USS Theodore Roosevelt docks in Yokosuka ahead of Keen Sword with Japan

The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt, the cruiser USS Chosin and the destroyer USS Decatur pulled into Commander, Fleet Activities Yokosuka on the morning of 16 October 2026, the U.S. Navy said, as Carrier Strike Group 9 prepared for the biennial Keen Sword field training exercise with Japan.

Navy officials framed the stop as routine maintenance and resupply before the strike group joins Keen Sword, scheduled for 19 to 29 October. While in Yokosuka, CSG-9 will hold professional exchanges with Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force counterparts to align tactics and bilateral procedures, according to the Navy release.

USNI News reported that Theodore Roosevelt is the first non-forward-deployed carrier to dock at Yokosuka in four years, since USS Abraham Lincoln in 2022, and that Yokosuka city records list this as the ship's first visit to the port. Stars and Stripes said the San Diego-based carrier took the berth normally used by the forward-deployed USS George Washington, which is operating in U.S. Central Command.

Keen Sword is a routine U.S.-Japan bilateral exercise designed to raise readiness and interoperability. Japan has previously put tens of thousands of personnel, ships and aircraft into the series, which in recent cycles has stressed defence of the southwestern islands that sit beside the Luzon Strait and Taiwan's eastern approaches.

USNI News noted that past Keen Sword iterations were often led by a Yokosuka-homeported carrier, but George Washington is currently outside the Seventh Fleet area, so the visiting Theodore Roosevelt strike group will fill that role for the 2026 drills. The same report said Japanese public Keen Sword documents have not yet listed specific CSG or unmanned surface vessel tasking.

Theodore Roosevelt deployed from San Diego on 27 September with Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel Seahawk embarked, USNI News said, citing Acting Secretary of the Navy remarks that described the pairing as the first carrier strike group to deploy with a large unmanned surface vessel. Stars and Stripes put CSG-9 at about 5,000 sailors and Marines.

Local groups protested the nuclear-powered carrier visit over earthquake and liberty concerns, Stars and Stripes reported, while Navy commanders reminded crews to follow U.S. Forces Japan liberty rules and treat Japanese hosts with respect. Yokosuka Mayor Katsuaki Kamiji had earlier asked Tokyo to stress crew conduct after an Okinawa Marine arrest, according to USNI News.

USNI News separately summarised Japanese planning documents that put about 45,000 personnel, 6,100 vehicles, 40 ships and 260 aircraft into Keen Sword, including an integrated live-fire serial on Oki Daito in the Philippine Sea on 19-20 October with AH-64D helicopters, F-2 fighters and a JMSDF MQ-35 V-BAT unmanned aircraft for observation.

The same USNI report said a U.S.-led demonstration of Taiwan-based STR8 Ghostwake unmanned surface vessels is planned somewhere between 19 and 23 October off White Beach, Okinawa, with the 12th Marine Littoral Regiment and Unmanned Surface Vessel Squadron 7 taking part and the JMSDF observing. That serial sits alongside the carrier visit as another unmanned thread inside the same exercise window.

NHK World also reported the Yokosuka call and said city officials described it as the carrier's first visit to the base. The Navy said Seventh Fleet continues routine allied operations aimed at a free and open Indo-Pacific as Keen Sword begins next week.