Naval air defense shifts from breaking formations to killing threats

Short-range missiles increasingly perform the kill role once assigned to heavy anti-aircraft guns. Second World War fleet defense did not require every layer to destroy an aircraft: fighters broke formations into flights, heavy guns split those flights, and medium or light guns confronted the resulting individual attacks. Even thirty or forty seconds between attackers could let a ship redirect its batteries and survive. Nuclear-armed standoff weapons changed that tolerance because one successful release might destroy an entire task force. Modern defenses therefore try to kill the carrier aircraft before launch or intercept its missiles as far from the protected force as possible.