Coercion is never acceptable.Never, no way, no how. Not for a dollar, a dime, or a penny. Especially true when the use of force can be deadly.

WW II aircraft carriers had mount points for many self-defense guns (anti-aircraft) and even a few 3" or 5" guns for point defense against larger vessels. Even a 3" or 5" gun can sink a merchant ship - submarines during WW II used them to devastating effect not just their torpedoes.

The bigger point is that of re-supply. Aircraft don't fly based on nuclear propulsion or Galt's theoretical device, but on fuel which must be drilled, extracted and refined. People have to have food, and a ship's stores can typically only hold enough food for a month. And there's the small detail that the ship itself would have had to have hundreds of active crew for daily maintenance, upkeep, and operations. A warship is a major undertaking.

I think Rand left it intentionally vague not only because it wasn't a critical aspect to the plot but because she herself wasn't familiar enough with the military to write a convincing story. Hmmm. Atlas Shrugged Fan Fiction?

The Azores, maybe somewhere on the coast of Greenland or Iceland? Good point about Galt's motor (the Stark Industries Arc Reactor?) but it's also notable that even in WW1 heavy cruisers and battleships regularly launched amphibious scout planes from catapults and retrieved them with cranes after a water landing alongside. Not really a new technology.

Still, while it's an entertaining discussion, we're also dealing with a fictional story that regularly relies on unknown technology as a deus ex machina. So...

Well, Ragnar said he had made the flight from the mid-Atlantic. Now where did he make it from? Did he, in addition to having a ship built for him (Francisco could have easily managed that), establish a base on a small island? Could any island base accommodate a battlewagon?

By the way, the ship need not have had nuclear power. John Galt's electrostatic motor technology struck me as easily scalable, even to a scale to move a battlewagon and power all its systems.

I may be remembering this wrong, but I don't remember any indication that the aircraft took off from a ship.

A warship also needs support from a fixed port. They don't operate in a vacuum. They need supplies and fuel; even a nuclear ship needs food, fuel for any aircraft, ammunition and various sundries. Ragnar had to have a facility somewhere. That facility could well have included an airfield.

Major point as well: Where would you mount heavy guns on a carrier?

Nevertheless, Ragnar's ship had to be an aircraft carrier. He took off from its deck in a cargo plane laden to the top of the cargo bay with gold. I appreciate the statement about the heavy guns. But I wonder how reliable Rand meant that description to be. And where did his bullhorn voice come from? My guess: a UAV carrying a loudspeaker blared out his warning to evacuate. Then a squadron of bombers flew in and did the job.

The Big E was (obviously) a carrier. No big guns, which were clearly described as Dannekjold's ship's primary armament. Also, there is no description of aircraft operating from the ship directly. And while I'm no naval architect, I'd guess it would be easier to build a new ship than to convert a big (and lightly armored) nuclear carrier into a armored battlewagon.

The ship as described sounds like a battleship or heavy cruiser.

True: Atlas Shrugged never once discusses the origins of Ragnar Danneskjold's ship. To Henry Rearden, Danneskjold says he never robbed a military vessel, because the military of any country have a legitimate function.

I had thought his vessel would have one of two origins.

1. Francisco d'Anconia built it for him. Or:

2. It is the former USS Enterprise CVN-65, which was on her way to the boneyard when Danneskjold's crew hijacked it. He might even have managed to insinuate enough of his recruits onto that ship, for what was supposed to be her last voyage, to represent a majority. Thus the worst crime anyone committed, was barratry--when the officer-in-charge steers a ship to a port other than where the owner wanted her to go.

everyone must take responsibility for their actions. It is a major theme in AS. You cannot claim innocence by burying your head. Of course this is a literary device to demonstrate extremes. Remember there are SPOILER

three students of philosophy here, each with their own convictions on how to destroy the motor of the world.

But the crew are just employees carrying out their jobs for pay. On a ship very few are there for security, most are laborers, engineers, etc. No need for force on those folks, just the decision makers, the owners (who likely aren't even there).

The ends justify the means? Robin Hood?

Hi khalling ,
I might be splitting hairs but the crew of a ship
Delivering some goods to the people's republic of
France are unlikely to have been involved in the initial looting.

he only chose those who had already initiated force

I've wondered about that myself. Sure his objective was to take what was theirs, the company or government, as an object lesson and means of protest. Even so, those he had to face were intimidated, threatened, FORCED into compliance and into surrendering their cargo.

Makes me wonder how Ragnar Danneskjold pirated a ship. Is the crew of a ship threatened in a similar fashion For cargo they were hired to deliver?

Initially income tax was 1% for only a few. The people should have known better than to allow that forceful theft by the state.

Would John Galt have considered that crime of the robber as initiating an act of physical force requiring him (john Galt) to defend himself with whatever force he thought appropriate?