The Battle of Midway

1947 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Essay on battle of the coral sea

The Battle of Midway dealt a devastating catastrophe for the Japanese naval and air capabilities with destroying four carriers, one heavy cruiser, 248 aircraft, and 3,057 personnel. The Americans lost one aircraft carrier, one destroyer, 150 aircraft, and 307 personnel. Historically, Midway has been considered the turning point in the Pacific theater of World War II. Japan's shipbuilding and pilot training programs were unable to keep pace in replacing their losses, while the U.S. steadily increased its output in both areas that inevitably led denying Japan the ability to achieve its limited policy objective: to destroy the American carrier force in the Pacific and use the Aleutians and Midway Island as stepping stones for a Japanese invasion of Oahu in early 1943, which would force the Americans to negotiate for peace.
At the Battle of Midway in June of 1942, Admiral Chester Nimitz did the best job of addressing the issues of operational and strategic risk. First, Nimitz had a superior advantage of intelligence leading up to Midway that gave him the ability to understand the Japanese strategic and operational plan for the battle. Second, Nimitz had the industrial capacity and naval strength to match a portion of the Japanese fleet after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Third, Nimitz capitalized on a dispersed Japanese fleet with a concentrated force in a decisive naval battle. Finally, Nimitz had much less to lose than Yamamoto in a defeat at Midway, which shows that the U.S. was fighting a total war vis-à-vis Japan’s limited political objectives.
Nimitz’s Superior Intelligence
Nimitz had a superior advantage of intelligence leading up to Midway that gave him the ability to understand the Japanese strategic and operational pl...

... middle of paper ...

...capabilities after the battle at Coral Sea with repairing the Yorktown. Ultimately, Nimitz concentrated his forces to attack a portion of the Japanese fleet, which proved to be a major turning point in the Japanese expansion in the Pacific. This overall plan for Nimitz mitigated the risks to the American fleet while exploiting the weakness of the Japanese intelligence and dispersed fleet.

Bibliography
Baer, George W. One Hundred Years of Sea Power. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1993.
Parshall, Jonathan, Tully, Anthony, Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway. Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2005.
Jones, Mike. “War in the Pacific.” Lecture, US Naval Post Graduate School, Monterey, CA, May 5-7, 2014.
Spector, Ronald H. Eagle Against the Sun: The American War with Japan. New York: Free Press, 1985.
Tzu, Sun. The Art of War. Orange Publishing, 2013.

Show More
Related

  • How the Battle of Midway was the Turning Point of WW2 for America

    2189 Words  | 5 Pages

    In May of 1942, Japanese Admiral Isorosku Yamamoto devised a plan to draw the US Pacific fleet into battle where he could completely destroy it. To accomplish this master plan of his, he sought out the invasion of Midway Island which would provide a base for the Japan troops to attack Hawaii. Unfortunately for Yamamoto, America decrypted Japanese radio transmissions and Admiral Chester Nimitz was able to establish a counter attack against this offensive. Nimitz sent three aircraft carriers, The USS Enterprise, The USS Hornet and The USS Yorktown to destroy the Japanese. This is just a short overview of The Battle of Midway, or as commonly referred to as, the battle that changed the war. People argue that it had no affect on the war, but those critics couldn’t be farther from the truth. The Battle of Midway was the turning point of the war because it fully enters America into the war, it kicked off the Pacific Campaign, and it had Japan on the defensive, thus preventing them from helping The Axis Forces.

    Read More

  • World War II Veterans: Thomas Mahoney

    1240 Words  | 3 Pages

    To begin, the attack on Pearl Harbour was devastating to U.S. naval capabilities in the Pacific at the onset of their entry into the war. Japanese officials had grown tired of the U.S. oil embargo, which was meant to limit their territorial expansion and aggression in South-East Asia as well as China, and as negotiations weren’t reaching any conclusions they decided that the only course of action was a first strike on the aircraft carriers at Pearl Harbour to cripple U.S. naval capability in the Pacific (Rosenberg 1). The attack, which lasted about two hours, had resulted in the sinking of four battleships, among ...

    Read More

  • Japanese Alien and Japanese-American Poets In U. S. Relocation Camps

    4717 Words  | 10 Pages

    Okihiro, Gary Y. Whispered Silences: Japanese Americans and World War II. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1996.

    Read More

  • World War II Submarine Warfare and the United States

    2221 Words  | 5 Pages

    Whitman, Edward C.. “Rising to Victory: The Pacific Submarine Strategy in World War II.” Accessed November 25, 2013. http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html.

    Read More

  • The Battle of Cold Harbor

    1740 Words  | 4 Pages

    Rhea, Gordon, and George F. Skoch. The Battle of Cold Harbor: Civil War Series. Fort Washington, Pa.: Eastern National, 2001.

    Read More

  • Tora Compare And Contrast Essay

    2275 Words  | 5 Pages

    The events for the Japanese side begin on December 12, 1932 when Isoroku Yamamoto was appointed Director of the Aeronautical Department of the Navy Ministry. He inspired reliance and assurance with the opportunity to make the air fleet a resourceful part for the Navy. He established a long needed driving force toward the future. It was Yamamoto's temperament that also had to do with his strategy and lead on his next groundwork. Yamamoto's assessment of the war with the United States came from his extensive research he did while attending Harvard University and his service as naval ambassador in Washington. He became familiar with the United States strengths and weaknesses. It was August, 1939 that Yamamoto was appointed Commander in Chief due to his knowledge base of the United States and his Naval command that earned him this position. Yamamoto determined that if Japan was to have the lead in the war, they would have to destroy the US Pacific Fleet in a long range, preventive attack using aircra...

    Read More

  • The Doolittle Raid: An Analysis

    1339 Words  | 3 Pages

    Gailey, Harry. The War in the Pacific: From Pearl Harbor to Tokyo Bay. Novato: Presidio, 1995.

    Read More

  • The Decision of a Lifetime: Dropping the Atomic Bomb on Japan

    1989 Words  | 4 Pages

    Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi. “Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman and the Surrender of Japan.” Taking Sides: Clashing View in United States History. Ed. Larry Madaras & James SoRelle. 15th ed. New York, NY. 2012. 289-298.

    Read More

  • Internment of Japanese Americans in World War II

    2361 Words  | 5 Pages

    Prange, Gordon W., Donald M. Goldstein, and Katherine V. Dillon. At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor. New York: Penguin Books, 1981. Print.

    Read More

  • The Significance of the Battle of Midway

    1393 Words  | 3 Pages

    Even before the battle started, America saw his attack coming. Japan had bombed the Dutch harbor in Alaska on the days of June 3rd and 4th. Japan landed there instead of on the islands of Attu and Kiska, in fear the United States might be there. There attacks failed when the plan to get the American fleet from Midway to aid the freshly bombed Dutch harbor. At 0900 hours an American patrol boat spotted the Japanese fleet seven hundred miles from Midway. At that point admiral Soroku Yamamoto’s plans of a sneak attack were over. Admiral fletcher commanded the U.S.S. Yorktown before it was sunk by the Japanese. Then at 0750, japan spots nine enemy (American) planes fifteen miles out. Tones, a Japanese cruiser, opened fire on the American pilots. Almost instantly if an American bomber plane were hit it would explode and go down. The bombers dropped their torpedoes to far from their targets, so the torpedoes didn’t land a single blow to Japan. At 1040 japan sent from Hiryu,...

    Read More

  • The Battle of Midway

    1041 Words  | 3 Pages

    On December 7th 1941, Japanese Planes and submarines attacked the United States Naval base at Pearl Harbor. This event singlehandedly brought the U.S from its then neutral stance in World War Two to a fighting member of the “Allied Powers.” Pearl Harbor was the first of a long series of confrontations between the U.S and the Japanese in an effort to gain control of the Pacific. Unlike the “War in Europe” the Pacific strategy was dominated by naval and aerial battles, with the occasional land-based “Island Hopping” Campaign. As such, one of the most important factors in the war in the pacific was Fleet Size, the more ships a country could send to war, the better. Pearl Harbor was the Japanese’s way of trying to deal with the massive U.S Pacific fleet. However, Pearl Harbor was not the turning point of the war. After December 7th the United States began work on numerous technological developments which would ultimately help them in one of the most important battles of WWII, the largest naval confrontation of the war, The Battle of Midway. The battle, which took place from June 4th to June 7th , 1942 is widely considered the turning point of the Pacific Theater (James & Wells). Through the Post-Pearl Harbor desire for “Revenge” and various technological advantages including code breaking and radar, the U.S were able to outsmart the Japanese at Midway and ultimately win the battle, eventually leading to a victory in the Pacific.

    Read More

  • Battle of Okinawa

    1124 Words  | 3 Pages

    Last and biggest of the Pacific island battles of World War II, the Okinawa campaign (April 1—June 22, 1945) involved the 287,000 troops of the U.S. Tenth Army against 130,000 soldiers of the Japanese Thirty-second Army. At stake were air bases vital to the projected invasion of Japan ("Battle of Okinawa," 1996). The Battle of Okinawa remembered more for its iconic photograph of US Marines raising the US flag on Okinawa more so than any other war or battle ever fought. Okinawa the largest of the Ryukus islands played a major role in the American forces overall strategic efforts to advance to the mainland’s of Japan. Because it was the last major battle of WWII, the battle of Okinawa used lessons learned and TTP’s from all previous battles with the Japanese to successfully employ combined striking power of the services and techniques of amphibious operations.

    Read More

  • Pearl Harbor US Intelligence Failure

    959 Words  | 2 Pages

    One of the factors that contributed to the US intelligence failure was that the United States believed that they, together with Britain and France and other world power nations were the only ones that counted with the type of developmental army to be able to pull out an attack of a high degree, having in mind as well, the farness from their territory. Historian Warren Kozak wrote for the Wall Street Journal, “This was a failure to think outside the box, coupled with a strong belief that the Japanese were inferior and incapable of mounting such an attack.” Submerged in that superiority, they didn’t perform the enough investigations; they saw Japanese as weak and not a high degree enemy. Admiral Arthur Davis declared at the hearing on proceedings of the Hart Inquiry Monday, March 13, 1944: “I did not, however, realize to what a high degree of proficiency Japanese naval aviation had been developed. I do not believe that anybody else in the American Navy had any proper conception of this devel...

    Read More

  • The Battle of Midway

    1931 Words  | 4 Pages

    As the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 the United States officially entered World War Two. The Japanese government later learned later that this single event sets off an explosion that subsequently caused the United States to attack the Midway Islands in the Pacific Ocean. Pearl Harbor was one of the United States largest naval bases and the largest in the Pacific Ocean. This attack ceased all trade with Japan and officially added Japan as one of the US enemies. With a new world war started it created new concerns for the army. “World War II introduced a whole new set of problems in naval tactics” (Smith, 1). The main change driving these changes was the fact that aircraft carriers became more prevalent and common in every major countries naval force. Japan was able to pull off the Pearl Harbor attack as a result of aircraft carriers to launch their airplanes. As a result of the battles leading up to the Battle of Midway and conflicts with Japan this created a lot larger of an impact on WWII as a whole and to boost unity in America leading to a more prosperous period of history following the war.

    Read More

  • The Battle of Okinawa Analysis

    1878 Words  | 4 Pages

    Leckie, Robert. Okinawa: The Last Battle of World War II. New York: Penguin Group, 1995. Print.

    Read More

More about The Battle of Midway

Open Document