleet to make a show of force, Washington denied that a rescue operation was being considered. In fact, asserted American officials, not altogether convincingly, the primary + reason for the unusually large concentration of naval power off Lebanon was the unpredictable course of the Iran-Iraq war, some 700 miles to the east. In that war, Iran is waging a continuing campaign against the southern Iraqi city of Basra and thereby posing an implicit threat to Iraq's gulf allies, most notably Kuwait. "We talk about our strategic interests in the context of the Iran-Iraq war," a senior Administration official insisted.
Late last week, after apparently concluding that its powerful gesture had had some effect on the chaotic situation in both Lebanon and the gulf, the Pentagon ordered the armada to begin to disperse. The Kennedy, docked in Haifa, 75 miles south of Beirut, and other ships began moving away.
Another factor in the rise of tension in Lebanon last week was Washington's invitation to six allies to attend a conference in Rome on the hostage crisis. Other governments vetoed the idea of the meeting, fearing that any joint action might jeopardize the lives of the kidnap victims. Moreover, Iranscam has deprived the U.S. of much of its credibility in terrorist diplomacy, and allies are more reluctant than usual to follow Washington's lead.
The U.S. exercise in gunboat diplomacy in the Mediterranean, awesome though it may have been, did not help the plight of the hostages in Lebanon. In an atmosphere of rising tension, the Iran-backed Islamic Jihad organization, whose hostages are believed to include Terry Anderson, the chief Middle East correspondent for the Associated Press, and Thomas Sutherland, a dean at the American University of Beirut, defiantly warned that its captives would be killed if the U.S. attacked. Sheik Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, the spiritual leader of Hizballah, the pro-Iranian Party of God movement, personally challenged the Sixth Fleet. "What can they do, destroy Beirut?" he demanded. "They cannot do that. The Americans are welcome . . . If I am on their hit list, then that is an honor."