Dorn: what are we talking? About aircrafts RN deployed or designed? I am speaking about deployment and RN struggle with numbers at first part of war but deployed adequate aircraft to do the job.
I agree that designs are completely different and RN was behind with Fulmar as temporary adequate solution for time but due to other priorities were unable to design naval aircrafts and this I agree fully. But this was due to priorities elsewhere. Designed, built and deployed by the nation whose carrier we're talking about. Hence, UK designed, UK built, UK Deployed carrier planes. That a nation that was considered a first power in the seas and the air ended up straight up buying foreign carrier aircraft because their own were either inadequate or obsolete talks by itself about the state of the FAA.
FLiegerkorps X didn't use any Bf109s at all. It was a geschwader of naval attack dedicated JU87s and JU88s with some assorted planes for secondary tasks (He111s), but no fighters whatsoever.
On their operation against Illustrious no BF109s were present, for instance.
Considering the intensity of those attacks, that the US navy took no carrier losses even while parked next door to major land airbase hubs was quite the achievement at the time. 6 years before doing that kind of thing was considered suicidal...yet they lost not a single fleet carrier since november 1942 up to the very last day of the war.
As for what kind of "protection" the british carriers had to offer because of their closed hangar, armored deck, design, nope ,that didn't mean they were invulnerable. Illustrious was hit twice (by 500kg bombs) in areas vulnerable to 250kg bombs, for instance, the elevators. And she was no better than any other carrier in the world when dealing with torpedoes (which means, not particularily good).
and yes, the USN was able to protect their carriers. At least the full tonnage ones (Ranger or Wasp were design flops and the americans were well aware of it as their intention to keep them in the atlantic pointed out) Their Fleet Carrier designs were extremely sturdy and their DC drills the best of the world by far. As a result the scale of the damage ships as Yorktown or Hornet sustained before going down was extreme, the later refused to sink even when torpedoed by american destroyers, while Ark Royal was sunk by a single U-boat G7 torpedo and Illustrious was kicked out of the war by damage no worse than Enterprise survived during the war. Just a couple of instances and without even naming the Essexes, which were even toughter.
The doctrinal principle behind the "armored deck carrier" was that if subjected to attack, those carriers would bring down the planes, store'em up in the hangar and turtle up the damage. Simply stated, that was ludicrous because:
a) you still are vulnerable to bomb damage (as instances like Illustrious prove)
b) torpedoes don't give a damn about deck armor
c) ships with FAR more armor were completely overwhelmed and sunk by aircraft alone during WW2.
d) By giving up CAP you're not killing the enemy planes nor their crews, so they'll still be a threat another day. Thankfully that idiotic idea about recovering planes and "turtling up" for the attacks was abandoned as soon as the war started. But it goes on to prove how stupid the concept behind the armored deck carrier was.
Also you'll notice I'm talking about the "armored deck carrier" but I also talk about the "closed hangar carrier". An armored deck wasn't a bad idea per se (unless you were to design tonnage-restricted ships, as the british were). THe problem was the mix of both because it imposed some extreme design compromises that acted against both the longevity and usability of the carriers. Those ships had either a limited plane complement, cramped aircraft storage and workshop facilities or a mix of both. Stores for the air wing (avgas and ordinance) were very limited, even more considering the small air group. The Illustrious batch of CVs were unable to effectively operate air wings over 40 planes for long period of times, and the last batch of armored deck carriers were unable to carry planes like the F4U because hangar roof clearance was too low. Also by closing the hangar and making the flight deck the main strenght deck you made the ship far more vulnerable to far-reaching structural damage, as damage aboard carriers of that type showed. Also, and let's not forget, explosions confined by closed walls contain the explosive force within those walls - explosions within open spaces vent part of that destructive force outwards. A bomb within a british "closed hangar" carrier was FAR more devastating than a bomb going off in an american carrier.
All that price for what? Safer fuel stowage?.... compared to what exactly?. To Taiho?. or to Benjamin Franklin?. Because british carriers were as susceptible as any other to ruptured avgas lines due to torpedo shock like the ones that killed Taiho. And you don't get to survive worse fires than the ones some american carriers survived. Ability to bounce bombs off the flight deck was limited, as Illustrious' example (and the fact that the elevators were, by force, less protected) shows. The only real advantage those armored decks gave was that air operations were almost unhampered by kamikazes hitting the deck. For all other practical purposes, it was a waste.
"the deck was designed to defeat 250kg AP bombs" - on the main deck, maybe, not on the lifts. Besides, blast damage on the deck still could cause extreme trouble, both structural (the island is right there, you know), and as a fire hazard. Said that, bombs in the 454/500kg range weren't exactly rare, you know...Ju87s made plenty of use out of them, so did american SBDs.
The whole point here is that you can design a ship to be resiliant to damage, but that the best, by far, way to prevent getting your ship sunk is preventing the planes that drop the bombs from doing so (by putting up a credible CAP), not by crippling your own carrier design in the process of putting some deck armor to then go burning a lamb leg to the godess of luck for that armor being enough to bounce bombs off.
And again, deck armor and closed hangars did jack when dealing with torpedoes, and planes dropped torpedoes too.
And what will I see?. That against a concentrated well executed attack Illustrious survived by miracle, to then spend almost a full year jumping from drydock to drydock?. Or that afterwards she was unable to steam beyond 22knots for the remainder of her career because the hull was so severely compromised after the damage that even the central shaft had to be removed because it couldn't be alligned?. The only reason Illustrious wasn't written off after the mauling she received at the hands of Fliegerkorps X is that a war was going on and every flattop was valuable - even those that had twisted hull girders and whole shafts removed from the ship could be used to ferry stuff around even while being operational cripples. But as a combat unit she was as effectively killed in 1941 as had she been sunk.
First- main danger was in the theater where the enemy was a world class naval power with the best carrier fleet in the world, not in the theater where one nation was building ships without knowing what for (germany) and the other thought putting their battleships out of port was an unmanageable risk (Italy). And the smallest reason wasn't that neither had carriers.
Still, ok, for you 1943 is latewar then. For me is 1944-45. But besides that, USS Wasp and USS Ranger operated several times well within the range of naval-based aircraft in the ETO. They took part in offensive operations yet never took a hit operating in the "main danger zone" (according to you), and well within range of land-based aircraft.
Conversely american carriers operated well within striking distance of japanese land-based airpower many times during the whole war and not one US fleet carrier was sunk since USS Hornet had to be torpedoed twice by destroyers (once by american ones, the second by japanese destroyers).
And that was because when engaged in offensive operations against land based airpower carriers' biggest asset wasn't armored decks - it was their ability to move in ,attack, and move out before being found and attacked themselves. You didn't need armored decks or closed hangars for that role.
Also "Wildcat was inferior to europeand land based fighters". Which fighters?. The Hurricane the RAF was still using in plentiful numbers until 1942?. Or the P-40 that remained in active combat duties in the ETO until 1944?. Just to name two.
No fleet in the world (again:NONE) in 1940 was supposed to park their carriers under the umbrella of enemy air power waving a flag of "attack me". That Tarento was a surprise attack is a given. So what?. It's how you used CVs - come in, strike, get the hell out of the way. Naval air power was all fine and dandy but while their airfield had an advantage land based power didn't have (their air base was mobile), they also had a serious drawback (land airbases can't get sunk).
So what is, exactly, the reason Taranto or Pearl Harbor can't be used as instances of why you don't need an armored deck at all in a carrier?. They are excellent instances of how to apply the best feature of CV airwings: surprise, mobility, and the ability to get the hell out before striken back. Tarento was an instance. Pearl Harbor was an instance. The american raids on the Marshalls and Gilberts were good instances. The raids against Truk were excellent instances. Etc etc etc - in all of those operations CV forces struck land-based targets well within reach of enemy land-based airpowers. In none of those operations a single CV was ever hit.
That by 1944 the americans could muster such a quantity of high-capacity fleet and light carriers carrying enough top-class fighters to park off a couple hundred miles off the coast of a target and blast it into submission without much regard to whatcame their way doesn't mean CV forces had to operate that way to be succesful.
And again in neither scenario crippling your design to give it 4 inches of deck armor and a closed hangar makes any sense.
By that standard any mediocre weapon is a world beater if a good soldier knows how to work around it's many defects and still make it useful. Sorry, that's just bull. A weapon is good or bad because of it's own traits, not because the excellency of those who use said weapon and who has to fight handicapped because of said weapon.
The Royal Navy was a force with excellent and proud crews, sailors, officers, commanders who were driven by the will to fight to defend their nation against their enemies at any cost and were resourceful enough to put up an excellent fight even when given awful tools for the job. That's the only reason why stringbags like the Swordfish had any success. Not because they were great tools. Because they weren't.
A good analogy would be the Falklands. A made-up assortment of "Carriers" operating off the south atlantic to fight back after an UK possession had been attacked, within range of land airpower. You can make an incredibly long and detailed list of how amazing the british crews and airmen were to achieve that result, you can make an incredibly long and detailed list of reasons why there can't be enough praise to be given to the resourcefulness of those who had to make do with the extremely limited tools they had at hand. You can certainly commend all that and more...
but what you can't do is to say that the Hermes, or the Invincibles, were great carriers ,because that they were not. The Royal Navy had to put a fight handicapped (Again) by stupid political decisions made in whitehall years before that meant that neither Ark Royal nor Eagle weren't around anymore, because what the Royal Navy needed in that theater of operations was a proper carrier, not the couple of flatdeck antisubmarine tincans operating Harriers the Royal Navy was forced to make do with during that conflict. That they achieved what they did with the complete inadequate tools they had for the job speaks loads about the professionalism, bravery, skill, excellency and dedication of those soldiers.
But it says nothing about the tools they were forced to use, and which handicaps they had to make do with because their fleet had given up the proper tool for the job years before.
Well, same goes for WW2 Royal Navy. involved in a world-wide conflict against navies with better ships, planes and equipment, because their own government had been beyond shortsighted and stupid in the years leading up to the war. The RN accomplished a lot even while operating with inadequate equipment.
That speaks loads about the men. But says nothing at all about their equipment.
This argument makes no sense. HMS Eagle operated in the mediterranean too and did well enough until hit and sunk, not by an airplane, but by a submarine (and went down exactly the same way Illustrious would had she been the one struck by that spread of torpedoes).
Asking wether a Yorktown could do what the other, much less capable, carriers did in the mediterranean or not, when much less capable ships already did, is a no-brainer. Of course they could, and far better than what the british fleet carriers did (there's a "certain" advantage in operating almost twice as many planes per carrier when we speak about carrier ops).
USS Wasp was in that list of carriers, btw, she was part of Spitfire Mk.V ferry operations in the mediterranean in 1942. So in a way she already answered that question 76 years ago.
Why would RN send fleets to the Pacific?. Don't know. Ask Churchill, he was the one who insisted HMS Victorious to be based off Singapore in 1941 alongside Repulse and PoW (and lucky for her, machinery trouble prevented it from happening).
"Lasting effect on designing Midway class"?. On putting some armor on the ships' flight deck?. Sure. On the british concept of "closed hangar, armored deck"? not at all. USS Midway had the same style of open hangar as previous US aircraft carriers did and retained the main strenght deck at the hull, not the flight deck. Both were polar opposites of the british principles and practices. Simply stated, the Midways were designed with no economy of design at all, they had more than enough tonnage to put an armored deck on it while still being capable of operating an airwing of 100+ planes, so they did just that.
But now, conversely, and now that you bring the Midway class up...let's take a look at what was intended to be the "ultimate" British carrier designed by using wartime experience, the HMS Malta project, shall we?.
-armored deck abandoned and replaced by mild steel. Main armor deck lowered to the hangar deck and given limited side protection. The resulting armored box covered machinery spaces,but not the aircraft facilities anymore, in the same fashion of the american Yorktown and Essex designs: Plainly speaking,
the british completely ditched the flight armored deck in HMS Malta.-complete abandonment of the closed hangar principle, changing it by open hangar spaces pretty much identical to those seen in wartime japanese and american designsç
-main strenght deck lowered from the flight deck to the hangar deck, exactly identical to US and Japanese practices
-extra effort in the design to provide ample hangar and workshowp with enough roof clearance to operate any aircraft in the foreeseablefuture
-large air wing of 90 planes minimum
-hinged side elevators, similar to those in USS Essex, and enlarged deck elevators no longer constrained in size because of armor weight considerations.
Well, well, it seems that the Royal Navy learned enough about the "closed hangar, armored deck" carrier concept during WW2
to completely ditch it in their pursuit for the ultimate carrier, didn't it?.
Naval fighting in the ETO was pretty much over by the time Italy pulled out of the war and the landings off the italian coast were accomplished. Even more after D-day had been a success, and even more after Tirpitz was sunk. That means that as early as June 1944, and as late as November 1944 there was no real reason to keep all the carriers in the ETO. Yet british fleet carriers didn't venture into the Pacific well into 1945.
Facts don't seem to back your given reason.
Illustrious was disabled by a force of around two dozen Stukas in a first strike, and a follow up dozen completed the job in a second attack (those stukas, incidentally, were intercepted by fulmars, no Stukas were shot down. Let that thought sink, a naval fighter that was useless enough to shoot down Stukas. Yet you say it "was adequate for the job". But I digress). Not a single Stuka was lost.
Illustrious was the target of follow up attacks later on but she was already a wreck and had she been in high seas (like, say, you would expect to be in a carrier battle) she'd been a total loss. As it was she took one year to be repaired and was an operationally crippled ship for the remainder of her service.
Lexington and yorktown were attacked by a strike force including 38 D3As and 18 B5Ns. That's already a bigger force than what Illustrious had to deal with. She was struck by no less than two torpedoes out of 14 launches done in a pincer attack. Torpedoes caused extensive flooding -what torpedoes usually do- but worse than that the resulting vibrations of one of the hits ruptured several avgas fuel lines. Ship was reduced to 25 knots because some boilers were put offline by the shock and took a 6 degree listing after the attack. Soon damage control operations limited the flood and corrected the list by counterflooding. Boilers were back on line and ship was able to resume full speed steaming, with air operations being only briefly interrupted.
The ship would've survived but for the fuel lines breached. Avgas fumes couldn't be contained and only a spark was needed to detonate it. So it happened, minutes later followed by a 2nd explosion. Abandon ship was issued.
Yorktown took two bombs, one of which (250kg SAP, Illustrious was vulnerable to those too if hit in the lifts) penetrated four decks and exploded in one of the hangars. Luckily the blast effects were reduced due to the open hangar, but still the damage was serious and looked worse: japanese crews reported the ship was ablaze and probably going to sink. In truth the fire was soon under control and damage, while serious, didn't impair the ship's operational ability: she resumed air operations mere minutes later.
more importantly, out of the 69 planes involved in the japanese attack only 46 returned to land on Zuikaku (Shokaku was ablaze at the time and fighting hard to survive, let alone to conduct air operations). most of the returning planes were Zeroes, the Vals and Kates were pretty much mauled by the american CAP and AAA. Losses were so crippling that Zuikaku, even while untouched by the battle, had such a depleted air complement that she was written off the Midway operation (shokaku was out for far more important reasons). Meanwhile Yorktown went on to soldier on at Midway.
summing up: Lexington and Yorktown were attacked by a larger force than the one Illustrious was attacked with, to begin with. Lexington was fully operational not long after taking 2 bombs and 2 torpedo hits (Illustrious was a blazing wreck already after the 1st attack). What killed her was shock damage all carriers of the time (british ones included) were vulnerable to. Yorktown was fully operational not long afterwards, and after some emergency patchwork at Pearl Harbor went on to fight at Midway.
At Midway Yorktown was attacked by a combined force of 18 D3As and 6 Zeroes. Fighter CAP massacred the incoming planes but three got through (let's remember by now that those planes had some of the most experienced naval pilots in the world). All three got hits, one of them being so damaged that went kamikaze and crashed against the carrier deck, detonating parked aircraft.
Deck damage was extensive (specially because of the kamikaze hit that set off a parked dauntless' 1000lbs bomb). internal damage was problematic but not serious (fires were put out with notable efficiency). But one of the bombs had hit on the smokestack area and had caused a "down the funnel" blast that ruptured the uptakes of several boilers, and forced the rest to be shut down until damage was cleared. Once it was (roughly 90 minutes after the attack), the ship resumed way and restarted air operations.
Then the kates came, a force of 15 B5Ns. Most of the CAP had been diverted to Enterprise and Hornet by that time and only 2 planes were aloft, the ones that had landed briefly before launched again even while they were literally on fumes. Several kates were shot down in the incoming run, some more by the AAA, Yorktown avoided at least two incoming torpedoes but was struck by another two. Machinery had to be shut down, and without power pumps were out. The order was given to abandon ship because it was foreseen the progressive flooding couldn't be put at check without pumps.
Answer: Yorktown was attacked by a combined force of 39 planes. Again, more than Illustrious. Again, CAP wrecked the incoming strikes. Also, the damage she had taken at Coral Sea had been patched but not properly repaired. And what's even more funny...she survived. Because even after abandoned Yorktown didn't go down. Rescue operations were mounted the next day, and were making good in the process of salvaging and in their attempt to restore power to the ship when a submarine struck Yorktown with 2 torpedoes and USS Hammann with a further one that sank her ,setting off her depth charges which added to the woes of the wounded carriers. USS Yorktown finally gave up the fight and sank after taking a total of 3 bombs, 2 air torpedoes and one Kamikaze that she would've survived, and 2 submarine torpedoes that she simply couldn't anymore by that stage.
(lets remember here, HMS Ark Royal sank after taking a single submarine torpedo hit).
USS Hornet is even more incredible. Attacked in the Battle of Santa Cruz by no less than 38 Vals and Kates, she took a total of three bomb hits (only one of which did any meaningful damage), two torpedoes and two kamikaze attacks. 26 japanese planes didn't return and the carrier ,while forced to stop because the torpedo hits caused machinery to stop and a loss of electrical power, was in no immediate danger of sinking. Repairs were well under way and looking good when alater strike by 9 Kates caught the ship before it could resume way on her own power. 8 planes were shot down, the 9th scored a torpedo hit that ruined the efforts to repair the electrical systems and machinery. With the pumps offline orders were given to abandon ship, even while when Hornet ,listing as she was, seemed in no more dire danger of sinking than Yorktown at Midway, even after having taken 3 bombs, 3 torpedoes and 2 kamikazes. To make things better yet another strike arrived, yet another bomb hit happened, yet the carrier listing as she was still didn't seem to want to down.
With the US force in retreat and the japanese advancing there was no chance for an attempt to salvage or tow. Instead there was an urge to ensure the ship went down before they arrived. So they torpedoed the carrier to scuttle it. And when -THAT- failed (admittedly, in part because most of them didn't go off, american torpedoes of the time, you know), the destroyers put more than 400 rounds of 5 inch ammunition on the carrier.
You'd think that did it, right?. Wrong. She still was afloat when the japanese arrived to the area hours later. Reduced to a blazing wreck by the american gunfire, she was finally put out of her misery by Long lances.
Answer: in repeated strikes involving no less than 50 planes, the ship was still not going down. After more than 400 hits by destroyers, the ship was still not going down. Long lances did the job when the ship was nothing but a smoldering wreck. More than 50% of the planes involved in the attacks against USS Hornet never made it back to the japanese carriers, and once again, most of that 50% were Zeroes, the Vals and Kates being all but wiped out by american CAP and AAA. Effectively the battle of Santa Cruz marked the moment where the japanese carrier fleet stopped being a real threat. The Japanese combined fleet was amost depleted of strike aircrews and couldn't mount any kind of offensive operations anymore; the remainder of the surviving Zero aircrews were redeployed to Rabaul to take part in the Solomons campaign and the carrier fleet completely retired from the war for a full year, until they had their last hurrah at the Marianas Turkey Shoot.
You're seriously making a tremendous mistake in questioning american WW2 fleet CVs toughness. Those things literally took unwordly beatings and still actively refused to sink. That's how tough american carriers were, and they didn't need any amored deck nor closed hangar to be so, while still operating in excess of 70 planes without a hitch, while the british carrier struggled to have more than 40 in theirs.
USS ranger took active part in combat operations in the Atlantic, including taking a prominent part of Operation Torch, And conductiong patrol operations in the North Sea (well within range of german Ju-88s).
Most notable was her role in an operation against german shipping in Norway (where a notable german air presence was based, including numerous fighters and bombers as part of their attempt to strike on murmanks convoys). USS Ranger attacked targets near Bodo (with a crossed "o"...you know, that strange norwegian letter), just next door to the same air forces that were giving the convoys a living hell.
If that's "keeping her out of danger zones" I don't know what it'd looked like to send it down the lion's den...maybe sailing straight into wilhemshaven would've qualified as such?.