Obama has been doing all within his power (very little due to congress in-fighting) to try and reduce our nuclear stockpile as much as feasible. With 3 seawolf class nuclear missile submarines sneaking around somewhere in the ocean, it is unlikely that anyone no matter how advanced could prevent nuclear retaliation should they pre-empt the US.
That being said, the entire premise of this article is a bit silly, and coming from war is boring, I'm a bit surprised as their stuff is generally spot on. The thing about a full Carrier Strike Group is the blue water ability to project the US air power anywhere in the world. That is what keeps carriers relevant (for now). The new hypersonic glide vehicles might change the game certainly as there isn't really much of any defense against incoming warheads going Mach 10, but those are still a bit out tech-wise.