No catapult, no use...
Is there no-one in the Navy, the government or the procurement teams who realises that without a catapult, the ship is virtually useless as an aircraft carrier?
Even if your strike aircraft are capable of unassisted takeoff with a useable payload (which is not a given) how about all the ancilliary aircraft normally used in carrier operations?
An aircraft carrier will normally have a complement of AWACS (or AEW) planes to provide eyes over the horizon, these (like for instance the EC2 Hawkeye) need a catapult to get off the deck with sufficient fuel load to be useful.
Then you have Carrier Onboard Delivery. All the mail, spare parts, personnel transfers etc are collected and delivered by aircraft: helicopters don't have the range and payload necessary, so again, you need an aircraft which will require an assisted takeoff to be of any practical use.
So, what actual use is this shiny new carrier? None, that I can see.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
