The Battle of Midway Mapped Timeline Part 2

this timeline was created out of excerpts taken from my eight and a half hour long video course the battle of midway 101. at 1100 all three american carriers were recovering aircraft from the morning strike yorktown and task force 17 was here enterprise hornet and task force 16 was here midway itself in addition to landing its own aircraft was landing carrier planes that couldn't make it back to their ship kobayashi's strike force was here ketobatai reduced to just 10 ships was here each of the three burning carriers was tented to by two destroyers soryu was here kaga was here akagi was here the cruiser negera which was in the process of transferring admiral nagumo from makagi was here yamaguchi blinkered all ships on update second wave composed of 18 bombers and five fighters has taken off i plan to have an additional nine attack planes and three fighters take off in one hour [Music] amari and tony's number four scout plane was finally relieved by one of chakuma scout planes shortly after taking over the new pilot sent a message back to the fleet the enemy is in a position bearing 70 degrees distance 90 miles from our fleet's position nagumo's launch pulled alongside nagera at 11 27. rear admiral kamura commander of destroyer squadron 10 received the admiral and his staff on the quarter deck soon after boarding nugumo was handed chacuma number five scouting report this was the best news nagumo had received in hours the report apparently meant that the enemy had continued to close with his position and along the same bearing if this were true it might be possible to engage the americans in a daylight surface action to nagumo this was an enticing prospect so instead of moping about on nagera nagumo decisively reassumed command of the battle and tried to take the fight to the enemy it was a poignant and symbolic moment as nagumo's new flagship began pulling away from the blazing akagi akagi had been nagumo's home for the last 14 months now he would have to win or lose without her [Music] meanwhile on board tone admiral abe who also had seen chacuma number five's report decided to attack the approaching enemy at 11 30 he blinkered his ships to prepare for torpedo action [Music] back on negera at 11 43 nagumo received a message from admiral abe i have part of cruiser division 8 battleship division 3 and destroyer squadron 10 prepared to attack the enemy nagumo blinkered back to abe pulled up the first thing he had to do now was catch up with the remaining ships of quito battali and farm them into some sort of battle formation while nagera closed with keto bataille admiral yamaguchi became involved hearing the radioed plans for the attack he countermounted his previous instruction regarding the destroyer screen for the three damaged carriers he radioed tone akagi kaga and soryu instructing them to leave just one destroyer as a screen for the three damaged carriers and have the others join the attack this message was either not received or ignored since two destroyers stayed with each carrier from this point on [Music] there was a sense of excitement among the men in anticipation of executing the gumu's plan the admiral's strategy was a simple one they would head straight for the enemy on a reciprocal bearing under cover of hereus strike waves they would close to within gun and torpedo range [Music] nugumo seems to have neglected issuing any direct orders regarding hiru's disposition letting yamaguchi handle her affairs directly he was focusing almost solely on the surface battle he was trying to create rather than overseeing the fate of what arguably still was the most important vessel in the japanese force just a couple of hours ago japan was winning the battle and the war even now with the situation in tatters there were still things worth fighting for besides mere honor bringing at least one of keto battai's carriers home was a damn sight better than losing all four as soon as kobayashi's attack was in the air here you ought to have poured on the coal and headed northwest at her best speed instead the two admirals failed to recast their current plans in the face of the enemy's new advantage in so doing they jointly signed the warrant for the complete annihilation of keto battalion's carriers [Music] if the remnants of keto bataille were sailing straight for disaster the americans were not in the best shape to take advantage of the situation the u.s navy had landed a crushing blow on its enemy but the cost had been high the total tally of american aircraft lost on the morning strike was 70 12 fighters 21 dive bombers and 37 torpedo planes this represented about a 40 casualty rate in terms of the planes launched the struggle to contain the blaze on akagi developed into a grudging battle of attrition that lasted more than nine hours while a cocky situation took several hours to deteriorate beyond hope kaga's situation was already grim [Music] on soru the situation was hopeless since captain yanagamato had given the abandoned ship order at 10 45 her crew had seized all damage control and were now simply trying to survive [Music] admiral spruance's task force 16 which included enterprise and hornet was here admiral fletcher's task force 17 with yorktown was here the three burning japanese carriers were here the remaining ships of quito battali were heading towards the americans and expecting a surface engagement at any time off to the west other japanese formations were approaching yamamoto's main body was here condo's invasion force was here tanaka's transports were here and the cruisers of corrida's support group were here after about an hour enroute kobayashi's strike force was within sight of task force 17. kobayashi cited yorktown at 1200 and promptly sent a message to hear you announcing that he was attacking almost immediately thereafter though his formation was set upon by american fighters coming from below and ahead several vows went down in flames almost immediately and another pair were forced to jettison their bombs finally at about 12 10 the remaining seven armed vows began their attack runs on yorktown their original formation having been dispersed the japanese bombers were forced to attack singly or in small groups all in all here used pilots had executed a superlative attack seven aircraft had secured three direct hits and two very near misses a great rate of accuracy by any standards lieutenant kobayashi would have been proud of his men but the strikeforce commander did not survive the attack none of his aviators had seen what happened to him when the attack was over kobayashi's plane had simply disappeared the five surviving aircraft were all that remained of what had been one of the finest dive bomber squadrons in the japanese navy it was at this juncture an hour and a half after receiving admiral abe's 1050 shocking message that yamamoto finally made his presence filled he and his staff had recovered from their earlier shock and formulated a plan to recover the situation [Music] yamamoto sent out a general dispatch to his forces first yamamoto and his main body would move south to negu mosai second tanaka's transport group was to withdraw temporarily to the northwest third condo's invasion force was to charge northeast towards quito battali about an hour later he ordered condo to send curita's close support group to shell and destroy the enemy air base at midway at the same time he temporarily postponed the invasion of both midway and kiska [Music] by 12 30 nagumo was back in control of his fleet and in effective communication with all units including hear you his flagship nagera was leading the surface units of quirobatai towards the enemy along a course of 60 degrees keto battali continued preparations for a surface battle nagumo informed his entire force that they should expect to encounter the enemy momentarily the admiral must have assumed the american forces were still closing his own and that the gap between them had been narrowing for the last two hours it should have occurred to nagumo that the enemy wasn't interested in a surface battle and would be maneuvering accordingly at 12 40 an update from chakuma's number five search plane dispelled his illusions cite what appears to be two large enemy cruisers bearing 15 degrees distance 130 miles from my point of origin in addition i see what appears to be one carrier and one destroyer course north speed 20 knots nagumo's subsequent actions revealed his realization of the full importance of the message the enemy force appeared to be shearing away to the north and opening the range this killed any immediate hopes of bringing about a surface action nagumo therefore chose to parallel the enemy's course and try to remain to the northwest of him he would await the developments from hereu's airstrikes the arrival of reinforcements and new search reports before taking further action at 12 45 changed course from 0.60 to due north preparations for launching the next strike were being completed 10 kate torpedo planes were on deck beginning to warm up the ten kates would be escorted by six zeroes and lieutenant omonaga would be in command of the entire strike force at 1300 yamaguchi received more definitive word about what he was up against conveyed by rear admiral kimura from cruiser nagara an american pilot had been picked up by the destroyer arashi during his interrogation the japanese learned that there was not just one american carrier present but there were three the japanese now knew they were up against a powerful adversary since the american carriers were apparently operating separately it was unclear whether both task forces had been found yet by the japanese this question was to be answered shortly thereafter by soyuz scout plane returning to the task force and finding hiru's deck already spotted with torpedo planes the pilot dropped a message it confirmed that the enemy was operating in two task forces containing three carriers with the second enemy task force located to the south of the formation that kobayashi had attacked at 1315 five scout planes were launched to find the second american task force meanwhile the americans were trying their best to recover from kobayashi's attack yorktown was crippled with thick clouds of black smoke trailing from her innards her fires were serious with damage control parties busy in several places below decks all in all she was a mess with her radar disabled and her command spaces bathed in smoke admiral fletcher decided to transfer his flag to the astoria here you began launching at 1330 watched intently by every man topside so here use final strike force assembled turned and made their way towards the eastern horizon near at hand captain kaku gave orders to begin recovering kobayashi's aircraft of the 24 aircraft here you would set a loft with kobayashi at 10 57 just six were landing now five vowels and a zero but the fighter and one of the bombers were shot up so badly that they were unserviceable the strike leader and his second in command lieutenants kobayashi and kondo were not among the returning aircraft meanwhile the fires had been blazing on akagi kaga and soyu for several hours and the ships were beginning to suffer permanent structural damage as a result onboard akagi and kaga which each had an elevator that had been dropped into its well the situation was aggravated because the elevator shafts began acting like chimneys venting smoke at the top and sucking air in through the bottom the effect created a blast furnace steel structural members having been heated too hot and for too long were now glowing red and beginning to come apart under the strain being hammered by induced explosions large chunks of the carriers some weighing several tons were simply being blown overboard the aircraft in the hangars had long since been melted down to aluminum slag leaving only the glowing steel engine blocks deposited on the hanger decks not surprisingly almost the entirety of the hangers on both kaga and soryu had been abandoned to the fires by 1400 it had been three and a half hours since akagi kaga and soryu had been hit by the american dive bombers here you had launched its second counter-strike and tomonaga's ten torpedo planes were heading towards the americans the ships of task force 17 were protecting the damage yorktown as she tried to recover from hereu's first counter-strike while this was taking place task force 16 with enterprise and hornet was maintaining combat air patrol fighters over both fleece [Music] keto bathai was heading north thinking that the american carriers were also heading that way a few miles to the southwest the men on akagi kaga and soyu were dealing with the fires as best they could off to the west yamamoto's main body and condo's midway invasion force were heading directly towards keto battali to provide support for safety tanaka's transports were heading away to the northwest and tasked with destroying the airfield at midway admiral kurita's fast cruisers were heading that way at top speed by 1400 yamaguchi hadn't heard anything from tomonaga which wasn't really a concern yet since tomonaga's strike force had only been gone for half an hour and would likely need another half hour to find the enemy at 1426 tomonaga radioed an order to his strike planes to form an attack formation the transmission was picked up by hiru a few minutes later another order from tomonaga was heard all forces attack for the men on hear you it was obvious that the strike force was now going into battle [Music] about this time cruiser chakuma laid smoke and began firing at what it thought to be a couple of enemy planes her sister ship tony followed suit 10 minutes later as hiru's combat air patrol fighters headed towards the intruders the american planes quickly retreated these were two of the 10 sbd scouts from vs5 launched from yorktown at 11 30. their mission was to follow up on the success of the morning's dive bomber attacks and determine if any other japanese carriers were still lurking in the area one of these scouts piloted by lieutenant sam adams spotted the wakes of the japanese task force at 14 30. after a closer look he sent a scouting report identifying the location of a lone japanese carrier so just as tomonaga's torpedo planes were starting their attack runs on yorktown a series of events was being set into motion that would eventually lead to the destruction of hear you strike like kobayashi's had started out uneventfully after forming up tomonaga's formation had climbed to 13 500 feet and set out eastward finding the americans turned out to be easy lieutenant hashimoto at the head of the second section had simply scanned the sea ahead with his binoculars at 14 30 he spotted shipwakes about 35 miles ahead hashimoto then maneuvered up next to tomonaga there the two lieutenants quickly conferred via hand signals and decided to head towards the enemy as they drew closer the collection of distant wakes began resolving themselves into an enemy task force with a carrier at its center from what tomonaga and hashimoto could tell the enemy carrier was uninjured it certainly wasn't burning and it looked as if both the carrier and her escorts were making 24 knots on a heading of 90 degrees tomonaga and hashimoto justifiably assumed that this was an undamaged carrier worthy of their attentions what the two flight leaders could not know was that this carrier was in reality kobayashi's earlier victim yorktown though hereu's dive bombers had left her burning and largely without power american damage control had been superb the fires were out her radar repaired and enough boilers put back online to achieve a speed of 19 knots the japanese overtook the yorktown from the carrier's port quarter tomonaga began descending in a shallow dive to gain speed he then split his formation ordering hashimoto's second section to sweep ahead of the north edge of the enemy fleet and then work around to the carrier's starboard bow meanwhile tomonaga would lead the first section against her port beam the escort fighters also split to cover both sections at 1434 tomonaga radioed his force to [Music] attack [Music] hashimoto led his section across yorktown's bow and away to the southeast looking back he looked for any sign that his torpedoes had found the mark suddenly one right after the other two enormous geysers lifted up over the carrier's flight deck hashimoto and his men felt a surge of elation as they realized their success the two torpedoes did tremendous damage to yorktown the first one slammed home at frame 90 knocking three boilers offline at once steam pressure immediately fell and the carrier listed six degrees to port but yorktown remained underway 30 seconds later the second torpedo struck a bit forward of the first at frame 75. the second hit was huge instantly flooding the forward generator room and killing power throughout the ship since yorktown was already turning the loss of power jammed her helm 15 degrees to port the carrier rapidly coasted to a stop and began listing further to port as water poured into her hole the second hit had damaged the carrier's forward pumps as well making counterflooding impossible as a result yorktown's list got so bad that just standing on the flight deck became difficult within 17 minutes her list reached 23 degrees yorktown's skipper captain elliott buckmaster was concerned that she might capsize and kill many of her crew to prevent such a catastrophe he ordered the men to abandon ship at 1 500. even though it had taken two japanese strikes to do it yorktown was now finally out of the battle [Music] by the time hashimoto and his section reached the squadron's rendezvous point it became clear that the price that here you paid for this latest success had been very steep lieutenant tominaga was nowhere to be found nor was lieutenant maury just five torpedo planes were left all from the second section and four zeros three of the case were so badly shot up it seemed unlikely that they could make it home let alone be a further use in the battle if this was victory it was the sort of victory here you could ill afford at 1445 hashimoto radioed his assessment of the attack back to hear you [Music] on hear you after receiving the initial strike report from lieutenant hashimoto admiral yamaguchi had no choice but to wait for his torpedo bombers to return but he already knew what he wanted to do next and at 1531 he radioed nagumo i am planning to direct our entire remaining power five bombers five torpedo planes and ten fighters to attack and destroy the remaining enemy forces in a dusk engagement at about this time several scouting reports were convincing admiral nagumo that the range to the americans was apparently opening and his goal of bringing them to bay in a surface fight was looking more and more unlikely as a result nagumo decided to change his tactics ketobatai would withdraw temporarily to the northwest as soon as tononaga's strikeforce was recovered he would then attempt a final airstrike at dusk followed by a return to the east with his surface forces after darkness had fallen [Music] at 1540 here you began landing the survivors of tomonaga's strike force for those who observed the proceedings there was a definite air of grimness as expected tomonaga was not among the returning aircraft that was no surprise worse only nine of tomonaga's 16 aircraft were returning four zeros and five kates of these three zeros and two kates were shot up beyond repair by 1600 after hashimoto had been debriefed yamaguchi reported the results of the strike to nagumo in a message two certain torpedo hits on an enterprise-class carrier not the one bombed earlier 30 minutes later at 16 30 yamaguchi sent nagumo a second message here u's third attack will take off at 1800 to engage the enemy at dusk even though yamaguchi was inclined to attack nagumo was now inclined to get hear you out of danger it appeared that despite hashimoto's best efforts at least two enemy flat tops remained operational with the odds not getting any better and here you second strike recovered it was time to start opening the range so the mobile fleet began a retreat to the northwest turning to a course of 315 degrees at a speed of 28 knots unknown to yamaguchi and nagumo american retribution for yorktown's crippling was already forming up and heading for hear you as soon as lieutenant adams sighting report had come in at 1445 task force 16 had begun to prepare for a strike enterprise immediately began spotting a composite dive bomber group composed of both her own aircraft and those of yorktown there were 15 aircraft from yorktown's vb-3 while enterprise added seven aircraft from vs6 and four from vb6 all were under the command of lieutenant gallaher at 1525 enterprise turned into the wind and began launching after hearing lieutenant adams sighting report harnett had spotted her own strike force at 1456 however not having received any orders from enterprise with regards to the upcoming strike harnett broke her spot at about 1510 to recover aircraft the result was that when enterprise signaled that she would begin launching at 1530 harnett was caught flat-footed hurriedly responding the deck hornet managed to put up 16 sbds under the command of lieutenant edgar stebbins at this point though enterprise's aircraft were already heading out to the target hornet therefore cutter launched short sending stebs chasing after the enterprise strike several opponents sbds despite being warmed up and ready to go were left sitting in the hangar once again the americans had squandered an opportunity to put together a coordinated multi-carrier strike in the end though none of the confusion aboard hornet detracted from the material point that at this stage of the battle both task force 16's carriers individually possessed sufficient force to overwhelm hereu's feeble remaining defenses [Music] on here you preparations for yamaguchi's dusk strike were already underway convinced that his aircraft had badly damaged two of the three american carriers yamaguchi was determined to go after the third unfortunately he now had practically nothing left with which to do it he was down to just four serviceable valve dive bombers and five kate torpedo planes nevertheless he was planning on getting in one last blow at dusk when the americans would hopefully be less wary and have a smaller combat air patrol overhead when he noticed that his aviators were on their last legs as a result of the day's constant flight operations he called it off yamaguchi then decided to push things back 90 minutes and used the lull to feed hiru's crew none of his aviators had eaten lunch yet [Music] just before the american strike force was cited by the japanese nagumo had signaled his force to turn to a new course of 120 degrees this order was not intended as an evasive maneuver but rather an intentional change in the base course nagumo's last minute maneuver had the effect of bringing hidobatai into a sharp turn just as enterprises spds began their dives as soon as the dive bombers were spotted here you immediately began putting up any aircraft fire simultaneously captain kaku ordered his carrier to make a hard turn to port which would bring her bow around into the americans in order to compensate for hiru's turn the sbds had to sharpen their dives [Music] [Music] [Music] finally instant richard jacquard of vs6 got the first hit his 1 000 pound bomb landed on here use forward elevator lieutenant shumway vb3's leader then placed his 1 000 pound bomb just ahead of jacquard's after another miss came vb6's leader lieutenant dick best his 1 000 pound bomb exploded just in front of where shumway's bomb hit [Music] the last hit was a 500 pound bomb delivered by lieutenant jg dusty kleis [Music] [Applause] the few american dive bombers who had not yet committed to their dives were now picking out new targets they could tell that here you was finished almost as soon as the first group of american dive bombers had finished with hear you another group showed up this was harnett's late launching formation since here he was on fire from stem to stern harness pilots realized that attacking her would be a waste of time as a result they attacked the cruiser's tone and chakuma instead but all of the 14 sbds from hornet missed thus harnett's miserable day was now complete her torpedo squadron wiped out her dive bomber and fighter squadrons badly depleted and not so much as a single hit to show for it ten minutes after hornet's planes departed the final american attacks of this long and costly day began rolling in lieutenant colonel sweeney's b-17s were back for the second time this day this time he had only six aircraft with him but another separate flight of six flying fortresses from hawaii coincidentally showed up at the same time the two independent groups didn't attack in concert but the japanese could hardly tell the difference the results of the attacks were the same as earlier in the day namely nothing the bombers droned overhead the japanese fired at them and the bombs all fell in the water the last of them departed at 1832 as the american aircraft began to leave the japanese fighter pilot's moods were grim here you would never land another airplane and they knew they would soon be facing a water landing one by one the japanese fighters returned continuing to fly their sad patrols above their burning carrier meanwhile here you raced northwest covered with smoke and flames even after here you had been hit the japanese were still determined to engage the americans in a night surface battle however most of their destroyers were presently burdened with tending to akagi kaga soryu and hear you in order to make these destroyers available for the upcoming fight the japanese reluctantly decided to scuttle their stricken carriers destroyer isokaze scuttled sorya with three torpedoes she began listing soon after the torpedoes hit and then sank at 1913. a similar scene was being played out around kaga on command from hagakaze's captain two torpedoes were fired the two hits shot sea water several hundred feet into the air slowly and still uneven keel kaga began swooning into the waiting arms of the sea seventeen and a half hours after she was hit at zero four fifty the word finally came down to the commander of destroyer division 4 captain auriga that akagi was to be scuttled each ship of destroyer division 4 was to fire a torpedo from a distance of between 1 000 and 1500 meters auriga's flagship arashi formed milwaukee hagakaze and makazi into a line behind her and they passed up akagi's starboard side from a stern at 12 knots each destroyer launched a single torpedo as they swept by three torpedoes slammed into the carrier's starboard side heaving enormous water spouts into the air shortly thereafter the men could see akagi bowing and surrender to the sea everyone on board the destroyers broke into shouts of banzai akagi banzai then she was gone nothing but enormous bubbles remained on the surface to mark her grave at 0 5 10 with the sun already rising in the east makigumo fired a single type 93 torpedo it ran too deep and missed a second torpedo was then fired which hit forward the explosion was spectacular shoving the carrier's bow out of the water and bouncing it to port gumo's skipper commander fujita judged that here you would not survive the hit he was right here he was mortally wounded but she wouldn't sink for another four hours so on june 4th 1942 by destroying keto battal's four carriers the americans delivered to japan its worst naval defeat in history thanks for watching and please don't forget to check out my video course the battle of midway 101. 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Channel: The Battle of Midway 101

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Length: 41min 33sec (2493 seconds)

Published: Sat May 01 2021