Carrier design requires a recurring compromise between hangar space, strike capacity, armour, and survivability. A higher treaty allowance could support six roughly twenty-five-thousand-ton ships without forcing every desired feature into a smaller displacement. Earlier scout-carrier construction would also give designers repeated opportunities to test lifts, hangars, and flight-deck arrangements. That experience could make deck-edge lifts and an Ark Royal-sized carrier with armoured-hangar protection more plausible by 1939, though the proposed design remains contingent.
Notable Point · 1:04:16-1:08:01
A roomier armoured fleet-carrier compromise
A higher treaty limit could let the Royal Navy combine more of Ark Royal's air-group capacity with the protection sought in armoured-hangar designs.