Looking on the bright side, Ranger-chan did managed to get two battle stars during operations on North Africa and Norway.

LucasHidemiKomori said:

Looking on the bright side, Ranger-chan did managed to get two battle stars during operations on North Africa and Norway.

And she was another Pre-war carrier to survive World War 2.

She was also sorta the United States Houshou. (Although not quite as crippled as Houshou was...) She's the first purpose-built carrier, but also a little underwhelming in her stats, (slower and smaller than later carriers,) so they put her up against the Germans as an anti-sub carrier.

Having served aboard Ranger (CV-61), my heart goes out to this girl.

NWSiaCB said:

She was also sorta the United States Houshou. (Although not quite as crippled as Houshou was...) She's the first purpose-built carrier, but also a little underwhelming in her stats, (slower and smaller than later carriers,) so they put her up against the Germans as an anti-sub carrier.

Eh not really IMO, Houshou was frankly experimental, she had almost no real tactical value which is why she was never used in combat even when Japan was desperate.

A much closer match is Soryu of similiar early 30s vintage. She was similiar in weight and built under a similiar idea of getting many planes into a small hull at the expense of basically any protection whatsoever with an eye toward getting more ships squeezed into treaty limits. In Ranger's case they also gave up some speed for even more hanger and deck space. Ton per plane her and Wasp are probably about the most heavily loaded CVs ever built. In point of fact her operational air group was larger then any Japanese CV beside Shokaku. Her principle weakness was the total lack of protection used to buy this comparatively massive offensive power, she was even more of a trade off in this regard then any of the Japanese designs.

Speed was not really the biggest issue, she made about 30 knots on trails and did similiar operationally, and that was enough for 95% of fleet operations. Wasp was actually slightly slower. The biggest issues were the glass jaw and also that by the outbreak of war her plane handling equipment (arresting gear and such) was becoming somewhat dated and given the various compromises in her design their wasn't much motivation to try and majorly refit her to operate the latest aircraft or improve her capabilities when the swarm of Essex CV and the Independence class CVL conversions were already well underway.

Even so, she was still a full blown CV with considerable striking power so she wasn't used as an anti-submarine carrier. She was used in the Mediterranean 1942 covering landings and also operated with the Home Fleet for a good part of 1943 including a strike on Norway. By 1944 with so many modern CVs there was no real need for her anymore and she became a training ship.

Tapper said:

Having served aboard Ranger (CV-61), my heart goes out to this girl.

how old are you?