Aircraft Carrier Operations During World War II
   HOME
*





Aircraft Carrier Operations During World War II
This article discusses aircraft carrier operations during World War II. Naval historians such as Evan Mawdsley, Richard Overy, and Craig Symonds concluded that World War II's decisive victories on land could not have been won without decisive victories at sea. Naval battles to keep shipping lanes open for combatant's movement of troops, guns, ammunition, tanks, warships, aircraft, raw materials, and food largely determined the outcome of land battles. Without the Allied victory in keeping shipping lanes open during the Battle of the Atlantic, Britain could not have fed her people or withstood Axis offensives in Europe and North Africa. Without Britain's survival and without Allied shipments of food and industrial equipment to the Soviet Union, her military and economic power would likely not have rebounded in time for Russian soldiers to prevail at Stalingrad and Kursk. Without victories at sea in the Pacific theater, the Allies could not have mounted amphibious assaults o ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Evan Mawdsley
Evan Mawdsley (born 1945) is a British historian and former Professor of International History at the University of Glasgow's School of Humanities. He is currently a Professorial Research Fellow. He specializes in Russian history and the history of World War II. Bibliography * ''The Russian Revolution and the Baltic Fleet. War and Politics, February 1917—April 1918'' (Macmillan, 1978) * ''The Russian Civil War'' (Allen & Unwin, 1987) * ''Blue Guide to Moscow and Leningrad ( W. W. Norton, 1991) * ''The Stalin Years: The Soviet Union, 1929–1953'' (Manchester University Press, 1998) * ''The Soviet Elite from Lenin to Gorbachev: The Central Committee and Its Members, 1917-1991'' (Oxford University Press, 2000), with Stephen White * ''Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941-1945'' (Bloomsbury, 2005) (second edition 2016) * ''World War II: A New History'' (Cambridge University Press, 2009) * ''December 1941: Twelve Days That Began a World War'' (Yale University Press, 2011) ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Cape Of Good Hope
The Cape of Good Hope ( af, Kaap die Goeie Hoop ) ;''Kaap'' in isolation: pt, Cabo da Boa Esperança is a rocky headland on the Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula in South Africa. A common misconception is that the Cape of Good Hope is the southern tip of Africa, based on the misbelief that the Cape was the dividing point between the Atlantic and Indian oceans, and have nothing to do with north or south. In fact, by looking at a map, the southernmost point of Africa is Cape Agulhas about to the east-southeast. The currents of the two oceans meet at the point where the warm-water Agulhas current meets the cold-water Benguela current and turns back on itself. That oceanic meeting point fluctuates between Cape Agulhas and Cape Point (about east of the Cape of Good Hope). When following the western side of the African coastline from the equator, however, the Cape of Good Hope marks the point where a ship begins to travel more eastward than southward. Thus, the first mode ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Escort Carrier
The escort carrier or escort aircraft carrier (U.S. hull classification symbol CVE), also called a "jeep carrier" or "baby flattop" in the United States Navy (USN) or "Woolworth Carrier" by the Royal Navy, was a small and slow type of aircraft carrier used by the Royal Navy, the United States Navy, the Imperial Japanese Navy and Imperial Japanese Army Air Force in World War II. They were typically half the length and a third the displacement of larger fleet carriers, slower, more-lightly armed and armored, and carried fewer planes. Escort carriers were most often built upon a commercial ship hull, so they were cheaper and could be built quickly. This was their principal advantage as they could be completed in greater numbers as a stop-gap when fleet carriers were scarce. However, the lack of protection made escort carriers particularly vulnerable, and several were sunk with great loss of life. The light carrier (U.S. hull classification symbol CVL) was a similar concept to the ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Light Aircraft Carrier
A light aircraft carrier, or light fleet carrier, is an aircraft carrier that is smaller than the standard carriers of a navy. The precise definition of the type varies by country; light carriers typically have a complement of aircraft only one-half to two-thirds the size of a full-sized fleet carrier. A light carrier was similar in concept to an escort carrier in most respects, however light carriers were intended for higher speeds to be deployed alongside fleet carriers, while escort carriers usually defended convoys and provided air support during amphibious operations. History In World War II (WWII), the United States Navy produced a number of light carriers by converting cruiser hulls. These s, converted from light cruisers, were unsatisfactory ships for aviation with their narrow, short decks and slender, high- sheer hulls; in virtually all respects the escort carriers were superior aviation vessels. These issues were superseded by ''Independence''-class ships' virtue of b ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Fleet Carrier
A fleet carrier is an aircraft carrier designed to operate with the main fleet of a nation's navy. The term was developed during World War II, to distinguish it from the escort carrier and other less capable types. In addition to many medium-sized carriers, supercarriers, as well as some light carriers, are also classed as fleet carriers. History Aircraft carriers were designed in the years between World War I and World War II. Flight decks were installed on several different types of ships to explore the possibilities of operating naval aircraft without the performance limitations of flotation devices required for seaplanes and flying boats. The most successful of these early aircraft carriers were built from battlecruisers. Battlecruisers typically had a speed of about , which was several knots faster than the speed of contemporary battleships. Additional speed was not necessary for maintaining station with the battle fleet, but enabled the carrier to catch up with the battle ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Launch And Recovery Cycle
Aircraft carrier air operations include a launch and recovery cycle of embarked aircraft. Launch and recovery cycles are scheduled to support efficient use of naval aircraft for searching, defensive patrols, and offensive airstrikes. The relative importance of these three missions varies with time and location. Through the first quarter-century of aircraft carrier operations, launch and recovery cycles attempted to optimize mission performance for ships with a straight flight deck above an aircraft storage hangar deck. Carrier air operations evolved rapidly from experimental ships of the early 1920s through the combat experience of World War II. Background World War I naval engagements demonstrated the increased range of dreadnought battleship guns and the inability of scout cruisers to fulfill their traditional role of finding the enemy fleet and informing friendly forces of advantageous maneuvers before they came within gun range. Aircraft carriers were initially perceived as a ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Flight Deck
The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is the surface from which its aircraft take off and land, essentially a miniature airfield at sea. On smaller naval ships which do not have aviation as a primary mission, the landing area for helicopters and other VTOL aircraft is also referred to as the flight deck. The official U.S. Navy term for these vessels is "air-capable ships". Flight decks have been in use upon ships since 1910, the American pilot Eugene Ely being the first individual to take off from a warship. Initially consisting of wooden ramps built over the forecastle of capital ships, a number of battlecruisers, including the British and , the American and , and the Japanese Akagi and battleship Kaga, were converted to aircraft carriers during the interwar period. The first aircraft carrier to feature a full-length flight deck, akin to the configuration of the modern vessels, was the converted liner . The armoured flight deck was another innovation pioneered by the Ro ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north toward the East China Sea, Philippine Sea, and Taiwan in the south. Japan is a part of the Ring of Fire, and spans Japanese archipelago, an archipelago of List of islands of Japan, 6852 islands covering ; the five main islands are Hokkaido, Honshu (the "mainland"), Shikoku, Kyushu, and Okinawa Island, Okinawa. Tokyo is the Capital of Japan, nation's capital and largest city, followed by Yokohama, Osaka, Nagoya, Sapporo, Fukuoka, Kobe, and Kyoto. Japan is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eleventh most populous country in the world, as well as one of the List of countries and dependencies by population density, most densely populated and Urbanization by country, urbanized. About three-fourths of Geography of Japan, the c ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland, and many smaller islands within the British Isles. Northern Ireland shares a land border with the Republic of Ireland; otherwise, the United Kingdom is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, the North Sea, the English Channel, the Celtic Sea and the Irish Sea. The total area of the United Kingdom is , with an estimated 2020 population of more than 67 million people. The United Kingdom has evolved from a series of annexations, unions and separations of constituent countries over several hundred years. The Treaty of Union between the Kingdom of England (which included Wales, annexed in 1542) and the Kingdom of Scotland in 170 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territories, nine Minor Outlying Islands, and 326 Indian reservations. The United States is also in free association with three Pacific Island sovereign states: the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau. It is the world's third-largest country by both land and total area. It shares land borders with Canada to its north and with Mexico to its south and has maritime borders with the Bahamas, Cuba, Russia, and other nations. With a population of over 333 million, it is the most populous country in the Americas and the third most populous in the world. The national capital of the United States is Washington, D.C. and its most populous city and principal financial center is New York City. Paleo-Americ ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Battleships In World War II
World War II saw the end of the battleship as the dominant force in the world's navies. At the outbreak of the war, large fleets of battleships—many inherited from the dreadnought era decades before—were one of the decisive forces in naval thinking. By the end of the war, battleship construction was all but halted, and almost every remaining battleship was retired or scrapped within a few years of its end. Some pre-war commanders had seen the aircraft carrier as the capital ship of the future, a view which was reinforced by the devastating Pearl Harbor attack in 1941. The resultant Pacific War saw aircraft carriers and submarines take precedence. There were just two engagements in the Pacific Theater when battleships fought each other, and only three such engagements in the Atlantic. Instead, they were used to add to fleet air defense, for shore bombardment, and in several cases as fixed port defense batteries. Battleships remained the most heavily protected ships afloat; n ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Aircraft Carrier
An aircraft carrier is a warship that serves as a seagoing airbase, equipped with a full-length flight deck and facilities for carrying, arming, deploying, and recovering aircraft. Typically, it is the capital ship of a fleet, as it allows a naval force to project air power worldwide without depending on local bases for staging aircraft operations. Carriers have evolved since their inception in the early twentieth century from wooden vessels used to deploy balloons to nuclear-powered warships that carry numerous fighters, strike aircraft, helicopters, and other types of aircraft. While heavier aircraft such as fixed-wing gunships and bombers have been launched from aircraft carriers, these aircraft have not successfully landed on a carrier. By its diplomatic and tactical power, its mobility, its autonomy and the variety of its means, the aircraft carrier is often the centerpiece of modern combat fleets. Tactically or even strategically, it replaced the battleship in the ro ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]