Aircraft limits would freeze carrier development

What if the Washington Naval Treaty had limited aircraft size and the number carried instead of carrier displacement?

It would have badly constrained aircraft development because interwar negotiators could not define durable aircraft limits while aviation technology was changing so quickly.

Aircraft-based limits would have locked carrier aviation into assumptions that rapidly became obsolete. The problem appears throughout the interwar treaty experience, when repeated attempts to regulate aircraft ran into the pace and uncertainty of technical development. Aircraft size, performance, and the useful number carried were moving targets rather than stable treaty units. The exchange explains why direct weapons limits can be harder to sustain than limits on the ships carrying them.