US Aircraft Carriers Vulnerable to China: Pentagon Leaked Report & Island Strategy Explained

In this Special Report, India Today’s Managing Editor Sandeep Unithan analyses a leaked Pentagon report warning that US aircraft carriers are becoming ‘increasingly vulnerable’ to China’s hypersonic missiles and drones. To counter Beijing’s Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) capabilities, the US is reviving its World War II-era ‘island strategy’ in the Indo-Pacific. Unithan explains how Washington is establishing a network of ‘unsinkable aircraft carriers’ by upgrading airfields in Tinian, Palau, Yap, and the Philippines. The report also highlights the strategic importance of Australia’s Cocos (Keeling) Islands near the Malacca Strait. This dispersed posture aims to preserve US intervention options in a potential Taiwan conflict while complicating China’s targeting calculations.