Golden Journal No. 50:
Les Portes-Avions
Design Notes
by Mike Bennighof, Ph.D.
April 2024

Four nations operated aircraft carriers during the Second World War; three of them did so very successfully. And then there was France.

France’s Navy, the Marine Nationale, operated just one aircraft carrier, the converted battleship Béarn, but by 1939 “operated” certainly stretched the truth. She was simply too slow, and her condition too badly deteriorated, to consider her a front-line combat vessel. She could conduct carrier qualification trials, but not much more.

But the French had grand plans for more and better aircraft carriers, and I wanted to add these ships to Second World War at Sea. We included two of the planned Joffre class (only one of which was laid down) in Plan Z: Stolen Fleets, in German colors, but they needed to sail under the tricolor. They wouldn’t fit in either of our alternative history story arcs (the Second Great War and the Long War), but the Golden Journal is the perfect place to delve into the history of French aircraft carrier attempts. And so we have Golden Journal No. 50: Les Portes-Avions.

The Golden Journal is only 16 pages long, and it’s not truly our house magazine – it’s always fully devoted to its single, focused topic. Golden Journal No. 50: Les Portes-Avions is all about French aircraft carrier projects, with no room left over for anything else. We’ve got their stories, and then we have scenarios. Not nearly as many scenarios as I wanted to stuff into the package, but we have some fun ways to play with them.

The French carriers range in capability from close to useless (the aged Béarn and the converted heavy cruisers Duquesne and Tourville) through the formidable PA14 design, in essence the “French Essex.” So I decided to split the French carrier scenarios between Atlantic operations, for the small and/or crapulent ships, and Pacific carrier battles, for the big ships with their huge air groups.

Béarn is pretty well worthless in every environment, even with an air group of capable planes, but the small cruiser conversions actually have some purpose in the situation we laid out in the Campaign Study, Force de Raid. France and Britain had no formal alliance during the interwar years, and while promises had been exchanged, Paris could not be completely certain that London would not hang her out to dry in the event of a war with Germany. Such a conflict would see those German long-range commerce-raiding armored cruisers unleashed against French trade and supply lines without the Royal Navy around to seek them out and destroy them. France needed its own trade defense capability, and so the seemingly useless prestige projects like the Dunkerque-class battle cruisers and Richelieu-class fast battleships went forward even as the land forces desperately needed more funding.

What the Force de Raid lacked was a substantial aerial scouting capacity; it only had the floatplanes carried by its battleships and cruisers (the old battleships actually had no floatplane capacity; we added this in the Force de Raid scenarios else the French were at too great a disadvantage). Yet the core mission of searching vast stretches of the North Atlantic had been the reason for building the modern, fast ships. Even the small, otherwise useless converted heavy cruisers therefore add a very useful capability to the French squadrons when they’re forced to operate alone.

While I envisioned the French carriers in terms of the Force de Raid, the Germans didn’t provide the sort of foe I thought warranted for the big French PA14 carriers with their large air groups. They needed to fight someone with aircraft carriers of their own, and that meant the Japanese.

The big carrier scenarios take place on the Java Sea map, with the French carrier force facing off against the Japanese First Air Fleet, with French Indo-China in the balance. The big French carriers can operate air groups that match the Japanese, but they share the same shortcoming as the British carriers in Eastern Fleet: their aircraft were designed for European conditions, and lack the immense range of Japanese and American carrier planes. A French carrier admiral will have to plan very carefully, because otherwise the Japanese will dance about outside French range and launch their own strikes with impunity.

I’d intended to tie Portes-Avions closely to Force de Raid, but as is often the case I wrote more stuff than we could fit inside the Journal format. We kept the full scenarios, and trimmed the Force de Raid carrier-adding scenario modifications. Those are down below.

Force de Raid
Scenario Additions
You can also add your new French carriers to the scenarios from the Campaign Study, Bismarck: Force de Raid.

Operational Scenario One
Add the following to the force starting on the west edge:
CV07 Duquesne
            1 x LN401
            1 x D.790

Add the following to the force starting at Brest:
CV08 Tourville
            1 x LN401
            1 x D.790

Operational Scenario Three
Add the following to the force starting in or near Sea Zone AX 52:
CV02 Joffre
            4 x D790
            2 x Br.810
            1 x LN401

Operational Scenario Four
Add the following to the force starting in or near Sea Zone AC 24:
CV07 Duquesne
            1 x LN401
            1 x D.790

Add the following to the force starting at Brest:
CV08 Tourville
            1 x LN401
            1 x D.790

Add the following to Le Premier Convoi:
CV01 Béarn
            4 x D.790
            2 x LN401

Ignore the floatplane special rule (the French battleships do not have floatplanes).

Under victory conditions, sinking a transport from Le Premier Convoi is worth five VPs per cargo point rather than four.

Operational Scenario Five
Add the following to the force starting in or near Sea Zone AC 24:
CV02 Joffre
            4 x D790
            2 x Br.810
            1 x LN401

Add the following to the force starting at Brest:
CV03 Painlevé
            4 x D790
            2 x Br.810
            1 x LN401

Add the following to Le Premier Convoi:
CV04 Delcassé
            4 x D790
            2 x Br.810
            1 x LN401

Ignore the floatplane special rule (the French battleships do not have floatplanes).

Under victory conditions, sinking a transport from Le Premier Convoi is worth five VPs per cargo point rather than four.

The Golden Journal is only available to the Gold Club (that’s why we call it the Golden Journal).

Click here to join the Gold Club.
See your Gold Club Insider newsletter for ordering information.

Sign up for our newsletter right here. Your info will never be sold or transferred; we'll just use it to update you on new games and new offers.

Mike Bennighof is president of Avalanche Press and holds a doctorate in history from Emory University. A Fulbright Scholar and NASA Journalist in Space finalist, he has published a great many books, games and articles on historical subjects; people are saying that some of them are actually good. He lives in Birmingham, Alabama with his wife, three children, and new puppy. He misses his lizard-hunting Iron Dog, Leopold.

Want to keep Daily Content free of third-party ads? You can send us some love (and cash) through this link right here.