Rabia Iclal Turan
09 October 2026•Update: 09 October 2026
The USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier returned Thursday to its home port of San Diego, ending a record-setting 321-day deployment in which it took part in the US-Israeli war against Iran, according to USNI News.
The carrier pulled into Naval Air Station North Island after a deployment that included 265 consecutive days at sea without a port call, a Navy record.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth boarded the ship at sea Wednesday and presented the crew with the Presidential Unit Citation, the highest decoration awarded to military units, for its role in Operation Epic Fury.
Hegseth told sailors the strike group had done what “no other carrier strike group has ever done.”
He rejected what he described as attempts to turn the carrier into “a symbol of dysfunction” or of low morale.
The Lincoln, carrying 5,000 sailors and Marines, left San Diego last November for the Pacific. It was redirected to the Middle East after the US and Israel launched a war against Iran on Feb. 28.
During the summer, media reports described shortages of food and basic supplies, and declining mental health and morale among the crew, including reports that two sailors tried to jump overboard.
