Battle of Midway

Sixty-four years ago today, the naval battle now known as “The Battle of Midway Island” commenced. It lasted for four long days:

From the U.S. Navy’s official Midway history site:

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.

Japanese Combined Fleet commander Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto moved on Midway in an effort to draw out and destroy the U.S. Pacific Fleet’s aircraft carrier striking forces, which had embarassed the Japanese Navy in the mid-April Doolittle Raid on Japan’s home islands and at the Battle of Coral Sea in early May. He planned to quickly knock down Midway’s defenses, follow up with an invasion of the atoll’s two small islands and establish a Japanese air base there. He expected the U.S. carriers to come out and fight, but to arrive too late to save Midway and in insufficient strength to avoid defeat by his own well-tested carrier air power.

Yamamoto’s intended surprise was thwarted by superior American communications intelligence, which deduced his scheme well before battle was joined. This allowed Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, the U.S. Pacific Fleet commander, to establish an ambush by having his carriers ready and waiting for the Japanese. On 4 June 1942, in the second of the Pacific War’s great carrier battles, the trap was sprung. The perserverance, sacrifice and skill of U.S. Navy aviators, plus a great deal of good luck on the American side, cost Japan four irreplaceable fleet carriers, while only one of the three U.S. carriers present was lost. The base at Midway, though damaged by Japanese air attack, remained operational and later became a vital component in the American trans-Pacific offensive.

The full story of Midway Island could be a Tom Clancy novel for all its drama, technology, larger-than-life characters, luck, turning point nature, and heroic actors. It’s very sad for this history buff to know how few young Americans know this story…

From an historical perspective, of course the most important thing about the Battle of Midway Island is that it is the beginning of the Allied victory in the Pacific war against the Japanese Empire. Since the preceding December 7, when the Japanese struck Pearl Harbor, the Americans and their allies had been subject to six months of almost unrelentingly bad news in the Pacific. There were many knowledgeable and informed people at the time who were uncertain the Allies would be victorious — the Japanese Army and Navy had a definite air of invincibility about them. Those were dark days indeed for Americans. About the only positive news before Midway was Jimmy Doolittle’s amazing raid on Tokyo, just two months earlier. That raid, while terrific for morale, had little military significance. Midway, on the other hand, was an unqualified and very significant military victory:

Battle of Midway: 4-7 June 1942: Combat Intelligence Released as of 14 July 1942

21. The following is a recapitulation of the damage inflicted upon the enemy during the battle of Midway:

(a) Four Japanese aircraft carriers, the Kaga, Akagi, Soryu, and Hiryu were sunk.

(b) Three battleships were damaged by bomb and torpedo hits, one severely.

(c) Two heavy cruisers, the Mogami and the Mikuma were sunk. Three others were damaged, one or two severely.

(d) One light cruiser was damaged.

(e) Three destroyers were sunk and several others were damaged by bombs,

(f) At least three transports or auxiliary ships were damaged, and one or more sunk.

(g) An estimated 275 Japanese aircraft were destroyed or lost at sea through a lack of flight decks on which to land.

(h) Approximately 4,800 Japanese were killed or drowned

22. Our total personnel losses were 92 officers and 215 enlisted men.

Of course I was not there at the time — I wasn’t born until 10 years after Midway — but I have read extensively about the period. One thing comes through loud and clear: both in the military sphere and in the civilian world, the victory at Midway had an electric effect. It was a proof point that America and her allies could prevail; that the Japanese were anything but invincible.

Midway was also a triumph for our intelligence services, in particular the cryptanalytic team who cracked the Japanese codes. For anyone with a technical bent, the story of how that team cracked the codes is fascinating (and entirely declassified — so the complete, authoritative history is available). Likewise, the story of how they deliberately used disinformation to figure out that a particular code phrase referred to Midway Island is just as thrilling.

But most of all, when I think of the Battle of Midway Island, I think of the “Greatest Generation” — the courageous generation of my parents — who lived through such dark days (Hitler, Stalin, Hirohito, and Mao all at the same time!), rallied and persevered through months and months of unmitigated bad news, until finally one day they were victorious. Can you even begin to imagine the joy and relief every American must have felt on that happy day?

The Battle of Midway was the first uplifting step on the path to that day of victory. And today is the sixty-fourth anniversary of the first step…