> Even worse than the previous paragraph. Aircraft carriers did not render battleships obsolete at Pearl Harbor, which involved a fleet of old battleships at a

> Even worse than the previous paragraph. Aircraft carriers did not render battleships obsolete at Pearl Harbor, which involved a fleet of old battleships at a state of low readiness. If the Japanese thought battleships obsolete, why did they bring them to the Battle of Midway 6 months later? Look at the Battle of Taranto in 1940. The British sent a bunch of old, WW1 biplanes against the Italian fleet in port. Three battleships, a heavy cruiser, and two destroyers were disabled. The British lost two planes. Three days after Pearl Harbor, the Japanese hit two of the most powerful battleships in the Royal Navy (Prince of Wales & Repulse). Both battleships sunk, at a loss of six Japanese planes. Those ships were sailing and fighting back - they didn't fair any better than the ships at Pearl Harbor or Taranto. Battleships were now obviously sitting ducks without accompanying airpower. They were obsolete in that they were no longer the ship around which the rest of the fleet was organized. The aircraft carrier was the now the most important ship in the fleet.