Midway

Sixty years ago today, the Yorktown sank.

Battle of Midway

The Battle of Midway, fought over and near the tiny U.S. mid-Pacific base at Midway atoll, represents the strategic high water mark of Japan's Pacific Ocean war. Prior to this action, Japan possessed general naval superiority over the United States and could usually choose where and when to attack. After Midway, the two opposing fleets were essentially equals, and the United States soon took the offensive.

Midway stands as one of the greatest naval engagements in U.S. history, perhaps in the world. The entire fate of the war in the Pacific hinged on this one battle. Arguably, the entire conduct of the United States in World War II turned on this one engagement. The entire nature of the Pacific war changed between June 4, 1942, and June 7, 1942. Prior to Midway, the Japanese had the full initiative in the Pacific. They chose where to strike, and when to do so. After Midway, Japan was on the defensive; it never recovered the momentum it had previously enjoyed.

The Japanese sought to take Midway and destroy the U.S. fleet, especially the aircraft carriers. At this point of the war, the primary goal of the U.S. fleet was to stay alive, buy time until American industry could get up to speed. (How up to speed? In 1942, the U.S. had three carriers in the Pacific versus the Japanese ten, four more in the Atlantic. By war’s end the U.S. had over 100 carriers of various shapes, sizes, and configurations.) Operation MI, the Japanese designation for the attack, was enormous, a fleet stretching north from Midway to the Aleutian Islands. At Midway, for the Japanese, it all fell apart.

You can’t help but wonder when you read accounts of the Battle of Midway. All battles, all wars, are combination of skill, courage, training, equipment, moral, and luck. Midway is such a clear illustration of this. Yorktown had been heavily damaged during the Battle of the Coral Sea; she barely made it back to Pearl Harbor. Geeks at Pearl had deciphered the Japanese war code, and knew they were headed for Midway. 72 hours after pulling into Pearl, Yorktown set out to join Enterprise and Hornet, already headed in harm’s way.

When the shooting started on June 4, 1942, it was all in Japan’s favor. A series of events soon reversed that, as the U.S. found the Japanese fleet before they found us. The Americans launched three types of aircraft: fighters, dive bombers, and torpedo bombers. They were supposed to arrive over the Japanese fleet in a coordinated attack. They didn’t, and what should have been a fatal error was in fact what allowed the U.S. victory. Because while the Japanese fighter cover was off chasing the American fighters, and blowing nearly all of the torpedo bombers out of the sky, the dive bombers arrived. And finding their way unimpeded, they fatally hit three out of four Japanese carriers.

In the brief space of five minutes, Japan had effectively lost the war. It just took them a few years to realize that.

The surviving Japanese carrier did find the Yorktown, which never hooked up with the other U.S. carriers. They hit it so bad the first time they were certain it had sunk. The crew saved the ship, however, actually getting it back into fighting form. So when a Japanese scout found it again, the assumption was that it was a second U.S. carrier. They hit it again. Enterprise and Hornet never came under fire, and they launched the attacks that sank the fourth and final Japanese carrier. The Japanese withdrew, Operation MI a total failure.

The Yorktown sustained a torpedo attack from a Japanese submarine, and this was the fatal blow. She now lies beneath the Pacific Ocean, 16,000 feet down. When she went down, the Battle of Midway was officially over.