WW2? The last time there was a 'superpower war'? As to why they're building carrier fleets.. I dunno, why was Japan still building super-battleships into WW2? I'm not trying to suggest that they're wrong for doing so, but just because someone's going ahead with a particular strategy doesn't necessarily make it a good one. Besides - it shouldn't be news to anyone that military construction contracts aren't necessarily always that pure in their goals.
As for unmanned aerial combat... Maybe it'll take that long, maybe not. I'm thinking that with the F-35 we're probably seeing the last generation of aircraft where manned fighters are the primary platform, and that raises another question...
The planned build for the F-35 sees the USMC picking up 340, the USN only 80. (Edit: mistake: those 80 I attributed to the USN are actually -C variants for the Marines. USN has 260 Cs in total.. that's a significant change from my original numbers, though the Marines still have a bunch more JSFs than Navy does) With a planned 10 Ford class ships, it's no great leap of logic to see that they're still going to be using the Hornet an awful lot until they can sort their act out on their F/A-XX hopes, while the America class LHCs are flying Gen 5 JSFs. So realistically, the USMC is going to have the superior air capability for quite a while.
So why take out a $13bn floating airport to launch planes, when you can send out a $3bn one that launches better ones?
The USN has some really hard questions to figure out over the next few years. I don't envy their strategists.
As far as UAVs go, we have a very long way to go. The first that is going to happen in a major conflict other than the end of the world, is that satellites will be targeted and destroyed. UAVs are completely useless right now without a satellite uplink. Until we can develop an AI that can fly and fight on its own you're not going to see UAVs take over major combat operations.
LHD/LHAs are great, but are severely hampered by their size, speed, and logistics. Not to mention it's a flat bottom boat meant for near shore operations. Carriers don't need fuel, they don't need much of anything. There's a lot of missions and capabilities that the JSF doesn't have. A lot of people are skeptical if it is even capable of filling the role it is being forced into. It's an abortion of a project.
Just to clarify, the C version is the one with a lot of the issues, which is why the Navy has cut back on purchasing them. There's a big call in the Navy to just build more Hornets.