Carriers need to be big or we lose capabilities:
After soaring costs and years of delays with the Navy’s new Ford class of supercarrier, Congress wants the service to pursue lower-cost carrier options for the future fleet.
But a new Rand Corp. report commissioned by the service and published this month concludes the Navy cannot build cheaper, more modest carriers without significantly limiting capability or overhauling its current air acquisition plan.
And when you throw having to switch types of aircraft that are big carriers use but which can't be used on significantly smaller carriers, the argument in favor of big grows.
Honestly, I thought the size advantage was well established.
But that isn't the end of the carrier debate. So don't drop the mic, yet.
Big carriers are clearly more effective for power projection roles, being floating air fields to bomb enemies without the ability to shoot back at the carriers.
But the value of any type of carrier is called into question for sea control roles when battling enemy navies and air forces equipped with cheap precision long-range weapons.
Unfortunately, as I've complained, we argue apples and oranges over the value of carriers without clearly distinguishing between the two missions:
Power projection is what we've done with our carriers since world War II. Sail them off the coast of some country that doesn't possess a potent navy or air force, and use it as a floating air base. Without the need to fight for control of the sea, we exercise that control of the sea from the start of a conflict. We've done this a lot. And the carriers have performed superbly.
This history of power projection is what the defenders of carriers point to.
But what the anti-carrier side points to is usually the sea control mission. In this mission, by definition we face a nation with a navy and air force capable of fighting us for control of the seas--or at least denying us full control.
And for nations without carriers, advances in persistent surveillance and guided missiles give them a potent weapon to use against our big carriers.
Further, while defenders of carriers like to call them sovereign pieces of American real estate that can host our planes, unlike actual real estate, our carriers float and therefore can sink. Or just burn and become mission kills. Really.
We don't like to admit it and rarely practice what we do if a carrier goes down, but they can be sunk. They can be sunk by relatively cheap missiles. They can be sunk by relatively cheap missiles guided by relatively cheap surveillance assets.
Having an accurate carrier debate is better than what we have now.
But we need a sea power debate and not a carrier debate, which is almost as pointless as having a battleship debate or a ship-of-the-line debate.
NOTE: Pre-publication update.
Of course, if you can't afford the big carriers, you can't afford them. This is an interesting review of major carrier fleets.
I'll note that the importance of the carrier as a symbol of national power is a two-edged sword if the big ships go up in flames and sink on camera.
Note too the review fails to explicitly distinguish between the two carrier roles in the arguments over carrier utility.
