Chitose-class seaplane tenders as the better conversion path

The Chitose-class seaplane tenders offered a cleaner route to light-carrier conversion. They already had hulls and internal arrangements built around floatplanes and catapult operations. As tenders, they carried twenty-four floatplanes and four catapults; conversion produced light carriers with space for about thirty aircraft and two elevators. That aviation-oriented starting point made more sense than removing turrets from heavily armed battleships. Merchant ships designed for rapid wartime conversion appear as another way Japan might have created reserve carrier capacity.