norwaypinesavage:
"According to my FIL, Henry Kiser was summoned to the DOD several days after Pearl Harbor.
He left the same day with a purchase order for 50 aircraft carriers to be made by modifying Kiser Liberty ships already being constructed.
He was to produce the first one in 60 days.
He was forgiven after it took 90 days."
The US will not be building 50 jeep carriers to fight the CCP over Taiwan.
The US can no longer quickly build 50 of any ship, much less a "light" or "escort" carrier.
But the idea of a light carrier based on a civilian hull to support amphibious operations is not entirely dead.
It lives on today in the Puller Class ESBs.
These have large flight decks for helicopters and tiltrotors for air support, but, like the old CVEs, are not built for high intensity naval warfare.
Curiously, in 1943, USS Liscome Bay (CVE-56) cost around $10 million to build.
In today's money, that's around $500 million, which is roughly the price of the civilian-hull-based Puller Class ESBs.
Could we build 50 of those in a pinch?
No, but we might build 2 per year and, over time, that could be enough, given that ESBs will not do convoy escort duties like the old WWII CVEs.
Convoy escort duties now fall to destroyers, or better yet, to frigates like the USS Constellation (ooops!), which are purpose-designed to deal with wartime threats to civilian convoys and similar.
Point is: the old concept of a civilian based "escort carrier" is not dead, it lives on in today's ESBs, though the mission has changed and our ability to produce them is drastically reduced from WWII levels.
USS Liscomb Bay CVE-56:
It is an interesting concept. I had not been following the analysis on the Puller class, but had been following it in various other trials.
And you are correct. We won't be building 50 modern jeep carriers. But we do need more platforms, IMO.
I don't subscribe to the common notion that many people have, that carriers are not only not needed, but are impossible to defend and are therefore only good for SinkEx usage. That carriers are no longer worth it is not a sound analysis, but some people go so far as to say that all surface ships are obsolete. It ignores the history of warfare innovations on offense followed by counter-innovations on defense. Obviously, If a warship like a Gerald Ford class carrier is caught in the middle of that innovation cycle, it will be disastrous for that warship(s). But just as there is no such thing as an invulnerable ship or weapons system, it is also true that there is no such thing as an offensive weapon that cannot be defended against. This is the history of warfare.
But I don't want to go down that road here, because that is not what this thread is about.
We have been playing around with using our LHA Wasp (less likely) and America (more likely) classes for some time (Since the F-35 became available in greater numbers) outfitting them with F-35s, and if I recall, the results were promising. I found this link:
LINK: The U.S. Military Has ‘Mini Aircraft Carriers’ With F-35s: Meet The America-Class Assault Ship
You are correct to state our Naval Shipbuilding (both maritime and military) is in a moribund state, and the problem has grown so serious for years now that overhauls and refits are far, FAR behind schedule, creating chronic problems with operational cycles, especially, I believe, with submarines.
In the book I mentioned above ("Warship Builders") it is impossible NOT to draw the interwar parallels to 1919-1925 where shipbuilding in America was so anemic that we were in serious national security danger back then, to today's sad state.
In reading it, one can readily see: We have been here before.
But it is an improvement that the Trump administration recognizes this. South Korea and U.S. signed on Friday, November 14, a memorandum of understanding, implementing the agreement announced on July 30, 2025 as this linked article states:
LINK: US, South Korea Unveil Details On Korean Investments In Shipbuilding And Subs
This will serve two purposes: We can begin to upgrade our shipbuilding infrastructure, and with American employees working in shipyard(s) built by Korea, we can begin to build our anemic shipbuilding personnel workforce, which is also shorthanded and in need of expansion. These employees can be a seed crop for other future shipyard expansions. It is an uphill battle for us, as we have let our shipbuilding go so far that it is vital we begin the process.
As an aside, I went to the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath, Maine which builds and does refits on the Arleigh Burke class of destroyers, a class which I think may well be the finest class of destroyers this nation has ever built. We need to get them building soon, whether it is frigates or destroyers.