Whither Super Carriers?

Super carriers have a narrowing scope of effectiveness and survival

The role of super carriers is a very polarized debate. It seems that the bulk of the debate is a full-throated defense or attack of the expensive assets. Ground rules like that don’t allow for discussions of strengths and weaknesses that should define their roles. As long as America has dominant sea power, I’m not emotionally attached to the particular form it takes.

This is a qualified defense of carriers:

The smarter takeaway from the missile challenge isn’t to write off the carrier altogether, but to stop treating it as the centerpiece of American power. It’s one tool among many. In a high-end fight—most likely over Taiwan—it will play a supporting role in America’s efforts to relieve the island, alongside submarines, bombers, space-based ISR, and land-based missiles. In other theaters, or in gray-zone competition, it may still be the most visible and useful asset on hand. Context matters.

If anything, China’s missile arsenal is a sign of respect. Beijing wouldn’t be investing so heavily in carrier-killing systems if it didn’t think American carriers still mattered. The right response isn’t panic—it’s adaptation. And that’s exactly what’s happening.

Are Chinese anti-ship missiles a sign of respect for big carriers? Sort of. I'd never deny carriers can be useful if the enemy can't shoot at them! Indeed, that's the basis of my longstanding qualified defense of carriers. Carriers still have power projection missions:

I don’t think they are the best platforms for securing sea control. They can be used either during peacetime against small powers or during great power war after securing sea control.

But networked forces don't really protect carriers—they make carriers irrelevant for sea control. As I wrote about the development of the Integrated Combat System (ICS) for the future of the carrier role:

With ICS-equipped enemies, the [sea control] role becomes too expensive to carry out. Carriers will be sunk and their host of sailors, pilots, and expensive stealth and support planes will be lost in minutes as swarms of enemy missiles converge on the target.

You may say that ICS-equipped escorts will be able to mass defensive missiles and systems to protect the carrier. But I doubt that the defenses could stop all the inbound missiles. Enough will evade defenses to get at least a mission-kill. Is it really worth it to use networks to defend the big platform-centric offensive carrier instead of focusing on networked offense?

My qualified defense concluded:

The carriers will remain useful against smaller enemies that can't strike them. And the carriers could be committed like cavalry of old when the ICS-equipped swarm wins control of the seas and breaks an enemy's naval cohesion to fight networked. Then the carriers can be committed to help sink the scattered and isolated vessels. And used to project power ashore to really exploit control of the seas.

My prophecy is old. And delayed. But the vision is arriving even bigger than my original thoughts. Will the Navy lose the carriers needlessly in combat because it is too sentimental and reverential about their history? Or will the Navy phase out the carriers from their central role by relegating a smaller number to power projection roles, using the money for more ICS-capable ships?

It is wrong to think land warfare is inherently deadly while naval power is a technologically advanced clean form of warfare. That ignores the losses that would come from sinking an aircraft carrier and its escorts. China could hit a carrier strike group maneuvering in the blue waters of the western Pacific. And then sink the rescuers of that crippled carrier strike group.

In a matter of hours, America could lose more military personnel than lost killed in action in Iraq from March 2003 through August 2010, after which combat operations were declared over.

People like to say American super carriers send a message of reassurance to friends and of dread to enemies. But enemies could send messages via our carriers, too. What kind of message would video of that kind of defeat send?

We can use carriers—carefully. But we can probably gradually phase out half, at least, depending on what form of sea-based aviation we need. The money saved would need to go to building more submarines and surface warships, of course. The Navy would work under the strike radius of all those long-range, land-based B-21s the Air Force will get.

Even if pouring more money into protecting carriers can work, avoiding needless catastrophe is not the same as being more able to inflict catastrophe on an enemy. Face it, carriers are no longer the apex predator at sea. It's time to plan for their demotion from the starring sea power role and use the money saved elsewhere.

NOTE: I made the image with the Substack capability.