Wartime carriers underpin Britain's early Cold War naval-air position

Britain entered the Korean War relying on light carriers completed at or shortly after the end of World War II, alongside other wartime carriers and HMS Unicorn. Five or six years after the war, those relatively new ships formed the backbone of a large naval-aviation establishment. The comparison places the US Navy first, the Royal Navy second, other Western fleets below it, and the Soviet Navy beginning to rise. American predominance rested partly on financial capacity: the United States could support the largest fleet while other countries were indebted to it. Carrier power therefore depended on available hulls, institutional aviation capacity, and the state finances needed to sustain them.