Carrier battle groups against Soviet bastions

What was the role of carrier battle groups in a war with the Soviet Union?

They would push into the North Atlantic and toward Soviet bastions, suppress defending forces, and cover submarines hunting Soviet ballistic-missile boats.

NATO carriers would move through the North Atlantic to threaten Soviet submarine bastions and, if the defences broke, attack targets in Soviet territory. They would cover attack submarines hunting ballistic-missile boats, whose survivability made them especially important to Soviet nuclear deterrence. Kirovs, Kievs and Backfire bombers appear among the forces intended to make that penetration exceptionally costly. One recalled planning estimate involved a force of six to eight carriers with three or four sunk, although the numbers are given from memory. The expected destruction of much of the defending Soviet force underlines the scale of the contemplated battle.