Lol carriers were already being overwhelmed by regular missiles, this now means a multi billion dollar ship can and will be destroyed by cheap drones if it's anywhere near its optimal deployment zone.

> carriers were already being overwhelmed by regular missiles

Where? When?

> if it's anywhere near its optimal deployment zone

What are you referring to? The entire modern carrier strike group is architected around using stand-off weapons to clear threats to make way for stand-in weapons. The relevant ranges are what your stand-in bombers can hit without re-fuelling versus with. The era of direct firing from ships passed ages ago–that doesn't make carriers less valuable, just changes their role.

You have any evidence for this? Because low cost drones can't fly very far, are easy to spot with radar, are slow as hell and can be shot down with cheap intercepters, or even lasers as the US is already deploying.

Traditional anti-shipping missiles are a bigger danger.

The optimal deployment zone is far off shore, and there its very hard to reach.

Is your point that you can put a huge carrier literally in the straits?