2215 x 2953 px | 18,8 x 25 cm | 7,4 x 9,8 inches | 300dpi
Aufnahmedatum:
21. März 2003
Ort:
Northern Persian Gulf
Weitere Informationen:
Bombs being brought up to the flight deck by lift from the bomb room, deep inside the flagship of America's Fifth Fleet, the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72), in the northern Persian Gulf. Lined up on their trolleys, ready to be loaded onto various aircraft, which will later drop them over Iraq, are huge 2000lb bombs. Bottom left are two big bunker-buster bombs and two 500lb bombs. The bomb that has just come up on the lift is an AGM-88 HARM (high-speed anti-radiation missile) - a supersonic air-to-surface tactical missile designed to seek and destroy enemy radar-equipped air defence systems. A second one is ‘parked’ beyond the lift. The war with Iraq is officially just one day old. The 2003 invasion of Iraq lasted from 20th March to 1st May 2003 and signalled the start of the Iraq War, which was dubbed Operation Iraqi Freedom by the United States (prior to 19 March, the mission in Iraq was called Operation Enduring Freedom, a carryover from the War in Afghanistan). The invasion consisted of 21 days of major combat operations, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and deposed the Ba'athist government of Saddam Hussein.
