68 years ago today

[TommyK]

The battle for Midway Atoll in the Pacific began at day break and is well underway at this hour.

 

A scrap of sand barely able to support three run-ways and not much else, but strategically important.

 

By early afternoon the invasion had been repulsed and the back of the Japanese fleet had been broken with the loss of 4 carriers.

[milod]

It was an interesting naval battle that didn't fit prior paradigms until WWII - although there already in the Pacific had been a beginning of aerial warfare as came later at Midway.

 

Nelson certainly wouldn't have recognized it, nor Admiral Togo at the Battle of Tsuschima. Nor Jellicoe.

 

Another point about Midway. It had been a stopover for a "flying boat" transpac commercial air route. After the war functionally it was left behind in an era when land-based airliners had sufficient range.

 

m

[TommyK]

Gonna have to dust off my VHS copy of "Midway" with Charleton Heston. Theres a lot of 'drama' outside of the historical aspect.

 

I had to watch it 3 or 4 times to actually 'get' what it was that lead to our victory.

 

*Cracking the Japanese code that told us exactly where they were about to attack.

*Fielding a carrier that the Japanese thought was out of the fight. I'm not sure they ever did identify the 3rd carrier.

*Poor selection of ordinance topedos vs contact bombs, on the part of the Japanese

*L U C K

 

I did some net surfing and found out that the US, in fact, had been invaded and / or fired upon from Oregon to California and the then territory of Alaska. If we hadn't figured out the point of invasion, the Japs would had gotten a toe hold on that insignificant scrap of sand we call Midway Atoll, the war would have gone much, much differently.