V o L u m e I : a d

their worth during the Vietnam War, providing floating

air  bases from which to launch air combat missions well

inland.

During the Cold War, U.S. carriers served two primary

functions, first as a weapons system for land attacks and

second as a defensive system to protect the larger fleet

from submarine, surface, and airborne threats from both

aircraft and missiles. Generally, a larger carrier costs less

per aircraft embarked than a smaller one, and it can also

launch larger aircraft, which themselves can dominate

wider areas. Moreover, such aircraft carriers usually deliver

a lower cost per unit of ordnance or per unit of defensive

capability. The larger carriers can also carry more ammuni-

tion and fuel, are outfitted with more sophisticated elec-

tronic countermeasures, and have more armor protection

than the smaller aircraft carriers.

In wartime, power projection and naval striking capac-

ity are integral to naval strategy. Aircraft carriers are rou-

tinely deployed as a show of force to an area of potential

conflict and can also be rapidly deployed to another region

of the world should a crisis erupt, ready to operate as a

navy’s most credible, sustainable, and independent base

to launch everything from unobtrusive surveillance to

devastating air strikes. A carrier with a complement of fifty

attack aircraft can deliver more than 150 strikes per day

against littoral targets. Together with their onboard air

wings, aircraft carriers play vital roles across the full spec-

trum of naval strategy, deployable worldwide in support of

national interests or allied combat missions.

It is important to note that the ability of an aircraft carrier to remain on

station in international waters for extended periods of time is dependent

upon naval support forces. Although large aircraft carriers can carry great

quantities of fuel, food, and spare parts for sustained, unsupported operations,

these stocks must still be replenished on a periodic basis.

Carriers built during the Cold War were larger than their World War II

predecessors. They also featured armored flight decks. The introduction of

jet aircraft posed potentially serious problems because they possessed heavier

weight, slower acceleration, and higher landing speeds and had greater fuel

consumption than piston-driven aircraft. A number of British innovations

contributed to the solution of these problems: the steam-powered catapult,

the angled flight deck, the mirrored landing-signal system, and the ski-jump

deck and V/STOL (Vertical/Short Take-Off and Landing) airplane. The ski-

jump carrier permits a small ship to operate V/STOL aircraft, such as the

Hawker-Siddeley Harrier, at the limits of its lifting potential. In September

1960, the United States launched the world’s first nuclear-powered carrier, the

Enterprise. Nuclear engines made voyages of up to 1 million miles possible

without the need for refueling. When commissioned, the Enterprise was the

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Aircraft Carriers

The nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Enterprise

(CVAN-65) in the Gulf of Tonkin on 28 May 1966, during

the Vietnam War. With Douglas A-4 Skyhawk fighter

bombers at its bow, the Enterprise is ready to recover

additional strike aircraft. (National Archives and Records

Administration)

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AirLand Battle

largest warship in the world, and it was the second nuclear-powered surface

warship to enter service behind the U.S. cruiser Long Beach.

The immense cost of such large super aircraft carriers has essentially put

them out of reach of the British, Russians, and French. The small V/STOL

carrier is all the sea-based air capability that most navies can afford, and the

United States is alone in its use of the super multipurpose carriers.

Carriers may be roughly segmented into three classifications: the super

carriers, such as the U.S. Navy’s CNV Nimitz–class (102,000 tons, fully

loaded) and CV Kitty Hawk–class (93,960 tons); the middle class, such as

the French Charles de Gaulle (42,000 tons) and the Russian Admiral Kuznetsov

(58,500 tons); and the V/STOL-class, exemplified by the British Invincible

(20,600 tons), the Italian Giuseppe Garibaldi (13,850 tons) and Andrea Doria

(26,500 tons estimated, under construction), the Spanish Principe de Asturias

(17,188 tons), the Indian Viraat (ex-Royal Navy Hermes, 28,700 tons) and

Vikrant (38,000 tons reported, under construction), the Russian modified Kiev-

class Vikramaditya (ex-Admiral Gorshkov) (23,900 tons), and the Thai Chakri

Naruebet (11,485 tons).

Hirama Yoichi

See also

Aircraft; France, Navy; India, Armed Forces; Italy, Armed Forces; Royal Navy;

Soviet Union, Navy; United States Navy

References

Chesneau, Roger. Aircraft Carriers of the World, 1914 to the Present: An Illustrated Ency-

clopedia. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1995.

Fontenoy, Paul. Aircraft Carriers. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2006.

Friedman, Norman. Carrier Air Power. New York: Routledge, 1981.

Hobbs, David. Aircraft Carriers of the Royal and Commonwealth Navies: The Complete

Encyclopedia from World War I to the Present. London: Greenhill, 1996.

Jane’s Fighting Ships. London: Jane’s Information Group, 2004.

In the development of military doctrine, victory in war is usually followed by

a period of complacency and stagnation, while defeat spurs a period of criti-

cal self-examination and robust internal debate that often leads to dramatic

doctrinal innovations. This was true for the United States following the Viet-

nam War. For the U.S. military, the trauma of the loss in Vietnam was com-

pounded by the unexpected lethality of modern weapons witnessed in the

short but violent 1973 Yom Kippur War. That in turn led to an increasing

recognition that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) could not

rely on battlefield nuclear weapons to offset the overwhelming numerical

advantage of the Warsaw Pact in any future war on the European continent.

Working through the problem, American military thinkers identified

two types of wars that the United States could face in the future: a heavy

AirLand Battle

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