The Battle of Taranto was conceived as a multi-carrier operation. Eagle and Illustrious were expected to bring about forty-two Swordfish, and British planners still questioned whether that would be enough. An idealized strike might have involved several carriers and roughly one hundred torpedo bombers. Extrapolating from the historical hit rate, a much larger attack could have disabled a substantial share of the Italian fleet in harbor. The historical raid was the surviving fragment of a more ambitious carrier concentration.
Notable Point · 1:25:10-1:26:26
Taranto was planned as a multi-carrier strike
The historical raid by Illustrious was the reduced form of a plan for Eagle, Illustrious, and potentially more carriers with a much larger Swordfish force.