Let me add that aircraft carriers are the ultimate ability to project power. No other nation in the world can project power, just through the presence of a carrier, the way that the US can.
We maintain that credibility through actual use of the carriers in combat operations, so that a carrier strike group cruising off the coast of another nation shows that we are right there, able to act at any time, in close proximity.
The Chinese have long resented the presence of the USN in the Western Pacific. Ever since World War 2, the USN has kept carriers in WESTPAC, and often employed them on combat, right near the coast of China. They see the Pacific as partly theirs and right now, they have no way to parry the presence of the USN.
No other nation puts carriers off our coast, though the Russians, and to some extent, the Chinese, operate ships and aircraft nearby.
But those individual units are nothing on comparison to the capability of a USN Carrier strike group, able to generate 150-200 combat sorties per day within a few miles of the coastline of any nation we choose.
The Army likes to say that wars are won by boots on the ground, and that is true, but the Army takes months to get to the fight. The Air Force likes to say that 100% of the world is covered by air, and that is true, but the USAF cannot get more than a few airplanes to the fight around the world without forward basing, or a tanker bridge that allows one strike.
When a carrier shows up, it is bringing the ability to fly the entire air wing in repeat sorties for continuous operations. One simply has to take a look at Operation Eldorado Canyon in 1986 - The US struck Libya using Carriers in the Mediterranean and F-111s from the UK. The F-111s had to fly for over 12 hours, with multiple tanking operations on the way, to go around France and the rest of Europe because of treaty and overflight issues. The USN put up 38 airplanes that met the F-111s over the target. Before the F-111s even got to the first tanker on their way back, the USN airplanes were re-armed, refueled, and ready to fly again. The USAF got 24 airplanes over the target in 24 hours, and it would have been 24 hours before those F-111s could have returned, IF the tankers were available (and they weren’t).
The Carrier could have put 150 sorties over the target over the next 24 hours. No treaty issues, no overflight constraints, no refueling.
Every hostile nation, and every friendly nation, realizes this - a carrier allows us to put an airfield right next to any country we choose - and fly around the clock sorties from that airfield. True, some nations are land-locked, but most of the world’s population lives within 100 miles of the coast.
Carriers are complex, expensive, and difficult to operate, but the capability they offer is simply unmatched by any other combination of forces.
That’s why the Chinese want carriers - they want parity with us, they want the world to notice them when they operate, they want the ability to project power the way that we do.
JJ.
