Why the specialist night shadower lost its carrier space

The Royal Navy considered a very quiet aircraft dedicated to tracking an enemy fleet at night. Its low speed made it unsuitable for daylight work, while keeping four or five aboard would consume scarce hangar space for airframes unable to perform other missions. Even a navy operating the slow Swordfish judged that tradeoff poor. The abandoned concept shows how carrier doctrine had to balance specialist performance against air-group flexibility and finite stowage.