The thing is when the Harrier first went to Sea everyone said it was going to lead to a renaissance of carrier aviation. It never really happened even with VSTOL operations its still an expensive game and most nations don’t need a deep water carrier capability, most nations use their navies for coastal defence and their ships can be easily protected by aircraft from the airforce.
Considering the cost of the aircraft, ship, equipment and training it just isn’t reasonable for most navies to play that kind of game.
Whilst its true there are a number of Harriers coming onto the market in a few years time they also going to be time expired or close to time expired. Thailand has had a great deal of problems keeping the ex Spanish AV8A’s in the air and would really benefit from a purchase of AV8B but in the end there aren’t any airframes to spare and I doubt they could afford it. Of the ex RN Sea Harriers the only useful ones are the new build examples from the nineties which are probably going to India anyway, the airframes that were converted from FRS1 are worn out and not a wise purchase.
The only countries who might add a carrier capability if money is available when the F-35 comes online are Australia and Japan who have both expressed an interest in the capability.
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