We are not getting rid of carriers any time soon. This is both because of their utility and also because of their role in Navy culture and in the defense-industrial complex. It is an academic debate.

Robots are emotionless, so they don't get upset if their buddy is killed, they don't commit crimes of rage and revenge. But ... they see an 80-year-old grandmother in a wheelchair the same way they see a T80 tank; they're both just a series of zeros and ones.

When a robot dies, you don't have to write a letter to its mother.

It's very clear that there are greater threats to these ships since, arguably, World War II. There are new technologies that can now reach them and make them harder to defend, such as anti-ship missiles, combined with space based tracking. The bigger issue, though, is who are gaining those capabilities. With what's going on with China and Russia, we are returning to geopolitical state-by-state competition. The Navy has not had to fight a peer for control of the sea since the Battle of Midway 75 years ago.

The best way to create cost overruns in any military acquisition is to change course midstream. That is exactly what Donald Trump wants to do here.

China is working on a similar system for its future carriers. Donald Trump may want to go back to 1920s-level technology, but the rest of the world isn't.

The drone war takes place 24/7, 365 days a year. The war doesn't stop on Christmas. It's like being a fireman when there's a fire every single day, day after day after day. That's emotionally and physically taxing.