Destroyer experience and the Royal Navy's carrier programme

Which widespread non-Bismarck naval misconception is most frustrating?

The idea that battleship-minded admirals ignored carriers; the answer points to destroyer experience, a large interwar carrier arm, and wartime construction policy.

Many senior British and American officers had substantial destroyer experience, which complicates the familiar picture of admirals committed exclusively to battleships. The Royal Navy's large carrier arm in the 1920s and 1930s is another objection to that picture. The answer attributes the loss of Britain's carrier lead to Churchill's early-war interruption of capital-ship, cruiser, and carrier construction in favour of escorts. Flower-class corvettes and Hunt-class destroyers were already in production, so an escort programme did not have to be invented from scratch. Moving workers from yards accustomed to battleships and large liners into yards building small vessels added disruption. This explanation places the carrier delays in wartime industrial policy and the practical limits of transferring shipbuilding labour.