Five aircraft carriers and six big deck ampibs at Norfolk Naval Station
I will, for the moment step outside my accustomed role as a retired Coast Guard curmudgeon, and comment on the National Naval Strategy. Please forgive me, but this is the most “bully pulpit” I have. I got to thinking about this when the discussion of the Panama Canal noted that USN carriers cannot use the Canal and would take a very long time to join any naval conflict with China.
There is no longer any tactical or strategic reason that deployment of the US Fleet should be split 50/50 between the Atlantic and Pacific.
Russia is a fading shadow of the former Soviet Union with a smaller GDP than Canada. Our Atlantic Sea lines of communication are essentially secure. Russia is by no means ready to take on all of NATO, They can barely handle Ukraine.
China on the other hand is increasingly aggressive. Their rapidly growing fleet enjoys a home field advantage in the Western Pacific, particularly while half our fleet is based in the Atlantic.
Most of our ships and all of our aircraft carriers should be based in the Pacific.
In Europe, we have plenty of land bases we can operate aircraft from. Nevertheless, Britain, France, and Italy should be encouraged to coordinate their carrier deployments so that one of them is always immediately available
Big deck amphibious ships like LHAs operating F-35Bs and MH-60R ASW helicopters can fill in for what little carrier aviation we need in the Atlantic and Mediterranean.
In the Pacific we have few permanent air bases close to where conflict is likely. Carrier based aircraft can be the difference between victory and disaster.
The situation is starting to look much like World War II, when virtually all US fast carriers were assigned to the Pacific Fleet
Right now we operate aircraft carriers singly, even in the Western Pacific. Singly an aircraft carrier can barely defend itself against Chinese anti-access systems, much less go on the offensive.
Operating aircraft carriers in pairs with augmented escorts gives them a much better chance of both surviving and going on the offensive. One can play defense while the other prepares a massive strike.
Ten carriers in the Pacific would mean we could have a ready pair in the Western Pacific at all times. They and their larger destroyer squadron could even work up together before deployment.
The current distribution of shipyards capable of doing maintenance on aircraft carriers may suggest basing all US aircraft carriers in the Pacific may be impossible. It might be necessary to open a new shipyard. Vallejo might be an option. A fourth USN Pacific operating base on US soil could be advantageous. If a new shipyard is developed in the Pacific, if it were government owned and operated it could speed emergency repairs, avoiding the delays of contract negotiations.
Chuck Hill's CG Blog 
We need to upgrade the big graving docks in Yokosuka and Pearl to take CVNS / CVNs with bulbous bow. The 2nd graving dock for Bremerton isn’t going to cut it.
Figure we add a carrier back to home port at Pearl. My guess is Hawaii will have a love hate relationship with that at best.
North Island can fit 3 total. Bremerton can fit as many as needed but no idea how the are can absorb more than 3 they have coming and going plus using the graving docks.
Guam can’t handle it. So 8 would be a big improvement until we crack open the San Francisco Bay nut. That could finish the plan and get us up to 11.
You will have to crack the Norfolk lobby for any of this. Look how they stopped moving a carrier to Mayport. Frankly 8 in the Pacific, 1 in Mayport and 2 in Norfolk would still be a big win.
Andy is right, politically, we need to keep three carriers on the East Coast. so with the refueling schedules that leaves seven carriers to be homeported in the Pacific. with only San Diego and Bremerton currently capable of hosting a carrier having three at each port leaves one that would need to be homeported somewhere else Hawaii (Pearl Harbor) and Japan. What about the possibilities of home boarding one in Australia the Australians have had carriers before and they have ports large enough to accommodate them. Just a thought.
On a sidenote, Chuck your opinion of moving most of the fleet to the Pacific coast is right on and it appears the Navy agrees with you to some extent as I find it interesting that the first 12 of the Constellation Class Frigates will be homeported in Everett that pretty much fills that base up, but with the current construction schedule it’ll be 2040 before the last reaches the port.
I could see them going back to Huntington Ingalls for refueling.