[rmlew]

The War on Terror has siphoned off funds that would've gone to ship building, aircraft procurement, etc. The time is approaching when the Navy is going to have to employ a different strategy. An aircraft carrier is great, but it needs 40 ships around it to protect and support it. That's a lot of bucks.
We have 11 carriers and 285 ships. Even without thinking, your assertion is preposterous. Now here is the reality. By 40, you mean 5: a Ticonderoga class cruiser, 3 Arleigh Burke Destroyers, and a nuclear submarine (Los Angeles, Seawolf or Virginia). Then we have one of 2 replenishment vessels.

[The Sons of Liberty]

When we have to go up against a modern Navy, perhaps the Chi-Coms in a few years, I’m afraid all those carriers are going to be death traps, as they overwhelm them with anti-ship missiles.