Originally Posted by
ORAC
But it can defend itself - the definition of a self-licking lollipop.
Is the carrier group still a self licking lollipop when it it protects things such as reinforcement/resupply shipping and amphibious forces and provides freedom of
manoeuvre for our (and allied) forces - the primary role of navies for centuries? This was the reason the aircraft carrier was developed during the First World War, and its main role during the Second World War, the Cold War, the Falklands War, some aspects of operations in the Mediterranean/Gulf/Adriatic - basically anywhere the seas and maritime airspace have been contested.
Here is a NATO video dated 5 March 2024:
HMS
Prince of Wales can be seen from 2:15:
In the North Sea Exercise Joint Warrior
has been taking place. The exercises involved 14 countries with nearly 50 vessels. This includes aircraft carriers, destroyers, frigates, patrol vessels, minehunters, submarines, and auxiliary ships. There were 100 fast jets, 30 helicopters, and various surveillance, patrol, and air-to-air refuelling aircraft. Their mission? Within the Steadfast Defender
exercise scenario, they had to dominate the seas and the skies in the high north so that amphibious landings could be executed.
NATO task groups come together off Norway coast - Royal Navy - 14 March 24
Two potent task groups proved their strength to defend Arctic waters and shorelines from threats when they came together as part of NATO exercises.
The UK Carrier Strike Group, led by HMS Prince of Wales,
was joined by a NATO Amphibious Task Group and a range of aircraft off the coast of Norway as part of Exercise Nordic Response.
The formation of more than 10 ships from eight nations gave the men and women on board the chance to practise close manoeuvres - overcoming language barriers and different ways of operating at sea.
In a show of might for NATO and it partners, the exercise allowed the vessels and their aircraft to demonstrate their ability to defend allied territory while simultaneously defending themselves from potential enemies.
Taking part were: Royal Navy ships HMS Prince of Wales,
frigate HMS Portland,
Royal Fleet Auxiliary tanker Tidespring
and amphibious landing ship RFA Mounts Bay;
Spanish frigate ESPS Almirante Juan de Borbon;
German replenishment ship FGS Bonn;
Norwegian frigate HNoMS Otto Sverdrup,
corvette HNoMS Gnist,
patrol vessels HNoMS Olav Tyrggvason
and HNoMS Magnus Lagabote;
Norwegian coast guard ship KV Bjornoya;
Dutch support ship HNLMS Karel Doorman;
Italian aircraft carrier ITS Giuseppe Garibaldi;
French frigate FS Normadie;
and US destroyer USS Paul Ignatius.
Giuseppe Garibaldi was acting as part of the amphibious group, supporting marines and operating support helicopters. The carrier group provided defence for her and the other amphibious forces.
Why do people assume that a carrier carrying fighters does so for self defence when they would never make such an absurd claim about land based ones? Why do they think of a fighter on CAP as if it is some sort of point defence system? The same argument applies with ASW helicopters. Defending 'the force' was always a major part of the CVF/QEC design brief:
Without going into detail, the "Residual Threat Study" for what was then CVF - worked up by what was then still DERA - very definitely had the CVF contributing exuberantly to the defence of the force against enemy air attack (trying to recall from a quarter-century ago helping out the crew in Filton's Building 20X), it did assume both the "Fictional Foreign Hostile Place With Silly Name" launching Soviet-level mass strikes of multiple regiments of Backfires or successors, and something like five Horizon / Type 45 with some sort of shared TEWA - might have been US CEC, Canadian CORALS or something else - with a huge bomber force launching literally hundreds of incoming supersonic shipkiller ASCM, and being whittled down through the Fighter Engagement Zone (ideally killing scouts, then bombers, and only missiles if those failed); the Missile Engagement Zone where the various escorts re-enacted the "Start Of The War" from Red Storm Rising; and the study ending with "okay, this is what leaked through, maintain HIGH% probability of continuing to remain able to conduct air operations" as the requirement to meet for the carrier..
From here.
You might also consider what the late Professor Eric Grove said:
Professor Grove mentions carriers a lot, in terms of protecting shipping and amphibious forces. At 22:35 he mentions the F/A-18 Super Hornet or F-35 Lightning proving air defence, and then discusses the teaming of the F-35B and the Aegis system via data link to provide a level of air defence (with AMRAAM) that is approaching the capability provided by the old F-14 Tomcat/Phoenix combination.
At 50:15 he suggests that the thing hostile submarine captains dread most of all is the helicopter with dipping sonar - and that an airborne radar flooding an area will keep the hostile submarines down. He then describes witnessing an ASW exercise in which a number of NATO submarines transmitted Soviet levels of noise, and every one was covered by either an ASW helicopter or an MPA.