Battle Of Midway

[frozenazz]

Hey does anyone know any infromation on the battle of midway or wwebsites that have info. Thanks

[halfyank]

What information did you need to know? I consider myself semi-knowledgeable about Midway.


As to websites here is one to start with. http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq81-1.htm

[RLeonard]

If you seriously want to know about the Battle of Midway, go to

www.midway42.org

and check out the Battle of Midway Roundtable

If you have a specific question, perhaps I could point you in an appropriate direction.
I've just about anything written on the subject that's worth reading and some that aren't worth reading, not to mention a small collection of original documents from VF-3 off USS Yorktown.

Rich

[Kiwiwriter]

Read my web page...you'll find a vast amount of information about the decisive day of the Battle of Midway, June 4, 1942. http://www.usswashington.com/dl_index.htm will take you there.

[thunderbolt47]

There are some books that will help you out a lot they are:

Miracle at Midway -- by Gordon William Prang

Midway: The Battle that Doomed Japan, the Japanese Navy's Story -- by Raymond A. Spruance

The Battle Off Midway Island (The Great Battles of World War II)
by Theodore Taylor

[RLeonard]

Spruance?? Spurance did not write a book about Midway. The Japanese side of the issue was presented in “Midway - The Battle that Doomed Japan, The Japanese Navy’s Story” by Mitsuo Fuchida and Masatake Okumiya.

Prange’s “Miracle at Midway” is a popular history of the action, but, at least from the US side has some pretty annoying and serious errors. He drags out the old business about the design of the F6F being influenced by the A6M2 recovered from the Aleutians, absolutely untrue. He writes of 200 knot torpedoes, not only untrue, but hysterically ridiculous . . . give me a break. Unfortunately, you find Prange’s errors all over the internet on various purported historical sites that only serve push them on the unwary. Prange was one of the Intell folks on MacArthur’s staff during the early days of the occupation of Japan and was heavily involved the interrogations of Japanese military personnel. The story is that he kept a copy of all his notes and used these in his many works. Unfortunately, either he, or his co-authors Dillon and Goldstein, or his editors did not bother the double check his writings on the US side. I could go on, about 40 some out and out errors, some 25 of which are, in my opinion, serious. I caught and noted the big ones in the margins of my copy. For a real mark-up you should see my father’s (who was XO of VF-3 at the battle) copy.

Ambivalent about Taylor.

If you want to spend money on books on the Battle of Midway, there are only two. One is fairly inexpensive if you can find one, the other is pretty pricey.
On the reasonable cost side, if you can find one, get a copy of “A Glorious Page in Our History” by Robert Cressman, et. al. This is the most complete and carefully written works on the subject, to date, especially from the US side.
If you want to invest some bucks, look for John Lundstrom’s “The First Team – Naval Air Combat from Pearl Harbor to Midway” which will not only provide carefully researched descriptions of the action at Midway, but early carrier actions leading up to the battle as well.

There will be a couple of books coming out around Christmas that have a lot of promise, and for those inordinately interested in the battle, such as myself, anxiously await. The first will be “Shattered Sword: The Japanese Story of the Battle of Midway” by Jon Parshall and Tony Tully. It will examine the Japanese side and is drawn from official Japanese naval records and interview with remaining veterans. Should open wide some eyes. You might want to look at

www.combinedfleet.com/MidwayBook.htm

The other will be by John Lundstrom, a biography of VAdm Frank Fletcher which will fill in a lot of gaps and should straighten out a a lot of the popular mythology.

There’s also various places on the internet where you can get after action reports not just from US units, but also Nagumo’s report on the battle as well. Look at

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/PTO/...rns/index.html

Maybe someday someone will post the USN and USMC squadron after action reports. They make some pretty interesting reading.

Rich

[Kiwiwriter]

Spruance wrote the introduction for the Fuchida-Okumiya book. I know that Prange recycled the myth about the crashed Zero in the Aleutians. I corrected that (and other such glitches at the advice of an aviation expert) on my web page. The first F6F flew before Koga's Zero crashed in the Aleutians, so it played no role in the design of the Hellcat. It may have played a role in the continued flight-testing of the Hellcat and obviously played a role in American assessments of the Zero and its abilities. The myth is repeated in Richard Garfield's "Thousand-Mile War" about the Aleutian campaign. I also recommend "No Higher Honor," by Jeff Nesmith, about the USS Yorktown.

[ryobreak]

Well, to put the battle in a nutshell, it was really based on "luck," but the stakes were so high that it turned the tide in favor to the Americans, which ended the 1 1/2 year of triumphant reign of Japanese victories.

Japanese patrol planes were sent out in all directions to detect enemy carriers. However, one patrol plane was launched 30 minutes late due to technical difficulties.

On the other hand, American Catalianas detected many ships. However, the American forces knew that Nagumo's Carrier fleet, the true prize at hand, would come from the North-West, and figured that these sightings were actually ships en-route to Saipan.

The 30 minute delay of the Japanese patrol plane was devastating- in a heated 2 hours the Japanese planes were armed with torpedoes, switched to bombs, then reordered to torpedoes as soon as the notification of nearby enemy carriers came in.

The bombs remaining on deck was the biggest and largest factor which caused chaos to the Japanese carrier fleet.

Nagumo's forces had repelled the Americans successively no less than 6 times, and, his fleet remained unharmed except for minor strafing damage. However, because of the low-flying enemy attackers, this left the fleet's fighters at low altitudes- which meant that the carriers had lost their fighter cover.

American dive-bombers found their targets- and this marked the end to Japan's carrier fleet. A decisive battle which would have crushed America's Task force 17 + 18 failed, and left Japan at a horrendous loss... all due to a 30 minute delay of that one patrol plane. If this crucial 30 minutes had not been lost, the re-armament would have been complete, the japanese planes would have been in the air, struck a devastating blow to the American forces, and, because the planes wouldn't have exploded on deck- much less damage would have been done (if at all) to the Japanese carriers. Also, the fighters would have been able to acknowledge the threat of nearby American carriers, and precautionary orders would probably have been carried out to maintain strong fighter cover.

[spidge]

A good source on the actual nitty gritty (Spruance nous etc) is listed below.

Admiral Fletcher, as senior to Admiral Spruance, became O.T.C.
(Officer in Tactical Command) as soon as their rendezvous was effected. As he possessed no aviation staff . . . it was probably fortunate that Spruance exercised practically an independent command during the crucial actions. . . . Neither Spruance nor Fletcher exercised any control of the air and ground forces on Midway Island, over the (13) submarines deployed in their area, or over the force in the Aleutians. The overall commander was Admiral Nimitz, who remained perforce at his Pearl Harbor headquarters.

Spruance saw at once the advantage of placing his force on the Japanese strike force’s flank and the possibility of attacking the Japanese carriers while their planes were raiding Midway. Spruance also made the prudent observation that the US carrier forces should not proceed west of Midway in search of the enemy before the enemy carriers were substantially disabled. The Japanese might alter their plans and head for Pearl Harbor, in which event the American forces might find themselves bypassed and unable tointervene.
Spruance had already made certain definite decisions. He would not come within 700 miles of Wake Island, no matter what the temptation. He knew the Japanese had beefed up the place, and he did not want to mix with land-based aviation. Nor did he intend to permit the Japanese to draw him so far west that they could close in with their superior surface strength and clobber him.

LUCK WITH THE CYPHER INTERCEPTS - (PROFESSIONALS)
LUCK WITH IDENTIFYING MIDWAY AS THE TARGET (AGAIN PROFESSIONALS)
LUCK WITH HALSEY BEING IN HOSPITAL (MAY HAVE CALLED IT DIFFERENTLY)
LUCK WITH YORKTOWN ( JAPANESE THOUGHT IT SUNK AT CORAL SEA)
LUCK WITH JAPANESE PLANE BEING 30 MINUTES LATE
LUCK WITH THE AMERICAN PBY'S SPOTTING THE JAP CARRIERS FIRST
LUCK WITH THE PLANE ALSO NOT BEING ABLE TO TRANSMIT (SO THEY SAY)

LUCK, LUCK, LUCK.

GLAD IT WAS ON OUR SIDE.


http://www.history.navy.mil/docs/wwii/mid1.htm
http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/...R775.chap3.pdf

[RLeonard]

It was, in my opinion, more a case of overcoming bad breaks or bad luck rather than a matter of a run of good luck. I suppose the difference could boil down to one’s outlook. The instances of bad breaks in the carrier operations were many, just to mention some:

Poor planning and leadership in the HAG resulted in VT-8 going off by itself to immortality while Cdr Stanhope Ring leads his dive bomber squadrons across the Pacific until the sheer weight of pilots turning back on their own forces him to do so as well. The result being a strike group of some 36 SBDs never make contact with the Japanese carriers. Bad break.

The VF-8 strike escort of 10 F4Fs manages to get lost on their return leg and, first one by one, then in sections, end up in the water. Bad break.

The VF-6 strike escort F4Fs in a moment of inattention gets separated from their VT-6 charges and end up covering Hornet’s VT-8. From their high altitude perch they never hear the “come on down” call pre-arranged with VT-6 for assistance and VT-8 gets slaughtered. Bad break.

VT-6, now separated from both their fighter escort and the two SBD squadrons of Enterprise’s strike group, bores in for a torpedo attack and calls in vain for the strike escort to come down and take on the Japanese CAP. The VF-6 escort has already left the area and VT-6 has only four planes that survive the attack. Bad break.

VB-3, upon clearing the task force areas proceeds to arm its bombs using the new electrical system. It is wired backwards and the three bombs blast holes in the Pacific Ocean before Lt. Cdr Max Leslie catches on and radios for the remainder of the squadron to arm their bombs manually. Leslie is one of those who has lost his bomb. Bad luck.

So, rather than a series of lucky breaks, perhaps the US carrier forces, and specifically the Yorktown and Enterprise air groups, were, in reality, overcoming a series of bad breaks.

Can good luck explain Lt Cdr Wade McCuskey’s turn to the north leading his Enterprise dive bombers in a box search for the Japanese fleet? Do you suppose that was just a lucky guess or the operational knowledge of an experienced carrier aviator who, upon not finding the Japanese where he was told to expect them, made the decision to go looking for them? What would have kept him from simply pushing on, droning off across the Pacific with nothing to show for his efforts? What would have kept him from turning south towards the island? Ring made both of those mistakes with the HAG SBD’s. No, McCuskey put himself in the Japanese shoes and did what he would have done in their place, turn to the North. That he spotted Arashi boiling north-northeast from her contact with Nautilus, I will concede was luck, but had he continued with his box search pattern, judging from the movement charts, he would have found the Japanese anyway. The Arashi sighting simply let him shave about ten minutes off the intercept. Was all that just a lucky break or the good judgment of a professional naval officer? The only good luck here was that McCuskey was in charge of the strike.

Can good luck explain the command group back on the Yorktown poring over the charts and sighting reports and reaching the same conclusion that the Japanese would have turned north? Can you explain RAdm Fletcher, task group commander; Capt Elliot Buckmaster, CO Yorktown; Cdr Murr Arnold, AO, Yorktown; and Lt Cdr Oscar Pedersen, CYAG, breaking with established doctrine calling for a deferred departure? (Deferred departure - the strike group circles the task force until all the planes have been launched and then goes off in one big gaggle at the speed of the slowest TBD. This was the method used by the Enterprise and Hornet strikes.) They directed, instead, using the attack plan they developed at the Battle of the Coral Sea that allowed for a timed, running rendezvous that brought Yorktown’s strike group together all in the same place, torpedo planes, dive bombers, and fighters all converging on a point over the ocean that put them about 10 minutes away from sighting the Japanese. And the Japanese were where they expected to find them? (Running rendezvous – Slow TBDs launch and proceed towards the enemy. Next bomb laden SBDs launch and follow the TBDs. Lastly the speedier, but shorter legged, escorting F4Fs launch and follow the SBDs. The relative rates of advance allows the three groups to converge at a point of choice based on a predetermined cruise speed.) Was that a lucky break, too, or was it the result of people who really knew their business?

And as McCuskey’s VB-6 and VS-6 groups approach from the southwest, Yorktown’s strike goes in, led by VT-3. The small VF-3 escort goes in with VT-3 since everyone, Japanese and American, knows that torpedoes are ship killers and no effort would be spared in hastening their demise. And one by one, as the Lt Cdr Lem Massey’s TBDs pound out a northwest track towards the distant Hiryu they are cut down until only two survive. Lt Cdr Jimmy Thach’s 4-plane escort group is assaulted by almost a third of the present Japanese CAP. Others chase off a smaller 2-plane escort closer to Massey’s TBDs, led by Mach. Tom Cheek, but not before Cheek and his wingman, Ens. Dan Sheedy, manage to shoot down at least two of their Zero tormentors. Thach’s group almost immediately loses one of their number, Ens. Edgar Bassett. The remainder, Thach, with Ens. RAM Dibb and Ens. Brainerd Macomber, initiate the first combat use of Thach’s Beam Defense tactic (later coined the “Thach Weave”). They are not only able to prevent further loss to themselves, but manage to shoot down five or six of their attackers. Was that luck or a carefully considered, and tested, tactic for just such a situation? Why was this so successful that Japanese summaries reported engaging 18 F4Fs where there were only three? Luck? No, Thach had more than 10 years of fighter operations behind him. He knew exactly what he was doing when he devised the Beam Defense and it worked exactly as he planned. Working out in the summer of 1941 the defensive maneuvers that not just saved the remainder of his flight, but soaked up a not inconsiderable number of the Japanese CAP just a lucky break?

And while Massey and Thach and company are absorbing the Japanese attentions, per attack doctrine, Leslie leads his VB-3 over the carrier Soryu and rolls over in an attack that ends with the ship in flames from end to end. Leslie leads his squadron down even though he has no bomb. Doctrine and planning and no small amount of courage or simply a lucky break?

Now at the same time comes McCuskey with his two squadrons. VB-6 led by Lt. Dick Best sets its sights on the nearest carrier, Kaga, but is thrown off by the plunging dives of Lt. Earl Gallaher’s VS-6 led by the CEAG. McCuskey. McCuskey, a fighter pilot by trade, was unaware that the practice where the VB squadron always attacks the near target and the VS squadron, with which he was flying, attacks the far. Nonplussed over the interruption and its resultant loss of most his squadron as they follow McCuskey and VS-6 down, Best breaks off his attack and leads his three plane section over to the next carrier, Akagi, and executes a text book attack that results in two direct hits and a near miss. Was the success of Best’s attack just a lucky break or were its results the product of years of training and practice?

Meanwhile VS-6 and the majority of VB-6 smother Kaga with so many bombs the Japanese stop counting. Gallaher dives in with the words “Arizona, I remember you” on his lips. His first fleet assignment as a new ensign was aboard USS Arizona. As Best pulls out from his Akagi dive he observes three carriers afire and, then, off to his north, the final moments of the doomed VT-3 attack on Hiryu. He notes that there was still at least one more carrier left with which to attend. Later that afternoon, Best plants a bomb in Hiryu’s flight deck, becoming probably the only dive bomber pilot of whom it could be said for certain hit two enemy carriers in one day. Luck or skill?

Back on Yorktown, Fletcher has held his VS-5 squadron in reserve, remembering the rude surprise of not having a strike group available when needed at Coral Sea. Listening in on the circuits, once the excitement had died down, he orders the launch of a ten plane search group in a general west-north-west direction around to north-north-west where his command group believes the fourth carrier has moved. Pedersen, with the squadron commander, Lt. Wally Short, makes the search arc assignments. Without going through the whole exercise, each two-plane search section was to cover a twenty-degree arc out 200 miles. The southernmost arc, deemed the most likely to result in contact with the Japanese went to Short and his wingman. To his right, the next two search arcs are assigned to his two most experienced pilots and their wingmen. Was this lucky accident or was it a deliberate assignment to put the best people in the most critical positions? They certainly did not draw straws for search assignments. Short does not find the Japanese. He was a little too far south of the Japanese. Hiryu is found by the next section to his right (north) led by Lt Sam Adams. But the key was that they knew where to look based on the tactical situation. Luck break or operational awareness?

Hiryu’s remaining lifespan is measured in hours and, true, Yorktown and Hammann did not have all that long either. In the next two days still more problems would rear their heads and would have to worked around. There are excellent works that cover the subject far, far better than could I that a careful reading will draw the same picture. I could point you in their direction if you wish. The after action reports also make for some interesting reading. Most of them can be found with a suitably worded google search (and that’s great because that means that those of us who have had paper copies for the last 20 years no longer receive request to make copies).

No, it was not that the USN had a phenomenal streak of good luck or lucky breaks. It was just the opposite. Just about anything that could possibly go wrong did, yet, training, planning, creativity, situational awareness, professionalism, dedication, and courage overcame the setbacks, the bad luck, and led to a victory in what became a pivotal battle of the Pacific War.

Rich