The beginning of the end of the war in the Pacific occurred for the Japanese.

The Battle of Midway was the most decisive single naval battle in U.S. history. The battle left two heavy Japanese carriers against four U.S. carriers, and cost the Japanese veteran pilots whose inexperienced replacements would require a full year of training. Furthermore, the Imperial Japanese Navy lost the secret of its Zero fighter, leading to certain improvements of the F6F Hellcat, which would, just a year later, begin to destroy Japanese air supremacy.

The Battle of Midway enabled the U.S. Navy to go onto the offensive. Herein lay the importance of the battle. For this is where I think people are wrong when they say that the loss of the battle would not have been a too important event. If the U.S. had indeed lost all three carriers at Midway there would have been merely three carriers remaining to oppose any Japanese move -- none of which was a really good ship. Saratoga was old and slow in maneuvering, Wasp small and with a small complement of planes, and Ranger slow and small as well as ill-protected. None of these carriers could hope to last in a battle with the Japanese carrier fleet which would allow the Japanese to prosecute several goals: construction of airfields on Guadalcanal; invasion of Port Moresby; invasion of New Caledonia; and more. The Battle of Midway reversed this. The Japanese could never again operate offensively, while the Americans could now do so at places of their own choosing.

Two years later, almost to the day, the successful invasion of Europe at Normandy would signal the beginning of the end of Hitler's regime as well.

Actually, Saratoga was a fine ship - it was the same class as the Lexington (sunk at Coral Sea). It's problem was it seemed to be a magnet for submarine torpedoes - the reason it couldn't make Midway. Wasp was slower than the other American fleet carriers - but did serve in the Pacific during the Guadacanal campaign (where it was sunk). Ranger was too small and slow to be a useful carrier in the Pacific Theater and spent the entire war in the Atlantic.

Yet, wasn't it Ranger (CV-4) under Adm. Dan Gallagher (sp) that bagged itself a U-Boat in the Atlantic.

They were all useful in their way.

Rich

If memory serves, Gallagher's task group was built around the Escort Carrier (CVE) USS Guadalcanal. Other units of the Task Group were the U.S.S. PILLSBURY, USS CHATELAIN, USS POPE, USS FLAHERTY, and USS JENKS, all of these last being DEs or Destroyer Ecorts

And he was named Daniel V. Gallery, not Gallagher.

There is a well-known photo of the American fleet at the end of the war that shows the sea covered in aircraft carriers. I cannot remember if this was the fleet moored in Tokyo Harbor or if it was Ulithi Atoll. But the point is that by the end of the war the United States had truly amazing carrier airpower. From the end of 1942 until the end of the war in August 1945 (only 2.5 years) the US built 17 Essex class fleet carriers and 9 Independence class medium carriers and 124 escort carriers (of which 38 were loaned to the Royal Navy).

All of this should be remembered when discussing the importance of Midway. It was certainly a major turning point in the Pacific War, but we must retain some perspective how "important" it was. American industrial might was well mobilized by that time and over 100 aircraft carriers were about to flood the seas.

The major strategic blunders of the Germans, and Stalin, are generally well known. But what are not as well known are the blunders made by the Japanese. Pearl Harbor itself may have been a blunder (both the decision to do it at all, and the decision not to go back and hit the fuel depots).

But the Japanese made some key mistakes in their conduct of the naval war. One mistake was keeping all of their best pilots in front-line service. After a few years of fighting all the best pilots were dead and the quality of Japanese naval airpower diminished rapidly. In contrast, the United States kept rotating its combat pilots back to the US to train new pilots and produced a superior force.

Another major Japanese mistake was the decision to order their submarines to go after American warships rather than merchantmen. Warships were harder to find and they fought back, resulting in the Japanese missing many opportunities and losing their sub force. In contrast, after a bad start, the US submarine force switched to going after Japanese merchant shipping, with absolutely devastating results.

So if Midway had gone differently, the war in the Pacific might have been prolonged, but it probably could not have reversed the outcome. The US still had its mighty production capability, the Japanese still made some key mistakes, and the US eventually had the Bomb.

I don't think anybody reads comments in posts that are more than a day or two old. But here goes nothing...

There is a fascinating article in the current issue of the US Naval Institute's Proceedings magazine on the battle for Midway. It makes the argument that Midway involved a lot of luck and happenstance in addition to good planning and excellent intelligence by the United States. In several cases a chain of events led to a success, but this chain involved a lot of luck.

For instance, B-17s and B-26s from Midway attacked the Japanese fleet, with no hits despite 332 bombs dropped. The USS Nautilus, one of the Navy's largest submarines, saw the gunfire and smoke and headed toward the fleet. The Nautilus' periscope was spotted by the Japanese destroyer Arashi, which depth-charged the sub. Arashi then stopped and raced back to the fleet. At that time a group of SBD Dauntless dive bombers were searching for the Japanese fleet. Through a break in the clouds they saw the Arashi steaming at high speed. They surmised that she was heading back for the fleet and flew along the bearing she was heading. They found the Japanese carriers. The carriers' protective air cover was at low altitude, where they had just slaughtered the ineffective attack by Torpedo Squadron 8. The Dauntlesses were thus able to launch their attack unimpeded.

Now take one of those links in the chain out and it is not clear that you can still achieve the same result. What if the ineffective B-17s had not attacked? What if the Nautilus had not spotted that attack? What if the Nautilus had not been spotted? What if the Arashi had not headed to rejoin the fleet? What if the Arashi had not been spotted? And what if the ineffective Torpedo Squadron 8 had not attacked?

What is particularly fascinating about this chain of events is that an effective attack by the Dauntlesses was made possible by a bunch of ineffective attacks by other forces--B-17s, the Nautilus, the Arashi and Torpedo Squadron 8.

I don't think anybody reads comments in posts that are more than a day or two old.

Well, not many. I do, but I get email notification.

Of course, if you were posting on the blog itself, you could just put up a post, and it would be at the top of the page...

Unfortunately (or fortunately, if you believe in providence), luck generally plays a very strong role in warfare, at least where opponents are evenly matched.

What if the carriers had been at Pearl Harbor when it was attacked? What if General Warren hadn't noticed that Little Round Top was undefended? What if Napoleon hadn't been sick at Waterloo? What if Eisenhower's weather gamble hadn't paid off?