Battle Of Midway: Better Or Just Luckier?

The film did not mention that the acquisition of Midway by the Japanese would mean the destruction of the American Fleet in the Pacific and the Japanese mastery of the Pacific Ocean, however, this was not the only motivation for acquisition of Midway. The Japanese were quite aware of the potential of American industry should a military mobilization of the country occur. The Japanese knew that if they were to be successful in the Pacific, they would have to make their annexations early on in their war with the United States, before this industrial mo

After Major Jimmy Doolittle’s bombing raid on Japan, two months before the battle of Midway, the Japanese felt that the annexation of Midway by the Empire of Japan would protect Emperor Hirohito from the indignity of having the Home Islands bombed again. Japanese acquisition of Midway would also facilitate a base for future raids on Pearl Harbor, and it would also mean that there would no longer be a forward refueling base for the U.S. submarines in the Pacific Theatre.

The battle itself was portrayed very well in the film. As a result of a decoy radio message deliberately sent from Midway, the U.S. Pacific Naval Command knew that the next Japanese objective in the Pacific was Midway. The U.S. also had an approximation when the attack was going to occur because of the commencement of the diversionary action in the Aleutians. The wave of Japanese carrier air forces was expected long before the Japanese even thought of launching it. Knowing that the Aleutians were a diversion, the US had sent out an eastward radial array of long range scout planes that had discovered that there was something up when they found some Japanese ships headed to Midway going quite fast. The first strike from the Japanese was armed with bombs while the second wave was armed with torpedoes. The first wave of bombs from the Japanese was unsuccessful in taking out the airstrip on Midway. (Taking out the airstrip was one of the major objectives in this strike).

The film did go into detail of how all four of the Japanese carriers were lost. However, the Japanese lost a lot more than just four heavy carriers. In all, four heavy carriers, one heavy cruiser, three hundred and twenty-two planes, and three thousand five hundred Japanese men were lost at Midway. The Americans lost one heavy carrier, one hundred and fi

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