Navy surface ships are obsolete.
The UK-Argentine Falklands War proved that.................
I thought the lesson there was that the Brits need to reprogram the computers on their defense systems to recognize that a French Exocet missile fired from an Argentine jet is hostile.
Surface ships are here to stay. Not everything can be done with airplanes and submarines. The role of surface ships in battle will undoubtedly change over time but they are not going to go away. Aircraft carriers are bigtime targets but they are about as well protected as technology allows. I don't dispute that their future usefulness is likely to decline but currently they remain a difficult target to take out and their ability to deploy massive air power is valuable.
I disagree.
The Brits fundamentally underestimated the capabilities of the Argentine AF and, combined with both poor intelligence and glaring lack of airborne surveillance - e.g., US Hawkeye - they were left vulnerable.
I view their losses as failure of leadership.