The Midway Ceiling

In 1951, budget and engineering disputes over flight-deck strength and catapult capacity led the U.S. Navy to abandon the planned Forrestal-class supercarrier in favor of an enlarged Midway-derivative design, capping fleet carriers at roughly 60,000 tons for the remainder of the Cold War. The United States consequently never built a true supercarrier displacing over 75,000 tons, reshaping naval aviation, aircraft design, and alliance basing strategy for decades.

Diverged 1951 · “The Forrestal class is never constructed, and the U.S. Navy operates smaller carriers through the Cold War.”