Midway Atoll

From Honolulu, sun-drenched Midway Atoll lolls in the blue Pacific 1,250 miles west-northwest up the chain of Hawaiian Islands toward Japan. Sixty-eight years ago on 4 June 1942, this atoll, three dots of land rising along an expansive lagoon, met its destiny. The Battle of Midway was the first over-the-horizon aircraft carrier battle at sea, and its startling result altered the course of World War II (WWII) in the Pacific. Today, activity is centered on Sand Island where more than 30 American and Japanese memorials are continuing testimony to the courage and sacrifice of those who fought that crucial engagement.

Present-day Midway is a National Wildlife Refuge administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Refuge personnel, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration personnel, and workers live there, near ruins of the old cable station and Pan Am PBY hangar. They live side by side with gooney birds—lots of birds. Like a heavy sprinkling of giant salt and pepper grinds all around you, nestled on the ground beside your feet and fearless, are big, 7-pound black-footed “black gooney” albatross, “white gooney” Laysan albatross, wedge-tailed Shearwaters that sing and wail, white- or red-tailed tropicbirds, foot-long little Bonin petrels, lacey white terns, transient birds, and even darting yellow canaries. Ironwood trees (providing branches for the terns), naupaka, and more sand have been introduced and a runway built.

Eastern Island, site of the original three runways and smaller than Sand Island, tapers to a point, and at its end is a tiny spit of an islet, aptly named Spit. Both Eastern and Spit are devoted entirely to wildlife; the old runways are nesting sites, and most pupping of Hawaiian Monk seals occurs on Eastern. Green sea turtles take the sun on all island beaches.

At 0525 on 4 June 1942, a Midway-based PBY Catalina patrol spotted the carrier force of VADM Nagumo (Chuichi) some 250 miles northwest of Midway. At 0430 Nagumo had committed 108 aircraft, less than half of his 4-carrier strike planes against Midway; the aircraft were Type 99 “Val” bombers and A6M2 “Zero” fighters launched from the Akagi, Kaga, Hiryu, and Soryu. It was to be his only strike. At 0555 Midway radar detected the approaching planes. Despite fierce opposition, the cable and radio stations, oil tanks, and the seaplane hangars on Sand Island were destroyed.

At Pearl Harbor, Pacific Fleet Commander, ADM Chester Nimitz, reading compromised Japanese code messages, had forebodings. Less than 1 month earlier, on 22 May he sent two companies of Marines to Midway from Honolulu. These men of Carlson’s 2d Raider Battalion (famed for action in Burma) put up defensive installations, made and placed landmines, and prepared. Company C went to Sand Island and Company D to Eastern, where three runways required defensive emplacements. Taking the runways would be the goal of any impending attack. By 4 June, 107 U.S. aircraft were on Eastern—Army, Navy, and two Marine Corps squadrons of 64 planes. Alerted on that 4 June morning, every aircraft on the island was airborne. Six Navy torpedo bombers and four Army B–26s rigged with torpedoes launched. Following came 15 Army high-altitude B–17s. Next were the Marine squadrons led by Maj Lofton Henderson and Maj Ben Norris; 36 dive bombers (SBD–2s (Douglas Aircraft scout bombers) and SB2U–3s) and 28 fighters (F2A3s and F4Fs) headed for Nagumo’s first carrier strike force.

Henderson’s group first sighted the carriers at 0744 and attacked. They were set upon by swarms of Zeros. Henderson and seven others were shot down without inflicting any damage to the carriers. Five Navy and two Army planes were lost causing no damage. The B–17s accomplished nothing more than waterspouts; apparently the Japanese were unaware they were under attack by “precision” bombers.

No hits were made on the carriers and none on the battleships Haruna and Kirishima. Of a 12-plane Marine group, 3 survived, including Marion Carl, who was credited with 2 downed Zeros and 2 months later moved on to become the Marines first WWII ace flying with the “Cactus Air Force” on Guadalcanal. Of a 13-plane Marine group, 7 survived. Henderson, the first Marine pilot killed in the war, lends his name to Henderson Air Field on Guadalcanal. Not all was irreversible; the attack delayed the advance of the Japanese fleet, forcing it to break formation and maneuver to evade torpedoes; half of their bombers were lost. The attack set the stage for U.S. carrier planes soon to arrive.

On his flagship, ADM Nagumo was plagued by lack of vital information, lost preparations, and timidity. From the outset, Japanese plans were hampered. Two key staff members were not present; one arrived at the last moment before sailing. Submarines arrived late and did not find the three U.S. carriers, Yorktown (CV 5), Enterprise (CV 6), and Hornet (CV 8), ADM Nimitz had positioned 200 miles north of his strike force. Nagumo was not informed that a planned reconnaissance by flying boats from the Marshall Islands was cancelled. Engine problems and delays in launching Mitsubishi Type “O” “Pete” observer floatplanes from two cruisers (Tone and Chikuna) also denied Nagumo intelligence of the approaching U.S. task forces to the east. He had no radar and no reason to think that a U.S. carrier force was at sea.

U.S. opposition was so heavy at Midway that Nagumo’s strike commander recommended a second strike, rearming torpedo planes with bombs. The Japanese fleet system did not maintain a deck park of aircraft, only B5N “Kate” aircraft had folding wings; all servicing, refueling, and weapons reloading was done in the hangar except on rare occasions. Nagumo began to receive reports of U.S. units in the area. At 0728 a floatplane spotted a large U.S. task force, later learning it included a carrier. This was a rare occasion.

At a crucial moment, Nagumo then made an ill-fated decision. He hesitated, choosing to recover his Midway strike force, rearm all aircraft on deck, and then strike at the American carrier force at 1030. It was a fateful stumble. He was not to have the 2 hours needed to rearm. Just after 0600 RADM Frank Jack Fletcher, who held overall command of the carrier force, was informed of the Japanese carriers’ location by a Midway-based plane. At 0700 hours Task Force 16 (TF–16), commanded by RADM Raymond Spruance, launched torpedo bombers from the Enterprise. At 0830 TF–17, commanded by Fletcher, launched torpedo bombers from the Yorktown. Rather than a single assault, the air groups attacked at different times. Torpedo Squadrons 8 and 6 inflicted no damage; 15 Devastator aircraft were lost. Yorktown’s torpedo squadron scored no hits and lost 10 of 12 aircraft.

Aboard the Akagi, Kaga, Hiryu, and Soryu, hangars and flight decks were unarmored. Each had two hangars, one atop the other; aircraft maintenance was outboard of the hangars. Fuel tanks were a part of the structure of the ship, and shocks to hulls also would affect the tanks, creating possible leaks. These fumes in the hangars could not be vented, a great potential for catastrophe. Torpedoes and bombs lay on Nagumo’s carrier decks in the process of rearming. As the Yorktown’s torpedo aircraft were attacking, Dauntless dive bombers from Enterprise and Yorktown at last located the Japanese carriers. Hornet’s dive bombers missed them.

Enterprise’s planes targeted the Kaga and Akagi. Most dove on the Kaga; she was hit four times. Akagi nearly got away until an Enterprise Dauntless scored a single hit leaving a hole in the flight deck. Deck plates slanted upward in grotesque shapes. Planes stood tail up belching flame and black smoke. Yorktown’s Dauntlesses attacked Soryu scoring three hits with 1,000-pound bombs. Huge fires raged, with no hope of extinguishing them. Hiryu, still not hit, prepared to strike. She had only 18 bombers and 9 attack planes. They launched at 1100 targeting the Yorktown. Radar found them 32 miles out, and U.S. Wildcats made the strike costly; Hiryu lost 11 bombers and 3 fighters. Seven Type 99s (Vals) survived long enough to dive on Yorktown scoring three hits and two damaging near misses. Two aircraft were shot down by U.S. antiaircraft fire. Five bombers and one Zero returned to the Hiryu. By 1400 Yorktown had fires under control and her boilers back on line. A second Hiryu strike again attacked Yorktown. Of the seven aircraft that survived to drop torpedoes, two scored hits. Yorktown was dead in the water, listing at 17 degrees. Five Japanese torpedo planes and four fighters returned to Hiryu. At 1445 U.S. scout planes found the Hiryu. By 1700, 25 Dauntlesses from Enterprise and 16 from Hornet were attacking. The Enterprise flight placed four hits on Hiryu, and Hornet’s aircraft attacked her escorts.

The Battle of Midway was ended. All four Japanese fleet carriers were destroyed, as well as all of their aircraft. The Yorktown, torpedoed by a Japanese submarine on 6 June, was lost.

The Battle of Midway was disastrous for U.S. Marine Corps aviation. Due to fuel shortages, pilots were trained inadequately; they did not practice vertical dive-bombing, staying with the simpler, vulnerable glide technique. There was no gunnery training. Their aircraft were obsolete Navy hand-me-downs. A few days after the Battle of Midway, Maj James Roosevelt, Executive Officer, 2d Raider Battalion and son of the President, was sent from Honolulu to Midway on a factfinding mission. Back at Pearl he was ordered to Washington to report findings to the President. Before leaving Honolulu, he met with LtCol C.A. “Sheriff” Larkin, senior Marine aviator in the Pacific, to seek his view on Marine Corps aviation at the Battle of Midway. Larkin spelled out the deficiencies in aircraft, equipment, and training in a letter to the President and gave it to Roosevelt. Whether it was the letter, or other strategies at work, we do not know. Washington wheels turned, and it was not long before action was begun to equip Marine aviation with better aircraft and training.

The battle was doomed before the main body forces of ADM Isoroku Yamamoto, Commander of the Japanese Combined Fleet, reached the battle zone. Yamamoto, haunted by the Japanese failure to destroy the carriers at Pearl Harbor, could not ignore the danger of American carriers and turned his focus on the central Pacific, seeking some way to bring American carriers to action. His solution was to attack Midway, assuming the United States would be forced to fight for the atoll to protect its base at Pearl Harbor. When that developed, thought Yamamoto, his Combined Fleet would be there to finish the destruction of the American Fleet that the Japanese had begun 6 months earlier. It didn’t happen that way.

Yamamoto believed that the Pacific war must be won within 11/2 years, well before the United States could build a strong counterforce. In August 1942 he predicted, “The real battle now is a competition between Japanese discipline and American scientific technology.” He was right.

Yamamoto, a brilliant strategist, was hampered by the Japanese system of seniority. Nagumo gained command through the system. Yamamoto accepted ultimate responsibility for the failures of the four great Pacific sea battles of 1942, all commanded by Nagumo—the Coral Sea in May, Midway in June, the Eastern Solomons in August, and Santa Cruz in October. Nagumo, a surface warfare specialist, never mastered the intricacies of carrier warfare. Lacking decisiveness, at Midway he did not make a stunning blow by launching everything he had immediately upon receiving the report of an American carrier in the area. Instead, he played it safe, delaying until he could launch a strike of great strength. That hesitation was his undoing. Nagumo was relieved of carrier command in November 1943. In March 1944 he was given command of the landbased air force at Saipan. During the Battle of the Marianas he died on Saipan by his own hand.

CPO Chuck Wheeler, 87, who visited Midway with a Pacific Aviation Museum tour, remembers well his 4 years of duty aboard the Enterprise. Attached to Squadron 6, during the battle he loaded 500- and 1,000-pound bombs on SBDs. In the midst of that desperate time, he saw a gooney bird land aboard; all of the sailors considered it a sign of good luck. With remarkable memory, Wheeler’s recol-
lections are vivid. One day at Pearl he was up on an aircraft wing struggling with equipment and cussing loudly. Someone from below called to him asking what the problem was. He didn’t look around at first and went on cussing, finally turning to look at the person calling to him. There stood ADM “Bull” Halsey. Contrite, Wheeler clambered down, and Halsey said, “Sometimes I cuss, too.” Soon Wheeler was elevated in rating and is quite sure ADM Halsey had something to do with that.

Midway’s gooney birds always were there—before the battle, after battle, and today—dancing their mating hop, clacking their beaks, running many yards to launch takeoffs, and making somersault landings or belly flops on water. The Wildlife Refuge is serene.