Source: The U.S. Navy’s Big Mistake — Building Tons of Supercarriers | War Is Boring
The Pentagon behaves as if aircraft carriers will rule forever … they won’t
The Navy is developing a new class of supercarriers that cannot function properly, and has designed them to launch F-35 fighters that are not ready to fly their missions. This is all happening during an era of out-of-control budgets, which bodes poorly for American sea power and leadership ahead.
“If our fleet of small numbers is so fragile that it cannot afford the loss of a single ship due to budgeting, how will it survive the inevitable losses of combat?”
– Commander Phillip E. Pournelle
new anti-ship missiles “put U.S. forces on the wrong side of physics,”
– Andrew Erickson, U.S. Naval War College
In a 1982 congressional hearing, legislators asked him how long American carriers would survive in an actual war.
Rickover’s response? “Forty-eight hours,” he said.