Asia’s Lightning carriers will boost national prestige, but will also come at high cost. Procurement of F-35 variants also cracks the door for Singapore or Australia to similarly appoint their large-deck ship programs with carrier-aviation capabilities should they choose to do so. South Korea also plans to launch a Lightning carrier by the end of this decade. In 2021, the United Kingdom dispatched HMS Queen Elizabeth to the Indo-Pacific on her maiden voyage. Navy forward-deployed its own Lightning carrier, the USS America, to Sasebo, Japan in 2019. It is also a milestone on a path that is establishing smaller aircraft carriers equipped with the F-35B Lightning II, or “Lightning carriers,” as the new capital ships of Asia. This is a landmark event for the Japanese navy and Japan’s defense posture more generally, giving Tokyo an aircraft carrier for the first time since World War II. The event marked an important step in the Izumo’s metamorphosis from a flat-deck helicopter carrier (called a “helicopter destroyer” in Japanese nomenclature) into a light aircraft carrier operating advanced fifth-generation short take-off and vertical landing fighters. Marine Corps F-35B Lightning II fighters embark ed on the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force ship JS Izumo as a capability validation.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |