Aircraft carriers and carrier-borne aviation are relatively new terms in military terminology but thanks to rapid technological advances their importance has grown beyond the wildest dreams of the pioneers of this new weapon.
Indeed, the versatility of the aircraft carrier has led to the development of carrier-based nuclear strike capacity in the United States, British and French navies for use in a wide spectrum of military operations.
Norman Polmar describes with zest and in great detail the development and operations of the world's aircraft carriers, from Clement Ader-who was probably the first man to propose the modern aircraft carrier, and the early attempts to fly an aircraft from a ship and land back on one, followed by the first true aircraft carriers and their development amid violent controversies during the 1920's and 1930's. Whatever misgivings still lingered were dispelled by the harsh realities of the Second World War when aircraft carriers and carrier-borne aviation really came into their own; the Ark Royal and her Swordfish torpedo planes-obsolete before the war- which stopped the mighty Bismarck;' the Japanese carrier strike force raiding Pearl Harbour; the American carrier operations leading to the five greatest carrier-versus- carrier battles in the Pacific; the world's largest aircraft carrier of that time, the Shinano, which was sunk before ever having launched a plane; and the development of the atomic bomb which changed the whole pattern of strategy.
From then on the aircraft carrier and carrier-borne aviation has played a dominant role in every major conflict, from Indochina, Korea, and the Suez, to Vietnam.

This is not only the definitive history of the aircraft carrier from the make-shift vessels to the nuclear-powered giants of today but it is also a detailed history of the birth and development of carrier-borne aviation. To cover both the technological development of this capital ship and its employment in the conflicts of this century required years of painstaking research and specialised knowledge. While this is for the most part the achievement of the author, he is the first to acknowledge his debt to such experts as General Minoru Genda, Japanese Air Self-Defense Force (formerly Captain, Imperial Japanese Navy), Captain Eric M. Brown, O.B.E., R.N., and the late Professor Robert M. Langdon, U.S. Naval Academy, for their invaluable assistance in documenting their nations' role in the aircraft carrier development. Norman Polmar is a leading American authority on 20th Century warships. His previous books in this field are Atomic Submarines (1963) and Death of the Thresher (1964). His articles on military subjects regularly appear in periodicals in the United States and abroad. He is currently a naval operations specialist with the Northrop Corporation's Deep Submergence Systems Program Previously he was Assistant Editor of the U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings and before that Associate Editor of the Navy Times, Mr. Polmar is Editor of the United States section of the annual reference volume of Jane's Fighting Ships.
Mr. Polmar is a graduate of The American University in Washington, D.C. He resides with his wife and two young children in Lanham, Maryland, a suburb of Washington