Carrier battle group in the context of "Naval fleet"

The air war during Operation Overlord, alongside the Battle of Britain, the carrier battles in the Pacific and the strategic air war against the German Reich, was one of the most significant air battles of the Second World War. It took place between April and August 1944 in the course of the Allied landings in northern France (→ Operation Overlord).

The Allied landing in Normandy was also made possible by the air superiority of the Allied forces. Before June 6, 1944, known as D-Day, the Allied air forces prepared for the invasion. They bombed German supply lines, artillery batteries and supported the French Resistance from the air with ammunition and equipment.

An aircraft carrier is a warship that serves as a seagoing airbase, equipped with a full-length flight deck and hangar facilities for supporting, arming, deploying and recovering shipborne aircraft. Typically it is the capital ship of a fleet (known as a carrier battle group), as it allows a naval force to project seaborne air power far from homeland without depending on local airfields for staging aircraft operations. Since their inception in the early 20th century, aircraft carriers have evolved from wooden vessels used to deploy individual tethered reconnaissance balloons, to nuclear-powered supercarriers that carry dozens of fighters, strike aircraft, military helicopters, AEW&Cs and other types of aircraft such as UCAVs. While heavier fixed-wing aircraft such as airlifters, gunships and bombers have been launched from aircraft carriers, these aircraft do not often land on a carrier due to flight deck limitations.

The aircraft carrier, along with its onboard aircraft and defensive ancillary weapons, is the largest weapon system ever created. By their tactical prowess, mobility, autonomy and the variety of operational means, aircraft carriers are often the centerpiece of modern naval warfare, and have significant diplomatic influence in deterrence, command of the sea and air supremacy. Since the Second World War, the aircraft carrier has replaced the battleship in the role of flagship of a fleet, and largely transformed naval battles from gunfire to beyond-visual-range air strikes. In addition to tactical aptitudes, it has great strategic advantages in that, by sailing in international waters, it does not need to interfere with any territorial sovereignty and thus does not risk diplomatic complications or conflict escalation due to trespassing, and obviates the need for land use authorizations from third-party countries, reduces the times and transit logistics of aircraft and therefore significantly increases the time of availability on the combat zone.

The Kh-22 "Storm" (Russian: Х-22 "Буря", NATO reporting name AS-4 'Kitchen') is a large, long-range anti-ship cruise missile developed by MKB Raduga in the Soviet Union. It was designed for use against aircraft carriers and carrier battle groups, with either a conventional or nuclear warhead. Kh-32 is an updated conventional variant of the Kh-22 and was accepted to service in 2016; it features an improved rocket motor and a new seeker head.

A carrier air wing (abbreviated CVW) is an operational naval aviation organization composed of several aircraft squadrons and detachments of various types of fixed-wing and rotary-wing aircraft. Organized, equipped and trained to conduct modern US Navy carrier air operations while embarked aboard aircraft carriers, the various squadrons in an air wing have different but complementary (and sometimes overlapping) missions, and provide most of the striking power and electronic warfare capabilities of a carrier battle group (CVBG). While the CVBG term is still used by other nations, the CVBG in US parlance is now known as a carrier strike group (CSG).

Until 1963, Carrier Air Wings were known as Carrier Air Groups (CVGs). Carrier Air Wings are what the United States Air Force would call "composite" wings, and should not be confused with U.S. Navy Type Wings (such as Strike Fighter Wing Atlantic), which are primarily administrative and training commands composed of squadrons of the same type of carrier-based aircraft when not deployed. The United States Marine Corps equivalent command-level organization to a CVW is the Marine Aircraft Group (MAG). However, MAGs are shore-based (with sea-based capability) and may contain any combination of aircraft squadrons and aviation support units. Carrier Air Wings integrate closely with their assigned aircraft carriers, forming a "carrier/air wing team" that trains and deploys together. There are currently nine U.S. Navy Carrier Air Wings; four of the wing commanders and their staffs are based at Naval Air Station Oceana, Virginia, four are based at Naval Air Station Lemoore, California, and one is aboard Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, Japan. The squadrons which make up each wing are based at various bases in the U.S. with their respective Type Wing Commanders with the exception of those squadrons assigned to the Japan based airwing which are based at Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni (fixed wing squadrons) and Naval Air Facility Atsugi, Japan (helicopters).

The Battle of the Philippine Sea was a major naval battle of World War II on 19–20 June 1944 that eliminated the Imperial Japanese Navy's ability to conduct large-scale carrier actions. It took place during the United States' amphibious reconquest of the Mariana Islands during the Pacific War. The battle was the last of five major "carrier-versus-carrier" engagements between American and Japanese naval forces, and pitted elements of the United States Navy's Fifth Fleet against ships and aircraft of the Imperial Japanese Navy's Mobile Fleet and nearby island garrisons. The battle was the largest carrier-to-carrier engagement in history, involving 24 aircraft carriers, deploying roughly 1,350 carrier-based aircraft.

The aerial part of the battle was nicknamed the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot by American aviators for the severely disproportional loss ratio inflicted upon Japanese aircraft by American pilots and anti-aircraft gunners. During a debriefing after the first two air battles, a pilot from USS Lexington remarked "Why, hell, it was just like an old-time turkey shoot down home!" The outcome is generally attributed to a wealth of highly trained American pilots with superior tactics and numerical superiority, and new anti-aircraft ship defensive technology (including the top-secret anti-aircraft proximity fuze), versus the Japanese use of replacement pilots with not enough flight hours in training and little or no combat experience. Furthermore, the Japanese defensive plans had been directly obtained by the Allies from the plane wreckage of the commander-in-chief of the Imperial Japanese Navy's Combined Fleet, Admiral Mineichi Koga, in March 1944.

A carrier strike group (CSG) is a type of carrier battle group of the United States Navy. It is an operational formation composed of roughly 7,500 personnel, usually an aircraft carrier, at least one cruiser, a destroyer squadron of at least two destroyers or frigates, and a carrier air wing of 65 to 70 aircraft. A carrier strike group also, on occasion, includes submarines, attached logistics ships and a supply ship. The carrier strike group commander operationally reports to the commander of the numbered fleet, who is operationally responsible for the area of waters in which the carrier strike group is operating.

Strike groups comprise a principal element of U.S. power projection capability; a single supercarrier holds enough firepower to rival the air forces of entire nations. Previously referred to as carrier battle groups (a term still used by other nations), they are often referred to by the carrier they are associated with (e.g., Enterprise Strike Group). As of March 2023 there are 11 carrier strike groups in the U.S. Navy.

In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, maneuverable, long-endurance warship intended to escortlarger vessels in a fleet, convoy, or carrier battle group and defend them against a wide range of general threats. They were conceived in the late 19th century as a defense against torpedo boats, and by the time of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, these "torpedo boat destroyers" (TBDs) were "large, swift, and powerfully armed torpedo boats designed to destroy other torpedo boats". Although the term "destroyer" had been used interchangeably with "TBD" and "torpedo boat destroyer" by navies since 1892, the term "torpedo boat destroyer" had been generally shortened to simply "destroyer" by nearly all navies by the First World War.

Before World War II, destroyers were light vessels with little endurance for unattended ocean operations; typically, a number of destroyers and a single destroyer tender operated together. After the war, destroyers grew in size. The American Allen M. Sumner-class destroyers had a displacement of 2,200 tons, while the Arleigh Burke class has a displacement of up to 9,600 tons, a difference of nearly 340%. Moreover, the advent of guided missiles allowed destroyers to take on the surface-combatant roles previously filled by battleships and cruisers. This resulted in larger and more powerful guided missile destroyers more capable of independent operation.

The fast combat support ship (US Navy hull classification symbol: AOE) is a type of replenishment auxiliary ship. Different from traditional logistic ships, the fast combat support ship is designed with high speed to keep up with the carrier battle group/carrier strike group, while the multi-product station is capable of supplying all types of necessities for the fleet.