@ MadRat
PS: 12-15 aircraft are more realistic for 12/14.000ts.

The Collossus class were under 14 kT and they operated 40 aircraft on a 700 foot long deck. So maybe the 500 foot deck is more the limit than the weight. The shorter, heavier frame of the ww2-era CVA made them suitable for foul weather operations. The longer ‘light’ carriers pitched too much when the seas moved around.

Pfcem-

You might be right, but we don’t want to occupy land space for political reasons. And you aren’t exactly talking WW2-era technology with predators. The warbird concept offers a lot more room for sensors, suites, and shooters. You’d maybe have 16-18 warbirds available at any one time. And as extended deployment works it’s attrition it might drop to 10 after two years out. We’re not talking huge workspaces on something like a CVA.

The Kaman eggbeaters are cool to see. One way to quiet down helicopters is to add more blades. More blades means more power do you drop the low frequency noise for higher frequency noise of a larger powerplant. Baffles can distribute the noise, too, which dramatically lowers the whine from most directions. Your frame has to be packed with insulation, adding further to your empty weight.

Over G –

You don’t always have the luxury of land bases to work from. The thing is that the majority of the WoT precision strike missions being done overseas right now are by predators. The carrier used to operate as a communications hub for the land element, which really lent credibility to the title “flagship”. Basically a floating command post. The amphibious assault ships still carry on with this role.

I realize this isn’t really COIN per se, but that is about the closest description to the job. Terrorists are just worldwide insurgents when you get down to the nitty gritty details. The COIN aircraft were always optimized for endurance coupled to STOL, with an effective area suppressive fire role. They either directly killed targets from above or pinned them down until cavalry moved in; i.e. helicopter or motorized cavalry. An aircraft carrier centered around these planes would offer effective mission coverage over 70% of the world’s land mass. And since they largely operate with permission from the governments which they operate over, they don’t need the traditional fleet protection that the full size carriers require.

Two dozen modern 2000hp class warbirds backed by a half dozen V-22’s and another half dozen predators and a couple of C-2’s would offer a lot of flexibility in the WoT. The predators can operate 24/7 to track down the targets, maybe neutralize the stray ones it can. When you need a larger package you move in the warbirds. The V-22’s can sling in troops and mobilize equipment (i.e. the new automated light howitzers for fire support or hummers for motorization) as required for clean up.

You’re only talking about a 500 foot long deck with overall a 12-14 kT displacement pushed by 20000hp at most. You’d probably cruise between 16-20 knots out to 10k miles on a full stomach. You could operate more freely in ports of call around the world because you aren’t a threat to carry nukes. You don’t need the huge fleet escorts as required by the larger carriers. And all the technology necessary to pull it off is readily available.