Oh man this is a very interesting question. Put simply prior to the development of Carrier warfare, navies tended to use battleships as their main weapon or capital ship. Battleships typically have artillery ranges of 20-25 miles. This limited engagements greatly, as ships had to be able to see each other to fire. With the advent of carriers attack ranges grew a lot. World War II carrier based fighters had ranges of 100-400 miles. This revolutionized navy based warfare as engagements were spread over such long distances that the carriers on opposing sides rarely saw each other. Essentially making battleships completely irrelevant as by the time they could get in the range of a carrier they would be long sunk. Specifically the attack on Pearl Harbor led American war planners to come to the realization that battleships were obsolete. In addition, carriers allow nations to project force over huge areas due to the long range of modern fighters. Also this is why the US added missiles to a few battleships after World War II. the long range on the missiles made the battleships somewhat relevant again, even though their role changed from artillery to a missile destroyer.

TL;DR: Carriers, which can sink a battleship long before a battleship gets in range, made battleships obsolete and carriers allow nations to project power over an incredibly wide area.

Edit: appears I got my gun ranges wrong. Thanks /u/jschooltiger