Essex, Saipan and Independance all are fast carriers, up to 31 kt. By contrast Commencement bay (19 ships) and Casablanca (50 !!) are hopelessly slow.
I can see the Northrop N-156N being produced by 1956, along the N-156T (T-38) and N-156F (F-5). They assume air cover from Saipans and Independance carriers with Skyraider AEW to guide them. While the Skyshark failed, another atempt -successfull - could be done at a "turboprop Skyraider" with the correct engine - the T56 turbine from the Hercules and P-3 Orion.
As for the Essex - the Crusader I & II are fine, of course, but F-5D Skylancer and F-11F-1F Super Tiger are awesome. All three aircraft with J79 will rule the skies. Plus the N-156N on the smaller carriers, and Phantoms on the larger ones.
I've read both 19 and 22 for C. Bay, and something like 39 Casablancas were in good enough shape for deployment (out of 45, five were lost during the war). N-156 was meant to operate from C. Bay, A2D from Casablanca. Both would be useful for the roles they had in WW2, convoy escort and air support of amphibious assaults. Add SH2 and SH3s and they would be good anti-submarine platforms as well. They could free up the fast carriers to focus on sea control and strike. Personally I'd shift a bunch of them to other NATO navies for convoy protection in the Atlantic. And by a bunch I mean 1/2 to 2/3rds of them, keeping the rest for Pacific duty and to support the Marines.
I don't see the Navy sacrificing an attack squadron for more fighters.
They did throughout WW2, with the fighter complement increasing and the attack complement decreasing. Fleet carriers only became attack carriers after the IJN ceased to be. "The great Marianas turkey shoot" validated the approach, as it was the first time the carrier force that got the first strike in lost, since the USN fighters killed the IJN strike package. I'd submit the only reason Cold War carriers had as many attack aircraft as they did was that they weren't up against other carriers. And remember, the plan was for an F-14 and A-6 only wing in the 80s, with the F-14Cs replacing A-7s, which F-18s actually did.
They will work hard on getting systems like the AWG-9/AIM-54 into service so that one defensive fighter can engage multiple targets simultaneously long before they sacrifice an attack Squadron.
Er, yes, but first - it would be 1970s before the AIM-54 would be available, and second - they would be forced to dealt with Tu-22 & Tu-22M, not Tu-16. Also, they wouldn't be facing Mig-19 by this time.
I often wonder why did they bothered with the Missileer in the first place or did not tried a "plan B" at least.
Maybe a better idea would be to put the radar and missiles, first, in modified A-3 Skywarriors (as was done for testing, incidentally !). It had a very large bomb bay, maybe the Eagle could fit inside, even only 2 of them.
- and later, try to put the (hopefully matured) system on modified A-5 Vigilantes.
F6D was designed for long range, long endurance CAP against bombers. It would be less useful if the enemy had fighter escorts, but even in that case they'd just chuck half a dozen Eagles apiece and turn for home, and let the remaining Soviet fighters and bombers (who would have had their formations wrecked by evasive maneuvers) try and deal with (in my ideal airwing for the period) onrushing F8U-3 Advanced Crusaders and F11-2 Super Tigers flinging Eagle and Sparrow missiles their way before the merge.
As for AIM-54, Eagle had 60% (160nm to 100nm) more range, and Vought's Advanced Crusader version of the F8U-3 had a bigger radar than the Sparrow proposal and carried a pair of Vought's submission to the Eagle competition (along with 4 sidewinders). If it could carry those, it could carry a pair of Eagles.
Eagle should have been available in the mid 60s along with the F6D, and the Advanced Crusader variant of the F8U-3 could have carried it. Who needs Phantoms if you have Crusader III and Super Tiger?
The most obvious thing would be, as has been said, many more full modernisations of the Essex class ships, and possibly more vigorous British investment in new build carriers after the 1950s. Another would likely be a much more straightforward and quicker development of a Tomcat-type fighter.
If the USN had Eagle carrying F8U-3s, which were much better dogfighters than Phantoms, the Tomcat might not have been developed. Its replacement would have been a decade later than the F-14. I don't know what a 1978 rather than 1968 Tomcat would look like. Was Grumman into their supercruising canard aircraft designs by that point? Because that would be cool.
There was a Aim-7 Sparrow armed Skyhawk proposed by Douglas (it could have been McDonald Douglas), with its search/guiding radar mounted in a modified centreline drop tank...
You wouldn't need them. Super Tigers could carry Sparrow, and in the variant Vought proposed to Germany (which lost to
the F-104 Lockheed bribes) could act as an attack aircraft as well. My ideal for this scenario would be Advanced Crusader, Super Tiger, and Buccaneer off the Midway and bigger carriers, and Super Tiger and Buccaneer off the smaller ones. The F11F-2 would act like an F/A-18, switching between fighter and attack as needed.
France only hope would be PA58 or PA59. PA58 is 45000 tons, early non-nuclear CdG.
- a golden opportunity to build carriers with the French in the 1955-1960 era. The last avatars of the "1954 carrier" at 40000- 45000 tons scream to be merged with PA58.
I quite like PA58. They would look good with Super Tigers and Buccaneers with RB04s (available in 1962) operating from them. Since F11F-2s were multi-role, so figure about a 2-3:1 ratio of F11F-2 to Buccs, since Super Tigers could pitch in and attack if necessary, increasing the number of aircraft available for both attack and defense.
Also, the attack aircraft now are in need of escort - they could be intercepted by Soviet AEW-guided fighters. With all respect to A-4, but if, combat-loaded, they are intercepted by Mig-19, they would be massacred.
P.S. Actually, I wonder; would A-3 have longer service career? If the emphasis of strike aircraft shifted from "low-altitude toss-bombing attack" toward the "standoff long-range missile attacks", then A-3 looks like an optimal platform for any kind of heavy anti-ship/anti-ground missiles.
I like the A-4, especially the Spey proposal, but with Super Tigers they become superfluous.
Buccs would still be useful, but if F-15s and F-16s can't catch Buccaneers flying at 20 feet over Nevada during Red Flag Mig 19s aren't going to catch them 20 feet over the sea. Add Rb04s for standoff and the situation gets even worse for the Soviets.
I suspect the A-3 and A-5 might have been retired earlier, since space is now even more of a premium. The A-6 and Buccaneer are both much better attack aircraft than the A-3 anyway.