re: #437 steve_davis

We currently have 11 aircraft carriers. 11. And the Secretary of Defense’s justification for why we need to keep 11 aircraft carriers in service is…because we can!!

Because it’s about a 1/3-active cycle (workup, deployment, refit), there’s one carrier in heavy-effort nuclear refueling, and we have three regions of traditional coverage (Atlantic/Med, East Pacific, Indian Ocean/Gulf). And as previously mentioned, if you build them too slowly, you lose the tradesmen who know how to actually do it (ever try to weld a submarine pressure hull?) and you will never really be able to do it right again.

Honestly, people, these things aren’t hard to find.