[openasocket]

There isn't a one-size-fits-all replacement, though there are a couple of ideas. The USMC has their expeditionary advanced bases concept which is certainly an option. The idea is to leverage the fact that the F-35B can take off and land on improvised runways, like a parking lot or a flat grassy strip somewhere. You have a flight of F-35Bs and maintain 3-4 of these improvised bases, each meant to only support a couple planes. And every few days you pack up one of these bases and move them to another spot. Since you're always moving your opponent has to continuously search for these bases, and even if they find one and destroy it, they've only destroyed some supplies and maybe 1 or 2 planes that happened to be on the ground at that base at the time. And locating these bases will be difficult since they will be small, and there's a continuous CAP looking to shoot down surveillance aircraft, as well as SAM batteries. The big question is if they will be able to transport enough fuel, munitions, and spare parts to these bases to support them, and if the F-35Bs will be reliable enough. It also requires that you have friendly territory, or at least secured territory, to operate from. In the case of a Sino-American war, I believe the idea is to use islands in the Philippines, or Japan. This has some info on how it could work: https://warontherocks.com/2019/12/expeditionary-advanced-mar...

That isn't really a replacement for a carrier, though, more of a supplement.

[mrfusion]

Thanks! Good info.

Along that same line of thought; What do you think about developing fighter sea planes and then have two or three fighters and a support boat at whole bunch of different/changing sea locations?

Another idea. For the expense of a carrier could we just keep planes in the air? Especially if they’re drones and don’t have to take care of pilots.

Re-arm and refuel as needed in the air.

[openasocket]

Actually read an article recently about the sea planes idea: https://warontherocks.com/2020/07/bring-back-the-seaplane/ . It's an interesting idea, but something where there will need to be a lot of research before it is viable. It's unclear if you can create a decent modern fighter that is also a sea plane. However, if you could, using those with a seaplane tender would be much easier from a logistics standpoint than the EAB. Even if you can't make a decent fighter seaplane, having a seaplane tanker would be very helpful for extending the range of the carrier air wing, as mentioned in the link.

For the drones, it's complicated. Airborne refueling has been a thing for decades, but off the top of my head there's never been airborne re-arming. But even if you had that you would still need to land for maintenance. But still you could probably keep these drones in the air for multiple days, maybe even a week at a time. But the logistics of managing so many tankers gets complicated fast. Check out the Black Buck raids for an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Black_Buck . And that's just for a bombing raid, if you want to maintain a combat air patrol you'll need even more tankers running continuously, and a bunch more fighters since for every one on station there will be multiples coming to/from a base or a tanker. I think long-range drones will definitely be a part of future warfare, but I think you still want a carrier to base them. I think all you need to do is move the carrier further away from anti-ship missile platforms, and increase the striking range of the air wing to compensate. There's a very lengthy write up on this if you are interested: https://csbaonline.org/uploads/documents/CVW_Report_Web_1.pd...