sentences:  To ensure French independence in defence matters, a new class of two modern fleet carriers was envisaged.Displacing just under 35,000 tons each, the new ships would be slightly smaller than the Royal Navy's newly commissioned 43,000 ton ships, but they would be capable ships for their size built from scratch to take advantage of the latest ideas in aircraft carrier design, including angled flight deck, steam catapults and mirror landing aid, and would operate a brand new generation of French designed carrier based aircraft.The draft statute prepared by the Naval General Staff in 1949 asked for four aircraft carriers of 20,000 tons to be available in two phases.