Living in Annapolis, I have gotten to know socially some of the foreign officers who do rotational tours at the Naval Academy. I was chatting one night with a young German officer -- a German Navy pilot. I asked what he did as a pilot in the German Navy, since as far as I knew Germany had never had any carriers. He said they had been thinking of buying or building one, so they had started to train a squadron of naval aviators. He was one of the first to get his wings. They were so impressed with him they sent him off to the Academy to learn American naval aviation doctrine. Then, while he was over here, they canceled the program and disbanded the squadron. He spent the rest of his tour as a German instructor at the Academy and hadn't a clue what he was going to do when he got home.
I'm surprised their Navy doesn't operate any maritime patrol aircraft over the Baltic and North Sea.