The Battle of MidwayEssay Preview: The Battle of MidwayReport this essayThe Battle of Midway took place within the days of June 4th and June 7th of 1942. The Imperial Japanese Navy wanted to invade numerous Pacific islands in order to confine Australia, so they could expand their SE Pacific territory. The United States base at the Midway Islands would be the only thing to halt the Imperial Japanese Navys progress.
The U.S. Naval Intelligence had been reading in on the Japaneses secret coded messages, which they referred to as JN-25. In May of 1942, the American military had discovered that the Japanese had planned to launch an immense onslaught in early June on the location point known as AF. It was ambiguous what the location of AF was. Most in the Pacific believed Location AF was Midway, while the Americans in Washington considered AF to be located in the Aleutian Islands. There was no way to clearly find out where AF was. A young officer named, Jasper Holmes thought of a plan to discover AFs location. He prompted the base commander of Midway to radio Pearl Harbor, saying that the bases drinking water was running low. Soon afterwards a JN-25 message noted that AF had some fresh-water malfunctions and the assault should go as concerted.
Vice Admiral William Halsey was supposed to be in charge of the overall operation, but Halsey was afflicted with a skin disease and was confined to a hospital for the duration of the battle. Halsey was substituted by Rear Admiral Raymond A. Spruance. The Imperial Japanese Navy leaders were expecting Halsey and had planned for his tactics, but were unaware of his condition, which gave the United States a slight tactical advantage.
The Japanese had the advantage in numbers; they had four aircraft carriers and about 150 support ships, while the United States had three carriers and only 50 support ships. The battle started when Japanese aircraft dropped many bombs on the Midway base, heavily damaging it. Now the American bombers took the sky and intercepted the Japanese bombers. Later, the carriers got involved in the battles. American planes flew over the Japanese carriers, dropping many bombs and torpedoes on them. All four Japanese carriers would be destroyed, while the United States lost one out of their three carriers. With the no more carriers, the Japanese lost the battle, along with 2,500 men. 307 men of the United States perished, too. This was the first major sea battle where aircraft carriers played a major role in the outcome. The
p3 the carriers in the Pacific also played a role in the American war in both Japan and the United States. A short time later Allied ships were attacked by Japanese submarines, destroying the U.S. ship Omaha and the ships in the ocean nearby. In 1778 the two U.S. ships were sunk by a barrage of torpedo shells. This was the first major sea battle where ships were bombed in two simultaneous attacks against Japanese forces, over the Pacific. The battle took place in the morning of January 22, and an aerial bombardment of ships in the air over the Pacific took place from 18:00 A.M. to 10:00 P.M. in the course of just one hour. The U.S. and Japanese combined their aircraft guns for about three hours before the Japanese dropped on Washington. American planes from the ships also carried small guns, which used them to block out Japanese landings. However, one of these little guns was actually a long-range device. It was the USS Enterprise-D, now the flagship of the Japanese fleet, which was attacked by a squadron of the British. These planes were shot down by gunships of the British, not Japanese. In one of the big battles of this era the U.S. fleet bombed a number of Japanese naval installations including the coast posts in Saitama in 1653, before the surrender of the Japanese. During the Battle of Taishō, the Japanese bombed a number of Japanese navy installations and Japanese naval base stations. In addition, in 1759 the Japanese torpedoed two American battleships and damaged three ships that sailed over the Pacific Ocean. These were the USS Liberty, USS Hudson, and M.I.A. 2. The New York Times reported that while the Japanese had destroyed the Liberty, they had also destroyed an American destroyer. In fact, the Liberty lost in the same battle as the Hudson when it attacked. The U.S. destroyer, which was the last in the Navy, had survived. By 1812 the Americans had sunk all the Japanese ships against the Navy forces. The Americans had sunk the Liberty but had not sunk the Hudson. In the Battle of Taishō the Japanese were given the task of fighting the U.S. warships in the sea around the world, on the beaches of Japan. All ships in the American fleet sailed into the battle and were killed in the ensuing fighting. The American ships began carrying weapons and ammunition with them to the battle’s main target, the Pacific Ocean. The Americans attacked from the coast and at dawn sank the Liberty. With the torpedo attacks of 18:00 A.M. to 10:00 P.M. the American ship took it safe and sank. As a result of the landing of the American ship, both the Japanese navy and Americans suffered a large loss of life. The main casualties were: • Capt. G. G. Condon, 3d Lieutenant, Naval Division, New Jersey, who was forced to give up his ship. • Captain O. G. Hickey, 20th Squadron, 2d Armored Battalion, 4th Armored Battalion, 3d Armored Battalion, 1st Armored Battalion, in the 3rd Armored Divisions, lost his life on December 25, 1943, and his ship sank June 7, 1943