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| F/A-18 Hornet (Image: Wiki Commons) |
By Robert Farley
What would a U.S. Navy without the F/A-18 Super Hornet look like?
Jerry Hendrix has launched an impressive salvo [PDF] in the apparently endless “carrier wars.” In a recent report for the Center for a New American Security, Hendrix examined the role that the aircraft carrier has played in U.S. naval doctrine and planning for the past seventy years, and evaluated new challenges to the centrality of the carrier battle group.
Hendrix traces the history of the carrier air wing, with emphasis on how the World War II experience led American naval aviators to appreciate the need for long range attack aircraft. Especially late in the war, the effectiveness of Japanese land-based kamikaze aircraft helped create interest in longer range attack planes, which in turn drove an increase in deck and ship size. This culminated in the mid-1970s, when US carrier wings could boast the long-range F-14 interceptor and the A-6 strike aircraft, as well as organic aerial refueling capabilities.
From this peak, the focus on range receded. Hendrix lingers on the failure of the A-12, the stealth capable successor to the A-6 Intruder. The cancellation of the A-12 forced the Navy to invest heavily in the F/A-18 Super Hornet airframe in order to keep numbers up and sortie rates high. By settling for the Super Hornet, however, the Navy gave up on long-range strike.
Read the full story at The Diplomat