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The dreadful conditions on the USS Abraham Lincoln, a Navy aircraft carrier stationed near Iran for nine months, have been widely reported. They include food shortages, water contamination, plumbing stoppages, lost mail, and mental health decay, spurring some crew members to jump ship.

President Donald Trump denied the news stories as “fake,” but the top U.S. commander in the region, Adm. Brad Cooper, confirmed them after inspecting the vessel.

The question many are asking with gaped jaws: How could this have possibly happened? The Defense Department’s budget tops $1 trillion, the largest sum ever, even allowing for inflation. The war on Iran is Trump’s top priority. How could basic operations on the Navy’s most highly valued and most vigorously maintained platform have deteriorated so badly?

Trump is partly to blame for starting the war under the belief that he could win it in a few weeks, with no need for a Plan B. But the lack of a Plan B also stems from miscalculations and mistakes in the Navy’s plans and budgets dating back more than 30 years—since the end of the Cold War.

The Navy has a large number of supply officers. For operations in the Middle East, some are based at U.S. Central Command headquarters, some in the Navy’s 5th Fleet in Bahrain, some on each ship. Supplies for the vessels—food, fuel, assorted goods for the shops on board—come from local suppliers in the region or from ports, especially in Bahrain, where ships with the Navy’s Combat Logistics Command bring in supplies.

These supply officers must have known they were in deep trouble from the first days of the war, when Iranian missiles destroyed much of the U.S. base in Bahrain, including the hub of the entire region’s supply chain.........

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