renrich
Chief Master Sergeant
My reference shows Hermes to carry 15 AC and was first carrier built in UK actually designed as a carrier. Not very useful but certainly a very early AC carrier. There has been a long discussion(and argument) on this forum before on this subject, but in my opinion(in a perfect world) the crystal ball in the US would have shown the need for a long range escort fighter and the War Department would have designated a manufacturer, besides Vought, to build a land based version of the Corsair. It would have been available in early 1943 and would have had the range and performance to have made it safer for our B17s and B24s to penetrate into Europe until the P51 B came along to take over.
