The Aircraft Carrier War

[jon_norstog]

My ex's father was on a can (DD) in that battle. His ship wasn't hit too bad. He told me they spent two days picking up survivors, what was left alive in the water after the sharks had their banquet.

jn

[dogtag]

Excellent. Thanks Art.

I remember reading about later in the war with the Kamikazi attacks - the British Carrier (s) ?
had steel decks and suffered less than the American Carriers with their Wooden decks.

True ?

[Art]

Excellent. Thanks Art.

I remember reading about later in the war with the Kamikazi attacks - the British Carrier (s) ?
had steel decks and suffered less than the American Carriers with their Wooden decks.

True ?

That is true, post 1940. It would not always defeat a big AP bomb but the Japanese weren't dropping a lot of those in 1945. There was a trade off though, the Brit carriers carried only about 60% of the planes of their American or Japanese counterparts. They boosted that some with deck parking. Did I mention the Brits also invented the armored flight deck that everybody used now??? There is a Youtube channel called "Armored Carriers" about those ships, you might check it out.

The videos deal with the other side of the world but shows Luftwaffe's attempt to sink one of these carrier that was part of "Operation Pedestal." First short video is background to a long series.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9hjfzXhoYI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViAKdtarKZ4

[blackhawknj]

IIRC the Zero's long range was due a total absence of armor or any protection for the pilot.
In the Battle of the Phillipine Sea IJN Taihowas sunk by a single torpedo due to design flaws and poor damage control.

[Art]

95% poor damage control but that's a story for a later episode.

[Art]

IIRC the Zero's long range was due a total absence of armor or any protection for the pilot.

Just a word on this.

All Japanese naval aircraft were designed to achieve the longest possible range. This was part of the reason for the lightweight construction. They knew they would be flying over very long stretches of water.

Right after the landings on Guadalcanal the Japanese launched a strike looking for the American carriers of 27 very long range G4M Betty medium bombers escorted by Zeros of the elite Tainan Air Wing. The range was around 700 miles. That's further than London to Berlin. No other fighter at the time could possibly have flown that mission. They didn't find the carrier but attacked some transports covered by Wildcats of VF 5 From Saratoga. The Zeros shot down all 5 Wildcats for the loss of one bomber. No hits were scored on the transports. Without the Zero escort the Betty's would have been slaughtered.

Saburo Sakai speaking of the Zero's combat radius which their mechanics were able to tweak to almost 1,000 miles, said the luxury of never worrying about running out of fuel was of almost inestimable value in the vast reaches of the Pacific.

[Art]

Midway June 7, 1942

Reading their mail....again. The staff infighting over the actual objective is well known but it all panned out.

The Japanese had had a back pocket plan for the Midway operation. The Doolittle Raid put the cycle into motion and the Japanese would bet the whole pile on the operation. The whole pile had problems that would only become apparent later.

Once the objective was known Midway was loaded up with every available aircraft. The scouting force was especially heavy. The Navy supplied 29 PBYs, 25 search and 4 strike. The Army supplied 19 B17s, 4 D models and the rest new Es. The B17s were equipped with "Tokyo Tanks" which were fitted in the bomb bays increasing their range but cutting their bomb loads in half. This would be one of the few time the Fortress would fulfill its original intended role as maritime reconaisance/strike bomber. The Army also supplied four B26s that would be armed with torpedoes. The fighters were all Marines, 7 F4F 3 Wildcats and 14 Brewster Buffalos (these had originally been sent on the Wake Island relief mission via the Saratoga) which was aborted. The Marines also had a bunch of obsolescent SB2 dive bomber. Speaking of Saratoga, she took a torpedo on Jan 11 from the I-6, she was unlucky that way, and was on her way back from a west coast yard. Her air groups were at Pearl Harbor, though and would provide replacements for losses at Coral Sea and sail with the task forces for the coming fight.

The Japanese used their normal wide ranging plan and used every single carrier available, including the old light carrier Hosho which sailed with Yamamoto's battle line. The Japanese had nothing like enough front line aircraft for their air groups and many second line models were on carriers headed for the Aleutians and with the invasion force. Hosho, for example carried 11 B4Y biplane torpedo bombers. CVL Zuiho with the invasion force had a listed compliment of 30 aircraft, 12 B5N Kates and a fighter group made up entirely of 12 A5M Claudes. In the strike group only the two Hiryu class ships carried their full compliment of aircraft and Kaga was down 20% on her air group. The Japanese went into the fight seriously outnumbered.

First blood was actually drawn by a strike PBY which stumbled onto an oiler group and put a torpedo into one. The tanker did not sink.

The rest is mostly well known. The Japanese struck Midway and annihilated the Marine fighters that piled straight in almost to a plane, and then bombed and strafed everything in sight. All of the Midway aircraft were launched and the dive and torpedo planes attacked the task force and were shot to badly shot up by the CAP causing no damage. The Avengers lost five of their six aircraft in this their first fight. As is well known this totally unexpected turn caused the Japanese to order another stirke. More bombings developed from B17s and from Midway making it very difficult to spot and launch a strike. The US carriers decided that speed was of the essence and launched their planes piece meal. The torpedo planes went first and were subjected to a military execution by the Japanese CAP. It would be their last day in combat. The hand full of survivors being withdrawn for training purposes and taken out of service completely by 1944. Then the Dauntless bombers appeared and the rest is history. Only Hiryu survived and her Admiral, Tamon Yamaguchi decided retribution was more important than saving his carrier for later use and rather than opening the range to take advantage of the superior combat radius of his aircraft charged the Americans (very samaurai that) and put himself in range of a counter strike. His pilots fatally damaged the Yorktown, but the Americans struck back with every SBD they could scratch together and ended the Hiryu's run right then and there.

The Japanese raced to the scene at flank speed including the four carriers spread among the other groups but the Americans, their air groups depleted had, like Elvis, left the building. Consideration was given to taking Midway with the remaining forces and that could have been done but the high command (Yamamoto) considered it and then declared the option a "bad hand."

Some things not generally known:

This is the only battle in which US aircrew losses exceeded those of the Japanese. Total air crew losses for the Japanese were 110 (mostly from Hiryu), the good guys lost 94 in the carrier torpedo planes alone. The captains of the other carriers had their priorities straight and evacuated their pilots first. Aoki Kajiro, Akagi's skipper interviewed after the war asked about his aircrew losses said they were very lucky to have only lost six (Akagi's total losses were under 300.) The idea that losses were much higher which persisted for many years was based on visual evidence of battle damage and not numbers.

What difference would the Zuikaku have made? The "Auspicious Crane" was unscathed at the Coral Sea but her air group was severely depleted . The Japanese had a policy of not mixing air groups so she didn't sail, what difference She had a rated complement of 84 aircraft, what difference would maybe even 60 more aircraft made for the Japanese. We had no such issue with Yorktown.

After the battle the Japanese still had more carriers available, than the Americans, including 4 CV. Their rate increase would never keep up. In fact the case is well taken that even if we'd lost Midway our numerical advantage by late 1944 would have been overwhelming.

Japanese rigidity paid a big price in their defeat. American flexibility played a big part in their win, with the aid of providence.

[jon_norstog]

My ex's father was on a can (DD) in that battle. His ship wasn't hit too bad. He told me they spent two days picking up survivors, what was left alive in the water after the sharks had their banquet.

jn

I take it back. His ship was in the Coral Sea fight, but the shark story came later, when the Indianapolis went down. My bad...

jn

[Art]

A note on how naval aircraft casualties were counted.

In the Army a plane that, for example went down undamaged on a mission because of a mechanical problem or regained its base but had combat damage significant enough to write it off was an "operational loss" just as if it was lost in a training accident, it was not counted as a "combat loss." This obviously was a bit misleading though the "operational loss" might still server a potential purpose as a source of parts. The best example of how this could skew the numbers was the Regensberg-Schweinfurt raid in August 17, 1943. The 8th Air Force put up 376 B17s of which 60 were shot down. That's bad enough. Miller, in his excellent "Masters of the Air" exhaustive work on the bomber war in Europe reports that an even 100 returning aircraft were write offs that never flew again. That's over a 40% loss in equipment and verging on combat ineffectiveness.

The Navy was different. In a battle any aircraft lost for any reason during a battle was a combat loss, shot down, ditched regardless of the reason, deck accident, landed and pushed over the side even if still operational for deck operations purposes or down with the ship.

[blackhawknj]

Also I hsve read that at Midway the Japanese's most serious losses were not of pilots but of maintenance and engine room personnel.