The Falklands conflict and possible use of US aircraft carrier resource

[Cy-27]

There is an interesting article in issue 5 of The Aviation Historian magazine about the proposal that the USA might 'wet-lease' an aircraft carrier to the UK should its carrier fleet suffer losses during the Falkland Conflict. The piece, which uses declassified Government documents as its source, explains that draft plans were drawn up to allow US service personnel to remain as non-combatants while the RAF used the carrier desks as an landing strip.

Any idea if this has been tried before in a combat scenario?

Surely the problems for the USA would have made this impracticable - what would have happened if the carrier was threatened by the enemies of the UK forces?

Despite this, the article by Ben Dunnell gives a bit of an insight into the 'behind-the-scenes' activities during the conflict.

By the way, The Aviation Historian is quite a good magazine and very similar to the much-missed Aviation Enthusiast quarterly in the areas it covers.

 

[Archibald]

They intended to lease, not an aircraft carrier, but a LPH of the Iwo Jima class, with a crew made of civilians / defense contractors, not military.
the Iwo Jimas were close enough in soze and tonnage from either Hermes or Invincibles to replace them if such ship was ever sunk.
and there were plenty of them available.

 

[Rickshaw]

Obviously there would be, as you suggest considerable legal and political problems with such a plan. The Argentines were hardly not going to attack such a target. There were also practical ones. I doubt the RN could have mustered sufficient personnel to man such a ship. Even if they could, they would need to be retrained in US systems which would take some considerable amount of time. That would take so long that their involvement would have become moot. Once the Southern winter had set in, the Argentines were staying put and any efforts by the UK to oust them would have had to cease for at least six to nine months which would have given the Argentines a propaganda victory and possibly a political settlement favourable to them.

 

[uk 75]

This is a well trodden subject. Defense Secretary Weinberger was a great friend to the UK over this period and even received a titular knighthood in gratitude.

Lots of paper proposals flew around at the time allegedly including offering an Essex class training carrier or even basing on a Forrestal/Nimitz class of Harriers away from the combat theatre to allow them to replenish (I am not sure how that would have worked-stocking up on fuel and Sidewinders I suppose)/

As Archibald says an Iwo Jima LPH, already used by the US Navy as an interim Harrier carrier before the Wasp class LHDs, could have been provided with "contractors" (Nicaragua style presumably). UK Sea Kings and Harriers had operated off these ships in NATO exercises so as long as they were manned by trained US personnel (it would have been impossible and impractical to train up RN personal but UK "contractors" might have been involved).

Politically I think it would have been a non starter. The loss of Hermes and/or Invincible would have empowere those in Washington and elsewhere who were critical of the UK response. At home the wets in the Tory Cabinet led by Francis Pym and others would have used the opportunity to climb down. The appeasement ethic was quite widely spread in the Cabinet.

Much would have hinged on Mrs Thatcher herself. She hated the loss of life and unlike Tony Blair was reluctant to use her military if it meant this. She would have been torn by shock and sadness at the loss of so many RN personnel and a desire to stick by her commitment to get the Argentinians off the Islands. She relied on the advice of the Chiefs of Staff.

That is the key point, what did the Chiefs of Staff have in mind to do if one or both of the carriers were sunk. The RAF might have pushed for operations against the mainland Argentine bases, perhaps from Chile. We will need to see the papers.