[Wonder Warthog]

"I am a submarine officer, and the value and the power projection that carriers bring cannot be understated. Submarines can control the seas almost entirely alone, but a carrier battle group as we have seen can take the war deep into enemy territory like we have in Afghanistan, when the ENTERPRISE launched the aircraft responsible for punishing the AQ and the Taliban."

Precisely my point. I don't see small carriers being able to fit the mission above.

[Little Ray]

More importantly I don’t see the PLAN have a need to project power like that...
So, it would be nice if the PLAN wasted its money on CVNs instead of improved SSNs and SSKs.