In August 1946, the Soviet Union sent a message to Turkey, proposing an overhaul of the Montreux Convention. During World War II, Turkey had allowed small, unarmed Axis vessels to pass through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles, rather than exercising its power under the Convention to close the straits to ships from countries not bordering the Black Sea. Moscow wanted a joint Soviet-Turkish defense system for the straits, which American officials feared would lead to a Soviet military foothold in the eastern Mediterranean.
In their study of the founders of American Cold War strategy, The Wise Men, Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas describe a White House meeting where a group of foreign policy hands, led by Under Secretary of State Dean Acheson, explained to President Harry S. Truman their proposal for a strong response. At first, they were unsure whether the President understood them. However:
“Truman opened a desk drawer and pulled out a large map of the region. A hush came over the room as Acheson and the others huddled to look over the President’s shoulder. Then the self-taught history buff from Independence [Missouri] launched into a lecture about the strategic importance of the eastern Mediterranean and the critical need to keep it free from Soviet domination.”
Truman dispatched a U.S. Navy task force, led by the aircraft carrier USS Franklin D. Roosevelt, to Istanbul to deter the Soviets. This firm response worked – Moscow withdrew its call for a new regime for the straits. Throughout the Cold War, the eastern Mediterranean would be one of the most important areas of U.S.-Soviet confrontation– a geopolitical prominence that has since returned.
The U.S. Navy established the Sixth Fleet in 1950, and gave it responsibility for the Mediterranean. While this domain figures less prominently in many histories of the Cold War than other flashpoints – Germany, Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Afghanistan – its defense was vital to containing Soviet aggression. The Sixth Fleet repeatedly showed its importance in Western maritime strategy by leading major North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) exercises. Exercises like 1952’s Longstep, and 1957’s Deep Water, simulated a Soviet invasion of the eastern Mediterranean, and gave the Western allies practice in repelling one. The Sixth Fleet was at the forefront of NATO’s defense of its southeastern flank.
In 1958, the governments of Egypt and Syria formed the short-lived United Arab Republic, and Iraq’s pro-Western monarchy was overthrown in a bloody coup. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, worried the Soviets would come to dominate the Middle East via Arab nationalist allies, dispatched marines and soldiers, backed by the Sixth Fleet, to ensure Lebanon did not fall into the Soviet camp. While in reality there was no risk of Lebanon falling to communism, this intervention showed how important the U.S. considered the Levant.
During the October 1973 Yom Kippur War, when Egypt and Syria attacked Israel, the Sixth Fleet showed its importance again. As the U.S. undertook a massive airlift of weapons and supplies to Israel, both the U.S. and the Soviets added more vessels to their Mediterranean fleets. When the Soviets mobilized seven airborne divisions for a possible intervention on Egypt’s side, President Richard Nixon raised the threat level for U.S. forces worldwide to DEFCON 3. For two weeks, the Sixth Fleet stared down its Soviet counterpart, knowing the Cold War might become World War III at any moment. A 2004 Naval War College Review article described this standoff as “perhaps the most dangerous of all Cold War maritime crises.”
While the 1980s proved to be the final decade of the Cold War, it also saw the emergence of new battle lines. In 1982, U.S. Marines returned to Lebanon, this time as part of a multinational peacekeeping force in the Lebanese Civil War. On October 23, 1983, truck bombs struck the peacekeepers’ barracks in Beirut, killing 241 Americans and 58 French troops. It was the largest one-day loss of life for U.S. Marines since World War II, perpetrated by a new enemy – Hezbollah, backed by Syria and the Islamic Republic of Iran.
After the Cold War, it seemed the eastern Mediterranean had declined in significance. When the U.S. Navy saw action in the Middle East, it was typically further eastward, such as its role in Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom. Great power competition, for many Americans, seemed to be a thing of the past.
The Sixth Fleet, however, was not idle. In 1999, when NATO intervened in Kosovo to halt Serb strongman Slobodan Milosevic’s attacks on ethnic Albanian civilians, the carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt and its air wing played an important role, as did Tomahawk missiles launched from U.S. surface vessels. Twelve years later, during NATO’s humanitarian intervention in Libya, the Sixth Fleet was the base for Joint Task Forces Odyssey Dawn and Unified Protector. NATO forces launched 26,000 sorties against the forces of Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi.
All the while, the alliance kept an eye on Russia’s resurgence, including its increased submarine activity in the Atlantic. The Sixth Fleet led NATO’s efforts to deter Russian aggression, through exercises such as BALTOPS and Trident Juncture. As then-Sixth Fleet commander Vice Admiral James Foggo III and analyst Alarik Fritz put it in 2016, NATO had entered “the fourth Battle of the Atlantic.”
Over the past decade, great power competition has returned with a vengeance. Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine showed the Black Sea still mattered to European security. When, eight years later, Vladimir Putin sent his army marching toward Kyiv, Turkey played a vital role in defending Ukraine by closing off the Bosphorus and Dardanelles. This prevented Russia from reinforcing its Black Sea fleet via the Mediterranean, helping Ukraine sinkRussian vessels like the cruiser Moskva.
In 2015, as an American-led coalition fought the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria, Putin sent his forces to back up Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. While ostensibly part of the anti-IS cause, Russian aircraft have largelytargeted non-jihadist opponents of Assad’s regime, Syrians who rose up against decades of dictatorial rule. Since then, Russian planes haverepeatedlyharassed U.S. aircraft over Syria, threatening to escalate tensions over U.S. aid to Ukraine into outright war.
Hamas’ massacre of 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023, finally disabused Americans of the notion that the eastern Mediterranean was unimportant to their country. As Israel began to retaliate against Hamas in Gaza, the U.S. sent two aircraft carriers to the region. Not only did this show solidarity with an ally under attack, it was a warning to Iran and its proxies like Hamas and Hezbollah: if you try to expand this war, you will regret it.
The partnership between Iran and Russia is a serious threat to American interests in the Middle East and beyond. As the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine continue, it is vital that the U.S. pays close attention to the eastern Mediterranean. The Sixth Fleet is once again on the front lines of a major geopolitical confrontation.
Michael D. Purzycki is an analyst, writer, and editor based in Arlington, Virginia. He has worked for the United States Navy, Marine Corps, and Army. The views expressed here are entirely his own.
The views expressed in this piece are the sole opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center for Maritime Strategy or other institutions listed.
Center for Maritime Strategy
By Michael Purzycki
In August 1946, the Soviet Union sent a message to Turkey, proposing an overhaul of the Montreux Convention. During World War II, Turkey had allowed small, unarmed Axis vessels to pass through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles, rather than exercising its power under the Convention to close the straits to ships from countries not bordering the Black Sea. Moscow wanted a joint Soviet-Turkish defense system for the straits, which American officials feared would lead to a Soviet military foothold in the eastern Mediterranean.
In their study of the founders of American Cold War strategy, The Wise Men, Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas describe a White House meeting where a group of foreign policy hands, led by Under Secretary of State Dean Acheson, explained to President Harry S. Truman their proposal for a strong response. At first, they were unsure whether the President understood them. However:
“Truman opened a desk drawer and pulled out a large map of the region. A hush came over the room as Acheson and the others huddled to look over the President’s shoulder. Then the self-taught history buff from Independence [Missouri] launched into a lecture about the strategic importance of the eastern Mediterranean and the critical need to keep it free from Soviet domination.”
Truman dispatched a U.S. Navy task force, led by the aircraft carrier USS Franklin D. Roosevelt, to Istanbul to deter the Soviets. This firm response worked – Moscow withdrew its call for a new regime for the straits. Throughout the Cold War, the eastern Mediterranean would be one of the most important areas of U.S.-Soviet confrontation– a geopolitical prominence that has since returned.
The U.S. Navy established the Sixth Fleet in 1950, and gave it responsibility for the Mediterranean. While this domain figures less prominently in many histories of the Cold War than other flashpoints – Germany, Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Afghanistan – its defense was vital to containing Soviet aggression. The Sixth Fleet repeatedly showed its importance in Western maritime strategy by leading major North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) exercises. Exercises like 1952’s Longstep, and 1957’s Deep Water, simulated a Soviet invasion of the eastern Mediterranean, and gave the Western allies practice in repelling one. The Sixth Fleet was at the forefront of NATO’s defense of its southeastern flank.
In 1958, the governments of Egypt and Syria formed the short-lived United Arab Republic, and Iraq’s pro-Western monarchy was overthrown in a bloody coup. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, worried the Soviets would come to dominate the Middle East via Arab nationalist allies, dispatched marines and soldiers, backed by the Sixth Fleet, to ensure Lebanon did not fall into the Soviet camp. While in reality there was no risk of Lebanon falling to communism, this intervention showed how important the U.S. considered the Levant.
During the October 1973 Yom Kippur War, when Egypt and Syria attacked Israel, the Sixth Fleet showed its importance again. As the U.S. undertook a massive airlift of weapons and supplies to Israel, both the U.S. and the Soviets added more vessels to their Mediterranean fleets. When the Soviets mobilized seven airborne divisions for a possible intervention on Egypt’s side, President Richard Nixon raised the threat level for U.S. forces worldwide to DEFCON 3. For two weeks, the Sixth Fleet stared down its Soviet counterpart, knowing the Cold War might become World War III at any moment. A 2004 Naval War College Review article described this standoff as “perhaps the most dangerous of all Cold War maritime crises.”
While the 1980s proved to be the final decade of the Cold War, it also saw the emergence of new battle lines. In 1982, U.S. Marines returned to Lebanon, this time as part of a multinational peacekeeping force in the Lebanese Civil War. On October 23, 1983, truck bombs struck the peacekeepers’ barracks in Beirut, killing 241 Americans and 58 French troops. It was the largest one-day loss of life for U.S. Marines since World War II, perpetrated by a new enemy – Hezbollah, backed by Syria and the Islamic Republic of Iran.
After the Cold War, it seemed the eastern Mediterranean had declined in significance. When the U.S. Navy saw action in the Middle East, it was typically further eastward, such as its role in Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom. Great power competition, for many Americans, seemed to be a thing of the past.
The Sixth Fleet, however, was not idle. In 1999, when NATO intervened in Kosovo to halt Serb strongman Slobodan Milosevic’s attacks on ethnic Albanian civilians, the carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt and its air wing played an important role, as did Tomahawk missiles launched from U.S. surface vessels. Twelve years later, during NATO’s humanitarian intervention in Libya, the Sixth Fleet was the base for Joint Task Forces Odyssey Dawn and Unified Protector. NATO forces launched 26,000 sorties against the forces of Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi.
All the while, the alliance kept an eye on Russia’s resurgence, including its increased submarine activity in the Atlantic. The Sixth Fleet led NATO’s efforts to deter Russian aggression, through exercises such as BALTOPS and Trident Juncture. As then-Sixth Fleet commander Vice Admiral James Foggo III and analyst Alarik Fritz put it in 2016, NATO had entered “the fourth Battle of the Atlantic.”
Over the past decade, great power competition has returned with a vengeance. Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine showed the Black Sea still mattered to European security. When, eight years later, Vladimir Putin sent his army marching toward Kyiv, Turkey played a vital role in defending Ukraine by closing off the Bosphorus and Dardanelles. This prevented Russia from reinforcing its Black Sea fleet via the Mediterranean, helping Ukraine sinkRussian vessels like the cruiser Moskva.
In 2015, as an American-led coalition fought the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria, Putin sent his forces to back up Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. While ostensibly part of the anti-IS cause, Russian aircraft have largely targeted non-jihadist opponents of Assad’s regime, Syrians who rose up against decades of dictatorial rule. Since then, Russian planes have repeatedly harassed U.S. aircraft over Syria, threatening to escalate tensions over U.S. aid to Ukraine into outright war.
Hamas’ massacre of 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023, finally disabused Americans of the notion that the eastern Mediterranean was unimportant to their country. As Israel began to retaliate against Hamas in Gaza, the U.S. sent two aircraft carriers to the region. Not only did this show solidarity with an ally under attack, it was a warning to Iran and its proxies like Hamas and Hezbollah: if you try to expand this war, you will regret it.
The partnership between Iran and Russia is a serious threat to American interests in the Middle East and beyond. As the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine continue, it is vital that the U.S. pays close attention to the eastern Mediterranean. The Sixth Fleet is once again on the front lines of a major geopolitical confrontation.
Michael D. Purzycki is an analyst, writer, and editor based in Arlington, Virginia. He has worked for the United States Navy, Marine Corps, and Army. The views expressed here are entirely his own.
The views expressed in this piece are the sole opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center for Maritime Strategy or other institutions listed.