Carriers in Combat

The aircraft carrier revolutionized warfare, allowing fleets to launch fighters and engage each other over great distances. World War II witnessed the carriers heyday as swarms of American Wildcats and Hellcats and Japanese Zeroes catapulted from flight decks to attack enemy ships and planes at battles like Midway and Leyte Gulf. Since then, as the more modest vessels of World War II grew into nuclear-powered supercarriers, these giant warships have served as floating airstrips in conflicts around the globe, from Korea and Vietnam to the Falklands and Desert Storm.