French warship to join US fleet in PG

France has dispatched a nuclear-powered warship to the Persian Gulf as part of an unprecedented buildup of naval and air power in the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean. France's Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier is now en route to the region and will arrive there at the end of October, when a quarter of the world's nuclear aircraft carriers will gather in the "stratgeic waters". The French carrier is accompanied by two frigates, an attack submarine, a re-fuelling tanker, 3,000 sailors and 27 aircraft. "The force would help allied navies fight piracy off the coast of Somalia and send jets to support NATO in the skies above Afghanistan," said the commander of the group, Rear Admiral Jean-Louis Kerignard. -This is while new opinion polls show that a vast majority of the French are against any military presence in Afghanistan and want an immediate withdrawal of troops from the war-torn country. There are currently over 31 warships docked in the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, nineteen of them belonging to the United States.