Patreon 39:What if Courageous and Glorious had survived?

Probably not: Italian priorities did not make a strike carrier urgent, even while British carriers operated in the Mediterranean.

Hypersonic weapons compress engagement timelines and create pressure to use artificial intelligence in defensive decision systems.

Broadly yes, though Glorious was slightly more modernized and had a longer-established air group.

Courageous and Glorious began as fast, shallow-draft tools for Fisher's proposed Baltic operation against Germany.

Their guns were meant to make lighter opponents avoid battle and oblige Germany to answer with major ships.

Courageous was reused for a nuclear submarine; the lack of Glorious and Furious is attributed tentatively to modern naming preferences, especially the aggressive sound of Furious.

Graf Zeppelin's design reflected Germany's lack of practical carrier experience and limited access to Japanese operational knowledge.

The ships' modest armour suited a fast, shallow-draft raiding role, and both were completed at exceptional wartime speed.

It had not ceased to exist in 2021, but its Belfast work had shifted away from large-scale shipbuilding toward projects such as wind turbines, with possible naval work under discussion.

At about 27,420 tons deep load, 30 knots, and roughly 48 aircraft, the converted sisters still combined fleet speed with a substantial air group.

Damage and a major yard period could have turned a surviving sister into a more useful full-length-deck carrier.

With aircraft airborne and room to use their 30-knot speed, they could likely evade and pressure the slower raider; surprise with aircraft below would be far worse.

Their 15-inch guns and 30-knot speed would let them dictate the fight, though their light armour remained vulnerable to 11-inch fire.

No. It required hull strengthening and was cost-prohibitive in peacetime, but wartime priorities could justify the work.

An extended hangar could preserve a group of about 48 aircraft through 1945.

Malta would be better, but an upgrade used much less scarce yard capacity and returned a carrier to service far sooner.

Not principally for deck strength, but they would need upgraded accelerators and arrestor gear for heavier aircraft.

The lifts, hangar arrangement, and aircraft mix show an early Royal Navy concern with sustaining fleet air defence as well as strike sorties.

Perhaps 60 to 70, though Eastern Fleet service is more plausible than deployment with the British Pacific Fleet.

They would have limits, but they could handle several Royal Navy aircraft and remain useful after a wartime flight-deck and hangar upgrade.

No. Their most plausible roles are in the Atlantic, perhaps the Indian Ocean, and in aviation support rather than the late Pacific front line.

The Royal Navy used accelerator for carrier launch equipment and catapult for the different systems used on battleships and cruisers; later terminology converged on catapult.

A Malta completed in the early 1950s might have remained useful long enough to reach the Falklands era and become a preservation candidate.

They could perform some support duties, with the centre of an escort-carrier strike group as the more useful role.

A 36-Swordfish air group shows why Glorious could have materially enlarged a Mediterranean carrier strike.

Around 1941, though the earliest Wildcats supplied to Britain lacked folding wings and were not ideal for every carrier.

Probably; twin 4.5-inch weapons or a stronger 40 mm battery are plausible upgrades.

Usually no; a Walrus could be carried in addition to the aircraft included in the published air-group figure.

Before radar, Swordfish covered reconnaissance and anti-submarine work as well as attack, explaining their numerical dominance over fighters.

Yes, if enough hulls are available after amphibious priorities are met; in that situation their flight decks can provide escort-carrier capability.

Furious's service from Norway to the Malta convoys shows how an imperfect converted carrier could remain useful across many wartime missions.

Keeping the sisters afloat would make temporary modernisation practical by leaving the Royal Navy with enough flight decks to cover its commitments.

In the proposed counterfactual, construction pauses while the class is redesigned around an angled deck.

Experiments with flush decks showed that routing funnel trunks through a hull consumed valuable hangar volume that an island could preserve.

No. The Illustrious class was intended to replace the older carriers as the fleet built toward about eight ships.

Courageous was lost while carrying out anti-submarine work that peacetime exercises had made look safer and more effective than war proved it to be.

The return from Norway placed Glorious in clear weather with only two destroyers, reduced speed, and no aircraft searching or guarding overhead.

Normally six during the period when they were carried as a Fleet Air Arm flight.

Interwar exercises rewarded attacks on capital ships, masking the willingness of wartime submarines and aircraft to destroy any valuable target they could reach.

No evidence supports that claim, and her depleted land-attack bomb supply makes it unlikely; the intended court martial offers the clearer explanation.

Range would remain limiting, making Atlantic service and perhaps the Indian Ocean more plausible than full Pacific operations.

A senior flag officer accompanying the carrier would likely have required a standing air patrol, creating warning, reinforcements, and a possible torpedo strike.

German torpedo failures around Narvik and Ark Royal provide a narrow but historically grounded route by which Courageous could survive her encounter.

There is no exact equivalent; in broad force-structure terms they sit between the Invincible and Queen Elizabeth classes.

The estimate is around 1950-52, though a carrier could succeed earlier if it maintained attack range beyond the battleship's guns.

Glorious's captain treated aircraft as weapons to launch only for a defined attack rather than as a continuous reconnaissance and defensive screen.

Not reliably, because surface ships also launched spotting aircraft such as Swordfish, so an aircraft sighting did not identify a nearby carrier.

Interwar exercises identified a need for about eighteen fighters, and wartime experience showed that radar improved warning without reducing that requirement.

An additional carrier presence would multiply reconnaissance, mine-dropping protection, and the ability to pursue French ships leaving Mers-el-Kébir.

The movement of Eagle and Illustrious into the Mediterranean shows a deliberate carrier concentration for Taranto and convoy air defence.

Adding Glorious could turn Taranto into a larger multi-wave attack, potentially disabling far more of the Italian battle fleet.

They could change it substantially, especially if a larger Taranto strike removed the Italian fleet support needed for the amphibious part of the operation.

The two losses removed trained aircrew, fitters, and carrier damage-control experience at the very moment the Royal Navy needed to expand.

A carrier operating from Iceland could use intelligence to intercept Fw 200 Condors before they guided U-boat wolf packs toward convoys.

A carrier with Force Z could provide reconnaissance, fighter cover, radar support, and a stronger escort group before Japanese bombers struck.

In a small pre-war carrier force, two saved ships enable multi-carrier operations, reduce escort demands, and release other forces for different theatres.

Greater success at Mers-el-Kébir, Taranto, and Norway could release British capital ships while making Germany less willing to risk Bismarck.

Most German and Italian capital ships would avoid the Nelson class; Yamato and Musashi are the Axis battleships best suited to that fight.

They could help preserve a stronger Eastern Fleet and, through earlier Mediterranean success, release troops and leaders for Malaya while disrupting Japanese landings from the sea.

Some additional air support, but probably no overall change because the fall of France determined the withdrawal from Norway.

Yamato would probably win, but Rodney could make the victory so costly that the Japanese battleship became a constructive loss.

With Rodney's Bismarck-era captain, Rodney is favoured; under other command the fight looks much more even and possibly mutually destructive.

Built in Britain or America, it could survive the invasion and might also draw additional Polish escorts safely into Allied service.

Not necessarily by much in Europe, but it could reduce Allied losses and limit Japanese expansion in Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean.

The final scale is uncertain, but a carrier with Force Z clearly adds fighters, radar, escorts, and strikes on Japanese landing shipping that change the operational problem.

Holding Malaya and Singapore could prevent the Indian Ocean raid and place a Royal Navy carrier force alongside the Americans at Coral Sea or Midway.

They might, but the carriers would also bring fighters and a larger screened force, complicating Japanese target selection and attack planning.

German overconfidence met British institutional commitment to codebreaking, reinforced by foreign and academic help in each war.

Most likely Albacores with Sea Hurricanes or Fulmars, reflecting what the Fleet Air Arm could field at that stage of 1942.

It could combine British experience in sustained fighter defence with American strike capacity, creating a larger and more resilient task force than either side could always field alone.

No. France and the Allies could use Béarn more practically as an escort carrier for anti-submarine work in the mid-Atlantic.

Not in this operation: the forward bases had only just received the bombers, and no fighters with suitable range were available there to escort them.

They would struggle in speed and turning contests but could be dangerous with diving attacks, cooperative tactics, and Royal Navy fighter direction.

It offers a cheap large hull, but a container ship is usually easier; a tanker is most plausible when it is the available option or when a disguised arsenal ship is desired.

The counterfactual gives the Royal Navy a useful night-operations edge against Japanese forces less able to preserve and pass on specialist flying experience.

Earlier success in Europe could release a much larger British fleet for Singapore, forcing Japan to confront a concentrated carrier and battleship force.

As merchant raiders and scouts intended to divide Japanese forces and create opportunities for Allied concentration.

Not immediately: British types remain likely in 1941, a transition could begin in 1942-43, and American aircraft become much more plausible by 1944.

Yes, but an earlier North African success could redirect radar sets and ships to Singapore in 1941.

Potentially much stronger, with Keyes handling politics while Somerville, Montgomery, and a senior air commander direct their respective operations.

The more relevant earlier aircraft is Barracuda, which would enter service before Spearfish.

News of Pearl Harbor should have triggered dispersal and full alert in the Philippines, where prewar doctrine already expected a Japanese attack.

John Cunningham and Richard O'Connor are the overlooked examples, alongside a call for more nuanced views of Patton, Halsey, and Nimitz.

Probably not; unique carriers holding 60 to 70 aircraft would likely receive stronger protection, as Ark Royal did.

As the fast capital-ship element accompanying Britain's carrier forces, broadly analogous to Japan's use of the Kongō class.

The speculation has MacArthur reaching the presidency while Keyes becomes postwar prime minister, changing the path to Suez and naval policy.

More ships and troops would still need firmer land command than Percival provided if the defence of Malaya and Singapore were to hold.

The final assessment attributes Courageous to misplaced confidence in pre-war ASW practice and Glorious to a failure to form a proper, air-covered task group.