Why Britain pursued supersonic V/STOL aircraft

Postwar jets needed more specialized runways than wartime aircraft, making known airfields increasingly vulnerable to reconnaissance and attack. V/STOL promised to preserve usable airfield capacity while also letting more Royal Navy carriers operate advanced fighters than a Phantom-centered force restricted to Ark Royal and Eagle. Royal Navy interest in two-seat Harrier variants also shows how a preferred specification could narrow options before the service accepted a single-seat solution. Sustained investment in a supersonic Harrier family could have created an exportable British capability attractive to the US Marine Corps. One possible carrier design is a 35,000- to 40,000-ton ski-jump ship with a waist catapult for Gannet or successor airborne-early-warning aircraft. A reciprocal purchase of the E-2 Hawkeye then becomes one possible industrial and operational consequence of that alternative path.