5 acres of US “soil” floating 25 miles off an enemies coast with enough armament to make just about any city uninhabitable for a century.
AKA Power Projection.
And, they never operator alone - there’s usually 2 subs, several frigate/destroyer/cruiser ships, tenders/oilers, etc.
I concur!
And these days, there are leaner and meaner ways to do that.
I'm not for one minute suggesting, as you said I did c_v, that we decommission them all. I can see all kinds of scenarios where a carrier or carriers would be necessary. But, to my mind, we don't need as many in service as we used to. I'm agnostic as to how many we should keep in the fleet.
Don’t forget the Marines MEU/MEF that sometimes tags along on the ‘Phibs that can be attached to a CVBG.