The Exocet's range is what? Let us imagine that it's 200 Km. Any aircraft that gets that close to an aircraft carrier will be intercepted.
Now suppose that the Chinese come up with an Exocet-like missile with 10x the Exocet's range. You fire it at where you think a carrier group is located. How does the missile distinguish a carrier from a destroyer? Optical signature alone? Still, the missile would have to go through all the protecting ships of the carrier group.
Swarms of small boats and planes launching 100s of such missiles would be a big problem indeed. But the response could be to have swarms of UAVs equipped with anti-missile technology, covering an area within 500 Km of the carrier group.
Now suppose that the Chinese come up with an Exocet-like missile with 10x the Exocet's range. You fire it at where you think a carrier group is located. How does the missile distinguish a carrier from a destroyer? Optical signature alone? Still, the missile would have to go through all the protecting ships of the carrier group.
Swarms of small boats and planes launching 100s of such missiles would be a big problem indeed. But the response could be to have swarms of UAVs equipped with anti-missile technology, covering an area within 500 Km of the carrier group.