HMS Unicorn as the British Pacific Fleet's mobile aircraft workshop

Unicorn's hangar workshops could rebuild radial engines and restore aircraft ranging from Corsairs to Fireflies. As the British Pacific Fleet's only efficient aircraft-support facility early in 1945, she prepared replacements and carried stores for every aircraft type in service. At San Pedro Bay her lighters worked day and night between fleet and replenishment carriers, while the ship supplied much of the replacement-aircraft flow for the Okinawa operations. Her wartime repair division handled 626 aircraft and 283 engines, showing the scale hidden behind a carrier strike force. The extract then follows the same logistics model into the Korean War, when Unicorn remained with the Far East Fleet to support operational carriers.