United States Sixth Fleet

Sixth Fleet
The U.S. Sixth Fleet's seal
Active	12 February 1950 – present
Country	United States of America
Branch	United States Navy
Part of	Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe
Garrison/HQ	NSA Naples, Italy
Commanders
Current commander	Vice Admiral Christopher W. Grady

The Sixth Fleet is the United States Navy's operational fleet and staff of United States Naval Forces Europe. The Sixth Fleet is headquartered at Naval Support Activity Naples, Italy. The officially stated mission of the Sixth Fleet in 2011 is that it "conducts the full range of Maritime Operations and Theater Security Cooperation missions, in concert with coalition, joint, interagency, and other parties, in order to advance security and stability in Europe and Africa." The commander of the Sixth Fleet is Vice Admiral Christopher W. Grady.

The Sixth Fleet was established in February 1950 by redesignation of the former Sixth Task Fleet. Since that time, it has been continually engaged in world affairs around the Mediterranean, and, on occasion, further afield. It was involved in numerous NATO maritime exercises, the U.S. Lebanese intervention of 1958, confrontation with the Soviets during the Yom Kippur War (also known as the October War) of 1973, clearance of the Suez Canal after 1973, several confrontations with Libya during the 1980s (including Operation El Dorado Canyon), and maintenance of task forces in the Adriatic during the wars in former Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Most recently it launched airstrikes on Libya again during the Libyan Civil War of 2011.

The United States has maintained a naval presence in the Mediterranean since the early 19th century, when U.S. Naval forces first engaged the Barbary pirates to prevent them from interfering with commercial shipping. The earliest unit was the Mediterranean Squadron.

On 1 February 1946, U.S. Naval Forces, Northwest African Waters (NavNAW), was redesignated U.S. Naval Forces, Mediterranean. The force was responsible to U.S. Naval Forces, Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean in London, and had as its flagship a destroyer tender, anchored at Naples, Italy. In 1946, President Truman dispatched the battleship Missouri to the Eastern Mediterranean, ostensibly to return the body of Münir Ertegün, former Turkish Ambassador to Washington, back to Istanbul. However, perhaps a much stronger motive was to demonstrate U.S. power in view of Soviet threats to Turkey and Iran. The cruiser Dayton relieved the tender Shenandoah as flagship and began operating with the fleet. In June 1946 Fargo, flying the flag of Vice Admiral Bernhard Bieri, Commander, Naval Forces Mediterranean, was despatched to Trieste.