CVA - 01 The CVA - 01 aircraft carrier was to be a class of at least two fleet carriers that would have replaced the Royal Navy ' s existing aircraft carriers , most of which had been designed prior to or during World War II . The project was cancelled , along with the proposed Type 82 destroyer s that would have escorted them , in the 1966 Defence White Paper , due to inter - service rivalries , the huge cost of the proposed carriers , and the difficulties they would have presented in construction , operation , and maintenance . Had these ships been built , it is likely they would have been named HMS " Queen Elizabeth " and HMS " Duke of Edinburgh " or the " Invincible " class . Origin . In the 1960s the Royal Navy was still one of the premier carrier fleets in the world , second only to the US Navy which was in the process of building the 80 , 000 ton " Kitty Hawk " - class aircraft carriers . The fleet included the fleet carriers HMS " Ark Royal " , " Eagle " , and two much smaller carriers , the completely reconstructed " Victorious " , and the much newer light carrier " Hermes " both with 3D 984 radar and C3 but limited to air groups of 25 aircraft , at the most 20 fighters and strike aircraft and 5 helicopters or alternatively 16 fighters and strike aircraft and 4 AW Gannets turboprops and 5 helicopters . A fifth carrier , HMS Centaur was modernized to the minimum standard to operate 2nd generation Scimitars and Vixens in 1959 , but was never satisfactory or safe for operating nuclear strike aircraft and was a purely interim capability , while Eagle was refitting . Only HMS " Ark Royal " , and Eagle could potentially operate the US F - 4 Phantom and a minimum S2 Buccaneer viable strike squadron of 14 aircraft and a total air group of 48 aircraft , which compared poorly to the 90 available to a " Kitty Hawk " class ship . The increasing weight and size of modern jet fighters meant that a larger deck area was required for take offs and landings . Although the Royal Navy had come up with increasingly innovative ways to allow ever larger aircraft to operate from the small flight decks of their carriers , the limited physical life left in the existing carriers , none other than Hermes capable of reliable and efficient extension past 1975 , and the inability of the Victorious and Hermes , the most effectively and expensively modernized of the carriers to operate the F - 4 or an effective and useful number of S2 Buccaneers , made the order of at least 2 new strike carriers essential by the mid 1960 ' s . Design considerations . Once the Chiefs of Staff had given their approval to the idea of new carriers being necessary , in January 1962 , in the strategic paper COS ( 621 ) 1 , " British Strategy in the Sixties " , the Admiralty Board had to sift through six possible designs . These ranged from 42 , 000 to 68 , 000 tons at full load . The largest design , based on the USS " Forrestal " class , had space for four full sized steam catapults , but was rejected early on as being significantly too costly , particularly in terms of the dockyard upgrades that would be needed to service them . However , the advantages of size were immediately apparent . A 42 , 000 ton carrier could only hold 27 aircraft , whereas a 55 , 000 ton carrier could carry 49 . This represented an 80 % increase in the size of the airgroup for a 30 % increase in displacement . Even with these smaller designs , however , cost was already becoming a serious issue . The Treasury and the Air Ministry were pushing for a new set of long - range strike aircraft operating from a string of bases around the globe . For the former this appeared a cost effective solution for the East of Suez issue , and for the latter it meant that the Royal Navy would not get a majority of the defence budget . This meant that by July 1963 it was announced that only one carrier would be built . Design . The CVA - 01 would have displaced 54 , 500 tons ( although the ship was said to displace 53 , 000 tons " in average action condition " ) , with a flight deck length ( including the bridle arrester boom ) of The size of the flight deck , combined with steam catapults and arrester gear would have enabled the carriers to operate the latest jets . The aircraft complement would have included 36 Phantom fighter / ground - attack aircraft and / or Buccaneer low - level strike aircraft , four early - warning aircraft , five anti - submarine helicopters and two search - and - rescue helicopters . The large ' Broomstick ' radar dome above the central island on the carrier was planned to be a Type 988 Anglo - Dutch 3D radar , which would subsequently be fitted on the Royal Netherlands Navy " Tromp " - class frigates , although this would not have been fitted to the final carrier as Britain pulled out of the project . Cancellation . By early 1963 Minister of Defence Peter Thorneycroft announced in Parliament that one new aircraft carrier would be built , at an estimated cost of £56 million , although the Treasury thought that the final cost was likely to be nearer £100 million . This was based on the carrier using the same aircraft as the Royal Air Force , the Hawker P . 1154 supersonic V / STOL aircraft ( a larger version of what would become the Hawker Siddeley Harrier ) . However , after the General Election of October 1964 , the new Labour Government wanted to cut back defence spending , and the RAF attacked the Royal Navy ' s carrier in an attempt to safeguard first its BAC TSR - 2 strike / reconnaissance aircraft and then its proposed replacement , the General Dynamics F - 111 , from the cuts . The new Government , and by extension Treasury , were particularly concerned about the size issues involved , as these were fluctuating quite frequently . They therefore demanded that the Admiralty keep to 53 , 000 tons . With the navy unwilling to alter the size of the carrier and its airgroup accordingly the difficulties spiralled , and the final tonnage was much more likely to be nearer 55 , 000 tons . The design issues also increased , including dramatically reduced top speed , deck space , armour and radar equipment . When the Cabinet met in February 1966 , the new Secretary of State for Defence , Denis Healey , strongly supported the RAF and their plan for long - range strike aircraft , by now the F - 111 , largely due to the costing issues of running fleet carriers . This meeting resulted in the 1966 Defence White Paper . In this paper the CVA - 01 was finally cancelled , along with the remainder of the Type 82 destroyer s that would have been built as escorts , of which only HMS " Bristol " was eventually completed . Instead plans were made for the modernisation of " Eagle " and " Ark Royal " . One well - known story about the cancellation of CVA - 01 states that the RAF moved Australia by 500 miles in its documents to support the air force ' s preferred strategy of land - based aircraft . Regardless of the story ' s veracity , the principal reason for the cancellation was that the Defense Review believed adequate cover , East of Suez could be provided better by RAF strike aircraft flying from bases in Australia and uninhabited Islands in the Indian Ocean than a small carrier fleet in the 1970 ' s which would have still included HMS Hermes . The Review asserted the carrier ' s only effective use was to project British power east of Suez . The Review , asserted without evidence , that the RN carriers were too ' vulnerable ' for the RNs other major theatre in the North Atlantic . When the British government decided later in 1967 that it would withdraw from east of Suez , the case for carriers weakened further in its eyes , and the actual 1966 Review , stated that the ability of RAF to cover 300 miles offshore was enough for the 1970s , regardless of whether the Air Forces claim to be able to provide air cover out to 700 miles , was contested , and without the 150 ( 1000 mile strike radius ) TRS2 aircraft , cancelled by Labour , mid 1965 which were the real RAF argument for its ' island hopping strategy ' Subsequent Royal Navy carriers . " Eagle " and " Ark Royal " - Phantomisation . The cancellation of CVA - 01 was planned to be compensated for with the minimum further updating of both " Eagle " and " Ark Royal " to enable them to operate the 52 F - 4 Phantoms ordered to fly from CVA01 and Eagle . However , a later decision was taken to completely phase out fixed - wing flying in the Royal Navy by 1972 ; " Victorious " was withdrawn just prior to the start of what was intended to be her final commission in 1969 , while " Hermes " was paid off for conversion to a " commando carrier " in 1971 . At the time of the announcement , " Ark Royal " was beginning , a minimum refit with an austere refit of radar systems , communications , partial electrical rewiring and fittings needed to allow operation of the Phantom , and it was deemed unacceptable either to cancel the much needed work , or to spend such a large amount of money ( approx £32m ) for less than three years continued use . As a consequence , the decision was taken to retain " Ark Royal " following her 1967 - 1970 refit , but not to proceed with a refit of " Eagle " , in spite of the estimated cost of providing her fittings and blast deflectors to operate , Phantoms being " £5m . " Eagle " decommissioned in 1972 , partially due to damage inflicted in a partial grounding a year before and would have probably required a minimum 18 month refit in 1972 - 3 at a cost of around 40 million pounds to operate till 1977 . Many of second squadron of F - 4 Phantoms intended for Eagle , were immediately transferred to the RAF and had their tail hooks removed and destroyed early in 1972 . Eagle remained officially in reserve as a source of spares to maintain " Ark Royal " . till 1978 , but never could have been reactivated . " Through Deck Cruiser " . The Royal Navy did not however completely surrender aircraft carrier capability , despite the eventual withdrawal of " Ark Royal " in 1978 . The concept of the " through - deck command cruiser " was first raised in the late 1960s , when it became clear that there was a good chance of the Fleet Air Arm losing fixed - wing capability . The " through - deck cruiser " name was chosen to avoid the stigma of great expense attached to full - size aircraft carriers , with these 20 , 000 ton ships having significantly less fixed - wing aviation capability than the planned CVA - 01 carriers . However , they were to function as part of combined NATO fleets , with a primary mission of providing Cold War anti - submarine patrols in the north - east Atlantic Ocean , in support of the American carrier battle group s . In order to ensure the safety of the battle group around the " cruiser " , the facility to carry the Sea Harrier was added at a late stage of development , the intention being that it could give the battle group the capability to intercept Soviet aircraft without having to rely either on land based or US Navy interceptors . The ultimate result of this was the Royal Navy being able to deploy carrier - based aircraft during the Falklands War . One officer who worked on the CVA - 01 believed , however , that had the United Kingdom " built two or three ships to this design , they would now [ in 1999 ] be seen to have been the bargain of the century and they would have made the Falklands War a much less risky operation " due to greater functionality . CVF . The United Kingdom has returned to the fleet carrier idea , with the construction of a new generation of aircraft carriers larger than the cancelled CVA - 01s . The two new carriers are to be named HMS " Queen Elizabeth " and HMS " Prince of Wales " . The contract for these vessels was announced on 25 July 2007 by the Secretary of State for Defence Des Browne , ending several years of delay over cost issues and British naval shipbuilding restructuring .