I think the nature of war has changed. A slow moving swarm of drones, will keep large Aircraft carriers well outside the range of their fighter jets.

A nation can swarm an aircraft carrier with a 1000 drones, each costing about 40k USD. Only a few are needed to seriously damage the carrier. Not to mention ballistic missiles.

In this scenario, does a US massive, slow moving aircraft carrier possibly carrying hundreds of billions of assets really work ? Can the US meaningfully project power with these?

In this scenario, who holds more power or leverage ?

An aircraft carrier can project power within 500 miles. The idea is to use a few of these to knock out the air power of the opposing nation, basically airfields, missile stockpiles, factories, power infra, etc. And then drop in a ground invasion force.

Does this now work? I dont think so. 10 drones can be launched from the back of a truck.