Billy Mitchell actually proved that given time and assets, it's possible to sink a ship that isn't defending itself or exercising damage control.
The point however stands, as demonstrated countless times since, that air power can be used to sink ships, although in fairness a sub-surface weapon is needed to do the job properly. An air launched weapon tends to just make it burn until everyone gets off.(Academic - I accept).
Here's a thought. JCA is a first day of the war fighter, the bad guys and their missile firers will probably be in static bases, as air forces tend to be. Would, in a Falklands style conflict, all these 'ships are easy to sink' arguments hold sway if we TLAM'd and PW4'd the living be-jesus out of their immovable, airfields/ weapon dumps/ POL on day one? We could do it cued by google earth, while they were still trying to find us using recently acquired MRA4.
Good fishing by the way, LAL, worked in the end!!