Historian Reacts - Battle of Midway by The Operations Room

welcome back everyone to another reaction video coming to you a little later in the day than i typically do these things uh and that is because i've been away for the last couple of days so i just got home uh before we dive into today's video i want to give a shout out to all of our executive level uh executive producer level patrons and thank you for your support james dennis yani levi john thank you for your support and your support is going directly to make it possible for me to be able to do things like this week going to gettysburg and washington dc to make content for the channel so thank you for that i've been promising this one for a while it's come up second place in votes on patreon a number of times but we're gonna go ahead and dive into the operations room the battle of midway today i'll put a link in the description to the original content creator so you can check them out make sure you give them a like subscribe if you like their stuff let's go ahead and dive into this one [Music] in june 1942 the war is going very well for the empire of japan she has succeeded in her primary war objective to secure the oil supplies of the dutch east indies and has scored further territorial victories against the might of the british u.s australian and dutch forces in the west pacific and southeast asia so a lot of people they look at this war and they ask themselves the question well why why would japan go to war with the united states and with the allies uh a war they knew long term they couldn't possibly win well they had to much like some of the reasons why people argued that hitler decided to go to war with the russians when he did it was about oil when you have this massive force that has a you know for japan has this big navy and you have planes and you have tanks and you have all of these things that require oil and your primary means for getting that oil has been cut off to you you kind of have no choice and in this case japan's primary source of oil the dutch east indies in the united states who are both allies and the u.s once japan starts being aggressive in asia on conquering places like china the u.s cuts off that oil supply and so japan needs that oil in order to build the sphere of influence that they want in in asia or in the pacific and in asia and so they know that long term they can't win a protracted war a long war against the united states the u.s is going to bring its military might its industrial might to bear and eventually defeat them so their hope is to get a quick strike to uh push really hard really fast to the point where the us has to super for peace has to make a settlement and does not go for a long war but of course that doesn't happen and midway becomes one of those places where the tide begins to turn and it's called midway for exactly the reason i mean you can't tell from this map but it really is kind of halfway in the pacific uh between uh the united states and japan however knowing that the industrial power of the united states would outdo them in the end the japanese decide that they must deal a decisive blow to the remains of the u.s pacific fleet specifically the aircraft carriers yeah so you know a lot of people argue that the carriers weren't the main target but if you actually read some of the people who were there and what they talked about the battleships were actually pretty far down the list of primary priority targets for the uh for the japanese at pearl harbor they did want those aircraft carriers think about it you know if you argue that well the japanese didn't really nobody knew that aircraft carriers were going to be the decisive factor in the pacific well the pro harbor attack was an attack by aircraft carriers nobody knew better than the japanese how important aircraft carriers could be because they were launching this attack using their carriers they knew what carriers were capable of the carriers had gone out to sea and didn't come back until the next day and so they missed those carriers and so now they're trying to follow up that attack on pearl harbor by getting the carriers this time the threat to midway a u.s navy submarine mounting station for operations in the pacific would hopefully draw the u.s pacific fleet out of pearl harbor to fight yeah and that's important to note here this is midway that's all there is it's an airstrip a little base for resupplying um it really on its own isn't that significant except it's a it's location and it's an opportunity to draw out the pacific fleet in its defeat japan hoped that with the combination of the loss of midway the threat to hawaii that would come from the loss of its airfield and port and the loss of their pacific fleet the u.s would come to the negotiating table for peace the carrier-borne doolittle bombing raid on tokyo in april further validated the need to destroy the u.s naval presence in the pacific on the 28th of may 1942 the largest assembly of naval vessels ever seen in the pacific leave their bases across japan and head east their commander admiral isuruko yamamoto is confident of victory so yamamoto was a smart guy he went to harvard so he knows the united states he knows the culture he knows the people he knows what they're facing and it was he that very famously said that after pearl harbor i fear all we've done is awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve however little does he know that the us navy combat intelligence office in hawaii has cracked the japanese communications code and are broadly aware of their plans so we need to talk about that a little more because uh throughout the war in both the european and pacific theaters intelligence is one of the deciding factors you cannot overstate the importance of intelligence not only in deciphering what the enemy was doing but in misleading him about what you are doing and this was brilliantly done specifically you can think of normandy and how the axis were fooled into knowing when and where that attack was going to come and who was going to lead it but also here in midway so they're able to crack parts of the naval code if you've seen the movie midway you're familiar with this already but for those of you who haven't and by the way i would say that the 2019 version of midway a lot of people panned it but as far as historical accuracy goes it's very well done uh you know no movie is a hundred percent accurate there are always going to be things that they have to take some license with but by and large the really important stuff they got right they really did a good job with it um i mean you can complain about details and about um things with the planes and what they could do and not but as far as the history the the historic historicity of things getting the important stuff right who was where when what ships were involved what happened they got all of that pretty well right uh so uh they can detect certain things in the code they can't break all of it but and they know that there's an attack coming but there's some uh disagreement about where that attack's gonna be is it going to be the aleutian islands is it going to be somewhere in the south pacific is it going to be midway so they've got to do something to figure it out and so there's actually a land line that goes underwater to pearl harbor from midway kind of a you know a landline basically and so they send a message to midway through that knowing it can't be intercepted and tell midway that they need to send a wireless transmission saying that there's something wrong with their water supply like the the way that they process their water it's not working uh knowing that the japanese will then say something about it and japanese code for midway was af and they mentioned that af is having trouble with their water supply so now they know the attacks coming at midway so now they set the trap west fleet admiral chester nimitz has been alerted to the possible attack on midway almost a month before the japanese even set sail and is assembling his defense he deploys task forces 16 and 17 who wonder admiral halsey had executed the daring bombing raid on tokyo a month before to the north east of midway to lyon weight heavily damaged at the battle of coral sea the aircraft carrier uss yorktown limps back to pearl she needs more than two weeks of repairs which would put her out of action for the coming battle but nimitz is desperate for every carrier he can master 1400 dockyard workers move into the ship on mass and labour around the clock there's a incredible feat of engineering and logistics and repair by these workers in pearl harbor to get yorktown yorktown had taken a bomb hit and it was severely damaged uh but we're already down you know the the allies are already down at least four carriers to two uh so they know they need every carrier they can get along with the land-based aircraft in midway so they've got to have yorktown and so so nimitz tells me you've got two days to get this thing fixed and get it out there so they basically patch it together with plywood and other stuff but get it in a situation where it can be used of course yorktown will end up being sunk at the battle of midway but they probably couldn't have won it without them miraculously she is patched up to battle ready condition and puts back to sea in just 72 hours yorktown set sail with her escort fleet to meet with task forces 16 and 17. the u.s defensive midway comprises three carriers carrying 233 aircraft eight cruisers 15 destroyers 16 submarines and 127 land-based aircraft on midway itself and that's big because 127 land-based aircraft that's more than a than an aircraft carrier is worth that's like almost two aircraft carriers worth of planes so from that standpoint they actually outnumber the japanese in terms of the available aircraft the japanese naval force heading towards midway comprises four carriers commanded by vice admiral nagumo two battleships seven cruisers 14 destroyers and 276 naval aircraft near them sails a transport fleet so actually they had more aircraft um on board those carriers than the us i think the us had 220 on their aircraft carriers but then you've got 120 land base so you're like 350 to 270 or so so you do outnumber them a little bit nagumo is an interesting character because he was kind of old school and uh they were wargaming scenarios for the battle of midway and one of the scenarios one of his younger kind of more with the latest trends kind of officers decides to war game that there's a surprise attack and that the u.s carriers are there waiting and nagumo was like that's not going to happen you can't do that that's cheating but that's exactly what happened so he kind of was warned of that beforehand but didn't take it seriously carrying the amphibious troops that would take midway at just after 9 a.m on the 3rd of june a pby recon aircraft spots approaching japanese vessels and shadows them to provide a clearer report it's only the troop transport fleet overnight into the 4th of june pbys and b-17 bombers attack the transport vessels with one hit on an oiler from 3am more pbys take off from midway to search for the carrier fleet at 4 30 am the japanese first strike wave began to launch into the night sky from carriers akagi kaga heryu and sawyu and remember these are some of the same carriers that attacked pearl harbor so there's a vengeance factor in this for the us they want these carriers first are the 36 mitsubishi zero fighters providing air protection for the attacking force second come 36 aichi vowel dive bombers followed by 36 heavier nakajima kate level bombers a further nine zeroes take off from carga to provide air cover to the fleet itself and reconnaissance aircraft launched to conduct 300-mile search patterns so that nine uh fighters that they have there they call that the combat air patrol it's basically to protect overhead in case the enemy shows up and that will of course become a factor during this battle at 5 34 am a pby reports citing a carrier the defending aircraft on midway are ready to launch with engines started using cloud to evade anti-aircraft fire and zeroes the pby's reported further sighting at 552 of two carriers minutes later midway's radar station detects a large formation of incoming japanese aircraft at night and remember this whole time the us fleet is up to the northeast of midway unbeknownst to the japanese at this point 93 miles and 11 000 feet the air raid sirens wail into life and marine buffalo and wildcat fighters are scrambled to meet the raiding force of 108 aircraft next up are the 16 dauntless and 11 vindicator dive bombers followed by six avenger torpedo bombers and four b-26 marauders and an ongoing issue here for the avengers is the u.s torpedoes are terrible i mean absolutely ridiculously bad uh and that'll show itself to be true in this battle it's the dive bombers who end up causing all the hits the torpedoes just be kind of kind of become cannon fodder and a distraction for the japanese many of the aircraft launch are considered obsolete the 37 bombers make calls for the japanese carrier group and escorted the u.s fighters have gained height advantage over the incoming japanese and at 6 16 am dive on the bombers the superior zeros move in and engage the buffaloes and wildcats during a confused few minutes of dogfighting the zeroes maul the american fighters shooting down 13 buffaloes and two wildcats the marine pilots have put up a gallon fight against hopeless odds with japanese reports later overestimating their numbers but their obsolete aircraft are just no match for the zeroes nearly unscathed from the attack the japanese attack midway with a lack of aircraft targets on the ground the level bombing kates hit the island's oil tanks and the aaa installations that are putting up a vicious wall of fire to meet them and on midway at this point i think it's john ford who's a hollywood director uh and he actually they get a lot of film of what's happening here it's it's pretty interesting the dive bombing vowels attack hangers supporting installations and the powerhouse the main hangar erupts in flame having dropped their fuel tanks the zeroes conclude the attack with strafing runs on remaining a weapons thirteen minutes after the explosive attack began the raiders withdraw at 7am the japanese raid commander sends a message back to the fleet that a second raid will be required to fully neutralize the base and that is going to become a key moment and midway is a fascinating case study in how little moments and certain decisions completely change not only the uh the trajectory of the outcome of this battle but then kind of take it to a bigger level the war itself because midway is a turning point in the war i don't think that midway changed the outcome of the war it just accelerated the timeline of that outcome i think if the japanese had won at midway the us still probably wins the war in the pacific it just might take another year or two longer so i think this just sped up this the timeline as far as the us being able to push into the pacific and eventually defeat japan but yeah i mean there's these little decisions that happen and one of them is this radio call saying hey we need a second wave to hit midway island they haven't disabled the runway nor knocked out heavier defensive weaponry that would later be used on amphibious troops over at task forces 16 and 17 admiral fletcher orders uss hornet and enterprise to begin launching their air wings this is much earlier than planned but he is keen to hit the japanese carriers at the most vulnerable point just after the airwings have returned from their raid on midway and while they are refueling and re-arming as only two of the fork enemy carriers have been spotted he holds launching yorktown's air wing for another hour and a half so this is kind of like um if you've ever been in a situation where like um you're playing a game like a civil war game where you you have a muzzle loading rifle and you're waiting to reload and you feel really vulnerable because in that time when you're reloading you can't do anything to defend yourself it's not like you have an automatic weapon that's kind of how these carriers are when they have landed their aircraft that had just come back from an attack and they're refueling and everything and they're bringing them in they're at their most vulnerable point because now you don't have aircraft ready to be launched you can't get new ones in the air you're in that really vulnerable moment and again there's where timing is going to be everything in this battle the b-26s and avengers are the first to attack the japanese carriers zeroes fall on the avengers as they brave the wall of a fire to launch their torpedoes against heryu they all miss owing to evasive maneuvering by the carrier and five of the six avengers are destroyed the four b-26s follow one is shot down on its run-in and another receives crippling aaa damage resorting to an attempted suicide attack on the okagi it narrowly misses the bridge containing the carrier group's commander vice admiral nagumo and crashes into the sea two torpedoes are released but miss and the surviving two bombers make for home an ambiguous message comes into nagumo from a recon plane the 10 u.s surface ships have been spotted north of midway and again there's another one of those key moments in the battle because the initial message doesn't mention whether or not there are any carriers just that there are surface ships what does that mean while reflecting on what to do with this information at 7 48 am the next u.s wave arrives the zeros tear into the 16 dauntless dive bombers and shoot down eight as they run in at a shallow angle towards the heru and this is and that's one of the things they mentioned these remember most of these u.s pilots still fairly new to combat japan's been a war for several years at this point uh the us has only been in the war a couple of months and most of these guys don't have a lot of experience and and diving in at a shallow angle these dive bombers are meant to come from a high angle uh release their bomb and pull up to get accuracy by coming at a shallow angle you're an easier target and you also don't have the accuracy to drop your bombs this unorthodox and inaccurate angle of attack is chosen because of the inexperienced pilots all eight remaining aircrafts drop their bombs and miss fifteen two waves both completely ineffective seventeen heavy bombers that had earlier taken off to attack the transport force has been re-routed to join the attack on the carriers and arrive at 8 10 am at 20 000 feet the carriers perform evasive maneuvers as the bombers release their ordnance so what you have now is these are what are called high level bombers they're 20 000 feet they're like you know not quite four miles up and so those bombs take a long time to drop and that gives the carrier plenty of time to maneuver it is not surprising that all of the bombs dropped from such a high altitude miss finally the 11 vindicators arrive and are greeted by another ferocious attack by the defending zeroes the flights commander decides not to press on towards the carriers but instead to attack the nearby battleship haruna again all bombs miss for the loss of three vindicators such a waste as the midway first strike wave aircraft begin to return to his carriers nagumo can't help but think that the morning action has been a clear victory for his forces morale in his fleet is high they no longer fear the american attack because the raids so far have been weathered so easily with minimal damage sustained against their vessels and then here comes another one of those critical moments because you've got this report of u.s surface ships but what are they if they're carriers the carriers are the priority now and you need to load up your weapons on your on your planes to attack ships instead of attacking land so he's got to decide and he has to make that decision without enough information however he's now received a more definite report from his recon planes the report says that the us vessels spotted earlier are accompanied by a single carrier one he realizes that this is his chance to inflict a decisive blow to the u.s pacific fleet that they desire and orders his aircraft re-equipped with torpedoes and ship strike bomb fuses so remember we talked about them being in a vulnerable situation well now he's extending the time of that vulnerability because they've already started they've already been reloading with bombs to hit the land targets now they've got to take those back off and reload with anti-ship weapons and so that just extends the time period and right at that moment is when they get attacked by an effective wave of bombers the fleet changes course towards the americans a single carrier should be a simple target to destroy he needs 45 minutes to rearm and refuel his midway striker it's a long time little does nagumo know the air wings of enterprise hornet and now yorktown are approaching such was the need for urgency to launch the strike most us aircraft did not form up over the carriers but headed straight out on takeoff this has them spread out over a long line of stern a total of 156 aircraft from the three carriers made up of 41 devastator torpedo bombers 89 dauntless dive bombers and 26 wildcat fighters approach in piecemeal formations first in line are wildcats from hornet and dauntlesses from hornet and enterprise but the unknown cause change nagumo ordered towards the americans has rendered them unable to find the japanese fleet but these hornet aircraft take no further part but the dauntlesses from enterprise turn north in search they still have a part to play next are the slow and lumbering devastators on a hunch hornet's 15 devastators have preemptively turned north to search for the enemy and the gamble has paid off knowing that their survival chances are slim they bravely fly towards the akagi as zeroes fall on them 14 of the 15 aircraft are blown to pieces on the run-in by zeroes and aa fire only one devastator makes it to drop its torpedo which misses before meeting the same fate as the others an entire squadron shot down with only one survivor almost immediately 14 devastators from enterprise begin their attack for some reason they don't signal for their escorting wildcats to drop from the clouds to protect them from the zeroes and they start their run towards karga a similarly brutal fate awaits them seven are cut to pieces by zeros and flack before they make a last second change to drop their torpedoes against her you again cruelly all torpedoes miss a further three devastators think about that how many waves of attacks have already come at these carriers and nothing to show for it if you're the japanese you've got to be feeling great right now we have hurled back everything they've thrown at us and nothing has gotten through but you also have to be wondering where are all these planes coming from this is too many to be from just one carrier but they're feeling good i mean they've got to feel great about their chances are lost and the remaining four leave the battle the zero force is running low on ammunition and some are beginning to land to re-arm when the okagi spots yet another raiding force yorktown's air wing has arrived in a coherent strike group of dauntlesses devastators and wildcat fighter cover however the devastators find themselves isolated from the others when the group flies through heavy cloud the wildcats engage some zeros at the start of their bomb run but yet again they basically make their attack alone they receive the same slaughter as the other squadrons and only two of the 12 devastators make it back with no successful torpedo hit the slaughter of the american airmen is not in vain however every attack delays the japanese ability to launch the counter-attack strike against the us carrier group and keeps the zeroes down at sea level a much more lethal purpose is being served by their sacrifice high above the now ammunition depleted zero cover 47 dauntless dive bombers from enterprise and yorktown arrive above the clouds and there's an important thing we talked about decisive moments and little things on which battle hinges uh in this case there had been a u.s submarine in the area that had actually launched a torpedo at one of the the carriers and very narrowly missed hitting the carrier but what that did was it caused the um the task force to send a destroyer to go and try to pin down that submarine and keep it from being able to continue the attack on the on the carriers and so the carriers had moved far ahead and so once that destroyer had successfully driven off the sub they turn around and they're going full speed to try and catch back up to the task force and so remember that they couldn't find the carriers the air groups from the u.s carriers but one of them and i think it was the enterprise it was the ones that end up being successful they spot that destroyer hurrying up to catch back up they don't spot the carriers but they spot it and they know where it's headed so they follow that destroyer and that leads them to the carriers and so it's little things like that on which hinge is one of the most important and decisive battles in history by chance the dauntlesses from enterprise that couldn't locate the carriers earlier have found them at the precise moment yorktown's dauntlesses arrive all 47 aircraft scream in and release their munitions and normally there's a there's a a way that they're supposed to decide you know if there's multiple squadrons who attacks what and there was a little confusion by that the ones that were supposed to go this way didn't go this way or something like that and so you have a bunch of them end up attacking the same target and only a few of them pull off to hit another one and they end up being the ones that sink that other carrier karga takes four direct bomb hits killing the captain and setting off a chain reaction of explosions in the hangar among the armed and fueled strike aircraft sawyu takes a similar punishment of three bomb hits including to the hangar finally the flagship okagi takes a single bomb hit with the same results that armed aircraft in her hangar detonate in a massive chain reaction the three carriers burn ferociously and are consumed by uncontrollable fire eventually all three crews will abandon and scuttle their ships after the america and what's crazy is and you see this in the movie midway if you're familiar with it dick best is the guy who's one of the squadron leaders and he scores a direct hit on one of the carriers and then he comes back later that day and scores another direct hit on another carrier dude sunk two carriers in one day i mean that is some pretty epic stuff and he never flies again because um his oxygen uh had like a bad mix and had like carbon dioxide in it or something and it hurt it damaged his lungs to the point where he could never fly again after that frickens withdraw to the northeast the remaining japanese carrier heryu launches 18 vowel dive bombers and six zeroes to strike back at the americans yorktown is recovering and refueling her aircraft as she detects the attack on radar all fuel pumps to the deck are shut off and the fire suppression system readied wildcats from yorktown engage and destroy three zeros and 11 vowels so the reason he mentions that it's really important is cutting off the the fuel to the deck means that there's less likely a chance of uh catastrophic flash fire that consumes this wooden deck and destroys everything which is partially what destroyed some of these japanese carriers is they had these chain reaction explosions so they're able to prevent that on board the carriers here of the seven remaining bombers two more are shot down by flack but the remainder scored three hits on yorktown starting a fire thanks to the pre-emptive fire control actions the fire is manageable [Music] no sooner is the fire contained a second wave of aircraft approaches this time 10 kate torpedo bombers and six zeroes wildcats and flack account for some aircraft shot down but the yorktown is struck by two torpedoes yorktown remains afloat but a burning wreck [Music] in a final all-out attack on the final japanese carrier hornet and enterprise launch 42 dawn misses her used dwindling fighter patrols are not the force they were earlier in the day and shoot down only two there's no stopping the inevitable now she takes four direct and fatal bomb hits her fate is sealed and she will sink the following morning some of these carriers are they're so well built uh same thing with a lot of the the newer battleships they're so well built that it's darn near impossible to actually sink one of them so what you end up doing instead is you cause enough damage to make it beyond repair to make it unsalvageable and so like the yorktown for example the yorktown was staying afloat but it was so badly damaged that they weren't going to be able to take it back to port and repair and so they end up scuttling because i think it takes a couple of uh submarine hits later on um and the same thing is true with some of these other ships is that they end up abandoning ship and scuttling themselves because they know there's just no way to get it back all the way to japan two days later destroyer uss hammond is taking part in salvage efforts to save yorktown a japanese submarine infiltrates the protective cordon and launches a deadly salvo of torpedoes against the two ships they both sink the battle is a clear victory for the americans okay so i may have gotten that wrong i was thinking that the u.s decided to scuttle uh yorktown themselves but maybe it did just get sunk by those two uh by those uh torpedoes in the four lost carriers japan has lost her most potent offensive force strategically the desire to bring the us to the negotiating table has failed and the industrial might of the united states will now be brought against japan and japan i mean they're just they're done after this this is so crippling a blow to these carriers because you know it's not like you can just churn out another carrier in three months these things take years to build and japan doesn't have the military and industrial might to just keep churning out you know like the us starts just building dozens of carriers i mean i don't know what the number is but when you count escort carriers there's i mean there had to have been 50 to 80 u.s carriers by the end of the war i don't know what the exact number is i'm going to look it up because now i'm curious okay so by the end of world war ii the u.s had 105 aircraft carriers 105 64 of them were escort carriers but that means that there were 41 that weren't escort carriers you know we're talking about like the yorktown class the uh the essex class which are the bigger ones um you know i mean japan just couldn't keep up with that at all and they knew that uh and so once uh midway happens it's it's kind of the inevitable it just takes a couple years to get there but it's all pretty much offensive for the allies in the pacific after midway the battle sees the loss of the offensive initiative for japan yep and she will not regain it so i'll admit i don't know nearly as much as i'd like to about the war in the pacific i'm trying to learn more and that'll definitely be something we focus on more uh in the coming months so let me know your thoughts use the comment section below add your thoughts to that did i get anything wrong or did i not offer enough detail if so let me know that as well uh and we'll see you again soon thanks for watching you

Channel: Vlogging Through History

Views: 49,957

Keywords: world war ii, history reaction, historian reacts, world war 2, pearl harbor, second world war, aircraft carrier battle, world war 2 movies, battle of midway, midway, midway reaction, historian reaction

Id: KVOfPuHJtow

Length: 33min 46sec (2026 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 12 2021