I asked a similar question a few months ago so here goes again since The Battle of Coral Sea just happened.
Additionally what’s the current future plans for both navies in terms of what what’s being designed and produced?
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The US Navy has an exceptionally bright future but a clouded present. The Two-Ocean Navy Act has authorized blockbuster expansion plan; these ships are now ‘on the stocks’ and being built. The Essex Class Aircraft Carriers will be a gamechanger due to their numbers: 18 full-size fleet carriers. Plus ten , 27 cruisers, 118 destroyers and 15,000 aircraft.
But with only five aircraft carriers afloat at present, a single lost battle could cripple the US Pacific Fleet and leave it dangerously short of carriers until the Essexes join the fleet.
The IJN is current on its fifth expansion plan since 1930. It is notable for ordering the Shinano, a Yamato hull converted into an sircraft carrier, the two Yamato battleships and is completing the Taiho, an armoured-d3ck carrier approved in 1941 under the 4th Naval Expandion Plan.
However while the IJNngas plenty of destroyers and submarines, they are not being used for convoy and convoy-raiding but are reserved for fleet on fleet actions. This is a critical error in the Pacific where supply is THE issue. The combat record of IJN sunmaribes is nothing short of an embarrassment.
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