The Battle of Midway (Pivotal Moments in American History) (70 page)

5
. Thomas Wildenberg, “Midway: Sheer Luck or Better Doctrine?”
Naval War College Review
58 (Winter 2005):121–35, In his after-action report, Nagumo acknowledged that, “under such weather conditions, it is believed that the number of recco planes should be increased.” See “CINC First Air Fleet Detailed Battle Report No. 6,”
ONI Review
5 (May 1947), available on line at
ibiblio.org/hyper-war/Japan/IJN/rep/Midway/Nagumo/
. See also Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 146–48.

6
. Craig L. Symonds,
Decision at Sea: Five Naval Battles that Shaped American History
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 228–29.

7
. Douglas C. Davis interview (Oct. 1, 2000), NMPW.

8
. Fletcher to Nimitz, June 14, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2.

9
. “Pertinent Extracts from Communications Logs Relative to Midway Attack,” Action Reports, reel 2; Fletcher to S. E. Morison, Dec. 1, 1947, Fletcher Papers, AHC, box 1; interview of Howard P. Ady by Walter Lord (April 9, 1966), Lord Collection, NHHC, box 18.

10
. Communications Log Relative to Midway Attack, Action Reports, reel 2; James R. Ogden oral history (March 16, 1982), 76–77, U.S. Naval Institute Oral History Collection, USNA.

11
. Interview with John F. Carey by Gordon Prange (July 1, 1966), Prange Papers, UMD, box 17; Robert J. Cressman et al.,
“A Glorious Page in Our History”: The Battle of Midway, 4–6 June 1942
(Missoula, MT: Pictorial Histories, 1990), 62; statement of Captain John F. Carey, USMC, June 6, 1942, Action Reports, reel 3; Kirk Armistead to Walter Lord, Feb. 15, 1967, Walter Lord Collection, NHHC, box 18.

12
. Statement of Captain John F. Carey, USMC, June 6, 1942, Action Reports, reel 3; Cressman et al.,
Glorious Page
, 62.

13
. Statement of Captain John F. Carey, and statement of Capt. P. R. White, both June 6, 1942, Action Reports, reel 3. The story of Kurz and the “stiff shots” is from Cressman et al.,
Glorious Page
, 64.

14
. John B. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral: Frank Jack Fletcher at Coral Sea, Midway, and Guadalcanal
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006), 237–43.

15
. Fletcher to Nimitz, June 14, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2; Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 134–35; Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 242. John Lundstrom notes that Spruance did not acknowledge Fletcher’s order and that Fletcher had to send a follow-up message fifteen minutes later. By then, Spruance was already heading toward the southwest
(Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 242). Interestingly, Spruance does not mention getting this order from Fletcher in his own after-action report (Spruance to Nimitz, June 16, 1942, Action Reports, reel 3.) In 1947, when Samuel Eliot Morison asked both Fletcher and Spruance who had commanded the combined American carrier task forces at this time, both men replied that it was Fletcher. “I ordered Spruance to attack,” Fletcher wrote, “but as we were well separated he was left to select his own point option.” Curiously, however, Task Force 16 did not set a point option. Fletcher to Morison, Dec. 1, 1947, Fletcher Papers, AHC, box 1.

16
. Richard Best interview (Aug. 11, 1995), NMPW, 37–38.

17
. Clark Reynolds, “The Truth About Miles Browning,” in Cressman et al.,
Glorious Page
, 214–15; Richard Best interview (Aug. 11, 1995), NMPW; Gordon Prange interview of Spruance (Sept. 5, 1964), Prange Papers, UMD, box 17.

18
. Communications Log Relative to the Battle of Midway, Action Reports, reel 2.

19
. Kimes to Nimitz, June 7, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2; Nimitz to King, June 4, 1942, Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 8, no page number, date-time group 042007; Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 301–2.

20
. Gordon Prange, with Donald M. Goldstein, and Katherine V. Dillon,
Miracle at Midway
(New York: McGraw-Hill, 1982), 206; Fuchida and Okumiya,
Midway
, 156; Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 149.

21
. Albert K. Earnest and Harry Ferrier, “Avengers at Midway,”
Foundation
17, no. 2 (Spring 1996), 1–7; Robert J. Mrazek,
A Dawn Like Thunder: The True Story of Torpedo Squadron Eight
(New York: Little, Brown, 2008), 6–10.

22
. Willard Robinson interview (July 20, 2003), NMPW.

23
. Ibid.; Albert Earnest interview (July 20, 2003), NMPW; Mrazek,
Dawn Like Thunder
, 61, 121; Cressman et al.,
Glorious Page
, 70.

24
. The details of Earnest’s saga come from interviews conducted by Robert Mrazek in February 2006. See Mrazek,
Dawn Like Thunder
, 122–23, 142–145.

25
. Recollections of Frank Melo, as told to Charles Lowe, Lowe Diary, BOMRT; Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 152; Cressman et al.,
Glorious Page
, 72–73. Fuchida Mitsuo recalled that one of the B-26 bombers tried to crash into the
Akagi
, but Fuchida very likely conflated Jim Muri’s plane, which flew very low over the
Akagi
’s deck, with that of First Lieutenant Herbert Mayes, which cartwheeled into the sea after being shot down. I am grateful to Jon Parshall for his insights about this particular attack.

26
. Nagumo’s chief of staff was RADM Kusaka Ryünosuke, who made these remarks in an interview with Gordon Prange (no date), Prange Papers, UMD, box 17. See also Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 153.

27
. Dallas Isom describes the rearming process in detail in
Midway Inquest
, 124–28; Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 157.

28
. “CINC First Air Fleet Detailed Battle Report No. 6” ; Fuchida and Okumiya,
Midway
, 148. It was Fuchida who sustained for so long the notion that the delay in launching
Tone
’s search plane no. 4 was a piece of horrible luck that doomed the Japanese at Midway. Jonathan Parshall and Anthony Tully have suggested that his motive was to imply that the Japanese defeat at Midway was a fluke of timing and circumstance rather than the product of doctrinal error or command failure. See Parshall and Tully
(Shattered Sword
, 132, 159, 161), who render Amari’s first name as Hiroshi.

29
. Credit for figuring out this irony belongs to Dallas Isom, “The Battle of Midway: Why the Japanese Lost,”
Naval War College Review
53, no. 3 (Summer 2000), 68–70. Isom makes the same point in
Midway Inquest
, 114–16.

30
. Kusaka’s recollection is taken from a questionnaire he completed for Gordon Prange in 1966, Prange Papers, UMD, box 17. In that same document, Kusaka asserts that “it was not before 0500 [8:00 a.m.] that the said report reached our ears.” Based partly on this, Prange and Isom both argue that the message probably did not reach the bridge on the
Akagi
until 8:00. Isom in particular makes a strong case that Nagumo did not learn of the sighting until 8:00 and concludes that this was why Nagumo could not get his strike launched until after 10:20. Parshall and Tully argue for the 7:45 time, citing not only the Japanese message log but also the intercept by Station Hypo. Isom suggests that the 7:47 notation in the Hypo log was added after the fact to comport with the reconstructed Japanese message log. See Prange et al.,
Miracle at Midway
, 217; Isom,
Midway Inquest
, 133–37; and Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 159–60. See also Isom’s article “Battle of Midway.”

31
. “CINC First Air Fleet Detailed Battle Report No. 6”; Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 162.

32
. Isom,
Midway Inquest
, 158–59; Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 155.

33
. R. D. Heinl, Jr.,
Marines at Midway
(Washington, DC: Historical Section, Division of Public Information, U.S. Marine Corps, 1948), 34–35.

34
. Cressman et al.,
Glorious Page
, 79; Statement of Captain R. L. Blain, USMC., no date, Action Reports, reel 3.

35
. Second Lt. George Lumpkin, USMC, quoted in Heinl,
Marines at Midway
, 38.

36
. Interview of Kusaka by Gordon Prange (1966), Prange Papers, UMD, box 17; “CINC First Air Fleet Detailed Battle Report No. 6”; Kusaka questionnaire, 1966, Prange Papers, UMD, box 17.

37
. Agawa,
Reluctant Admiral
, 264.

38
. Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 165–66; interview of Kusaka by Gordon Prange (1966), Prange Papers, UMD, box 17. See also the discussion of the impact of doctrine on operational decisions in Parshall and Tully,
Shattered Sword
, 404–5.

Chapter 12

1
. The young officer was LT James James E. Vose, who was interviewed by Barrett Tillman in June 1973 and quoted in Tillman,
The Dauntless Dive Bomber of World War II
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1976), 66, The sailor on the
Enterprise
was Alvin Kernan, in
The Unknown Battle of Midway: The Destruction of the American Torpedo Squadrons
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2005), 73.

2
. Robert J. Mrazek,
A Dawn Like Thunder: The True Story of Torpedo Squadron Eight
(New York: Little, Brown, 2008), 18–20; Kernan,
Unknown Battle of Midway
, 71–75.

3
. Peter C. Smith treats Ring more positively in
Midway: Dauntless Victory; Fresh Perspectives on America’s Seminal Naval Victory of World War II
(Barnsley, UK: Pen & Sword Maritime, 2007), 59–60, though most of the supportive comments about him come from Ring’s superiors. Barrett Tillman tells the story of Ring grounding pilots for refusing to come to attention in
Wildcat: The F4F in WW II
, 2nd ed. (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1990), 50. Ring’s insistence that the
Hornet
pilots remain on duty at Ewa Field is from E. T. Stover and Clark G. Reynolds,
The Saga of Smokey Stover
(Charleston, SC: Tradd Street, 1978), 29.