As worries deepened last week about whether North Korea would conduct a missile test, the White House declared that ordering a U.S. aircraft carrier into the Sea of Japan would send a powerful deterrent signal and give U.S. President Donald Trump more options in responding to the North’s provocative behaviour.

The problem was, the carrier, the Carl Vinson, and the four other warships in its strike force were at that very moment sailing in the opposite direction, to take part in joint exercises with the Australian navy in the Indian Ocean, 5,600 kilometres southwest of the Korean Peninsula.

Read the latest news on U.S. President Donald Trump

White House officials said Tuesday they were relying on guidance from the Defense Department. Officials there describe a glitch-ridden sequence of events, from a premature announcement of the deployment by the military’s Pacific Command to an erroneous explanation by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis — all of which perpetuated the false narrative that a U.S. armada was racing toward the waters off North Korea.

By the time the White House was asked about the Carl Vinson on April 11, its imminent arrival had been emblazoned on front pages across East Asia, fanning fears that Trump was considering a pre-emptive military strike on North Korea. It was portrayed as further evidence of the president’s muscular style two days after he ordered a missile strike on Syria while he and President Xi Jinping of China were finishing dessert during a meeting in Florida.

The saga of the wayward carrier might never have come to light, had the Navy not posted a photograph on Monday of the Carl Vinson sailing through the Sunda Strait, which separates the Indonesian islands of Java and Sumatra. The picture was taken Saturday, four days after the White House press secretary, Sean Spicer, described its mission in the Sea of Japan.

The Carl Vinson is now on a northerly course for the Korean Peninsula and is expected to arrive in the region sometime next week, Defense Department officials said. The White House declined to comment on the misunderstanding, referring all questions to the Pentagon.

“Sean discussed it once when asked, and it was all about process,” said a spokesman, Michael Short.

Privately, however, other officials expressed bewilderment that the Pentagon did not correct its timeline, particularly given the tensions surging in the region and the fact that Spicer, as well as the national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, were publicly answering questions about it.

Read more about: