The Battle of Midway

On June 4, 1942, one of the most decisive battles of World War II was fought. One of the largest naval battles of all time saw pilots from the United States battle pilots of the Navy of the Empire of Japan.

On December 7, 1941 the Japanese Navy launched a carrier-based attack on the U.S. Navy base at Pearl Harbor. The United States was taken completely by surprise and much of the U.S. Pacific fleet was sunk. While the U.S. battleships were destroyed, by sheer luck there were no U.S. aircraft carriers docked at Pearl Harbor that day. Japanese Admiral Chūichi Nagumo did not order a second attack to knock out U.S. port facilities and fuel storage. This would play a huge role in the battle six months later.

American carriers based out of Pearl Harbor would prove to be a troublesome threat for the Japanese. Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto developed a plan to take both Hawaii and the American carriers out of the war in one bold stroke. One Japanese fleet would attack the Aleutian Islands – off of the Alaskan coast to lure the American carriers to the North Pacific. Nagumo would then lead the Japanese carriers to attack Midway Island – the western most Island in the Hawaiian Island chain. The American carriers would rush south after the Island was laid waste where the Japanese carriers would be waiting to destroy the carrier fleet. Admiral Yamamoto with the most powerful battleships in the world led a third fleet that would have landed troops in Hawaii – effectively ending the threat from Pearl Harbor before the new fleet of Essex Class aircraft carriers and South Dakota class battleships could be completed.

Unfortunately for the Japanese, U.S. Naval Intelligence had cracked the Japanese codes so the attacks on Attu and Kiska Islands in the Aleutians did not draw a response from the U.S. Navy. Instead Admiral Chester Nimitz had ordered the carriers Enterprise, Hornet, and Yorktown to wait for Nagumo in the waters to the east of Midway.

The Battle of Midway

Admiral Nagumo launched naval aircraft from four aircraft carriers to attack the American airfield on Midway. The veteran pilots of the Japanese fleet outfought the American Army, Navy, and Marine Corps Aircraft from Midway. Midway was pounded by Japanese bombers; but the airfield at Midway was not destroyed. Nagumo then made the fateful decision to arm all of his reserves with bombs for attacking the airfield rather than torpedoes for attacking the American carriers – which they hoped would be off the coast of Alaska at the time. When a Japanese scout plane reported seeing an American carrier (Yorktown), Nagumo ordered the attack wave to be rearmed to attack the carrier. The attack on Yorktown was postponed because the attack wave that had struck Midway was returning and they feared losing those planes and pilots from a lack of fuel. It was an error he would soon regret.

Meanwhile Yorktown, Enterprise, and Hornet had launched their TBD Devastator torpedo-bombers and SBD Dauntless dive-bombers. The Americans had miscalculated the location of the Japanese carriers so the pilots who strictly followed their orders never saw a Japanese carrier and those that did attacked piecemeal.

One squadron of TBD Devastator torpedo-bombers (a type that was very near obsolescence) attacked the Japanese without any fighter support. The Mitsubishi "Zero" fighters made swift work of them. Those that were able to complete their attack runs either missed or (as many historians suspect) hit the target but the faulty torpedoes failed to explode. A second squadron of Devastators did the same and failed in similarly spectacular fashion. But what the torpedo bombers had done was lure the Japanese fighters to the deck (just above the surface of the ocean) to chase the low and slow torpedo bombers. Suddenly American dive bombers appeared – using an entirely different attack angle than the Devastators. The Japanese had stacks of bombs and torpedoes laying all over the place along with refueling aircraft. When the Dauntless' hit their targets; they set off a chain of explosions. Soon the Japanese carriers Akagi, Kaga, and Soryu were engulfed in flames.

Only the carrier Hiryu survived the onslaught. The Hiryu then launched an attack on the American carriers. They found and struck Yorktown. The Japanese erroneously believed that Yorktown had been sunk weeks earlier at the Battle of Coral Sea. The Japanese were not sure what carrier they had sunk but thought that Yorktown was already at the bottom of the sea along with this second carrier that they had just attacked. They were wrong on both counts. The American sailors had spent the night doing repairs to Yorktown and had her underway on her own power.

The next day Hiryu launched all the aircraft it had left (including some that probably were in no condition to fly that day) to attack what they thought was the last American carrier and salvage a victory after a very costly day of battle the day before. They found Yorktown again and again attacked the battered ship.

Unfortunately for the crew of the Hiryu, they were facing not one, but three American carriers. Hiryu was found by dive bombers from the Enterprise and set ablaze.

Yamamoto – even though he had far more battleships than the Americans – ultimately had to withdraw as landing troops on a defended Midway was impossible without air support.

Pacific power in order to gain territory in east Asia and the southwest Pacific islands. Japan hoped to defeat the US Pacific Fleet and use Midway as a base to attack Pearl Harbor, securing dominance in the region and then forcing a negotiated peace.

A Japanese submarine sunk the badly damaged Yorktown on June 7 along with an escorting destroyer.

The Japanese lost approximately 3,057 men, four aircraft carriers, one cruiser, and hundreds of aircraft. The United States lost approximately 362 men, one carrier, one destroyer, and 144 aircraft.

More importantly this victory halted Japan's growth in the Pacific and left the United States in position to use Pearl Harbor and Hawaii as a forward base to begin launching their own offensives in what became a years-long series of island-hopping invasions that led all the way to Japan itself.