It can be easy to lose sight of in this new era of America intervening and starting conflicts of our own choice throughout the world, but the U.S. is still 100% committed to total defense of both Taiwan and South Korea. I'm not talking about Afghanistan or Iraq levels of commitment (~100k troops for a few months, 3-4 carrier strike groups), I'm talking full mobilization of the reserves (1 million U.S. troops in uniform), commandeering the entire civil aviation fleet, every Marine, every ship in the Navy, every aircraft in the Air Force heading to the Western Pacific, fighting-to-the-last-man-like-it's-World-War-Two level of commitment.
All decisions on U.S. military force structure, including the number of aircraft carriers in the fleet, flow down from what is required to fight those two conflicts.
All decisions on U.S. military force structure, including the number of aircraft carriers in the fleet, flow down from what is required to fight those two conflicts.