I watched the 3 part series on the Queen Elizabeth Carrier with the F35 tests. I am sure I am not alone in thinking that we have a £3 billion ship with (eventually) several £100 million a/c but a total lack of destroyers & frigates - never mind attack/hunter submarines to protect this asset. Every US carrier fleet has a decent defensive fleet. In a past world I attended a course at HMS Dryad & learnt (by a nuclear submarine captain) about how the RN defends a carrier using the many assets available to the RN. I may be wrong but from what have recently read about the lack of serviceable naval surface assets, there are nowhere near enough ships available to defend the QE II never mind the second carrier.
The point I would wish to make is that the MOD & past Chiefs of the Air Staff/Admirals of the Fleet have gloriously cocked up for the UK in spending billions of £ on these enormously expensive machines when for less than a tenth of the cost Britain could have bought many squadrons of F16/F18 & F15s off the shelf plus a decent tanker fleet. Great Britain no longer needs aircraft carriers. Our priority is defence of the UK. There is also a distinct lack of intelligence from MOD in not replacing our medium/long range SAM systems which disappeared when Bloodhound went in 1991.
All it takes is for one anti-ship missile to hit the QE2, or a tactical air burst nuke within about 10 miles & there is one third of the RN gone.