The Battle of Midway (72 page)

15
. Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 34; Layton oral history (May 31, 1970), 124–25.

16
. Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 16–17; Layton,
And I Was There
, 259.

17
. Layton oral history (May 30, 1970), 167.

18
. King to Nimitz, May 4, 1942, Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 1:431; Layton oral history (May 30, 1971), 14–15.

19
. Layton oral history (May 30, 1970), 79.

20
. Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 19, 22. MacArthur in particular was skeptical of the conclusions offered by the cryptanalysts and preferred to rely on “hard” intelligence gleaned by scout planes and submarines.

21
. Ibid., 108; Rochefort oral history (Aug. 14, 1969), 26; Rochefort oral history (Sept. 21, 1969), 145.

22
. Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 65; Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 18, 20; John B. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral: Frank Jack Fletcher at Coral Sea, Midway, and Guadalcanal
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006), 120–22.

23
. Layton oral history (May 30 and 31, 1970), 108, 120; Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 72; author interview of Donald Showers (May 4, 2010).

24
. Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 25; Frederick C. Sherman,
Combat Command: The American Aircraft Carriers in the Pacific War
(New York: Dutton, 1950), 92; Nimitz to King, April 9, 1942; Running Summary, April 18, 1942 (italics in original); and King to Nimitz, April 18, 1942, all in Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 1:501–5.

25
. Traffic Intelligence Summary, Combat Intelligence Unit, Fourteenth Naval District (April 22, 1942), 3:154; Holmes,
Double-Edged Secrets
, 72.

26
. Nimitz to King, April 17, 1942, Nimitz Papers, Operational Archives, NHHC, box 1:514.

27
. Layton,
And I Was There
, 367–68; Prados,
Combined Fleet Decoded
, 300; Layton oral history (May 31, 1970), 137; Parker,
Priceless Advantage
, 18.

28
. Rochefort oral history (Sept. 21, 1969), 174–75.

29
. “Estimate of the Situation,” April 22, 1942, and Nimitz to Fitch, April 19, 1942, both in Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 1:375, 516, 518–19. See also Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 124–26.

30
. Fletcher to Leary (copy King), March 29, 1942, and King to Fletcher, March 30, 1942, both in Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 1:322; Joseph M. Worthington (June 7, 1972), U.S. Naval Institute Oral History Collection, USNA, 193 (Worthington was commanding officer of the USS Benham);Judson Brodie interview (March 13, 2007), NMPW, 24–25.

31
. King to Nimitz, April 24, 1942, and Running Summary, April 24, 1942, both in Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 1:409, 411; “Minutes of Conversation between CominCh and CinCPac, Saturday, April 25, 1942,” King Papers, NHHC, Series II, box 10; Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 126–27. By coincidence, April 29th was also Fletcher’s birthday—he turned 57.

32
. Lewin,
American Magic
, 92.

33
. E. B. Potter,
Nimitz
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1976), 68–69.

1
. John B. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral: Frank Jack Fletcher at Coral Sea
,
Midway, and Guadalcanal
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2006), 136.

2
. Richard W. Bates,
The Battle of the Coral Sea, May 1 to May 11 Inclusive, 1942: Strategical and Tactical Analysis
(Newport, RI: Naval War College, 1947), 7–12; Prange interview of Genda Minoru (Sept. 5, 1966), Prange Papers, UMD, box 17.

3
. Jonathan B. Parshall and Anthony P. Tully,
Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway
(Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2005), 61–63. See also
chapter 9
.

4
. Nimitz to Fletcher, April 22, 1942, Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 1:399.

5
. John B. Lundstrom, “A Failure of Radio Intelligence: An Episode in the Battle of the Coral Sea,”
Cryptologia
7, no. 2 (1983), 115.

6
. Nimitz to King, Feb. 25, 1942, Nimitz Papers, NHHC, box 8:545; Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 141.

7
. Richard W. Bates, in the semiofficial study
The Battle of the Coral Sea, May 1 to May 11 Inclusive, 1942
, insisted that by sending Takagi and Hara around the eastern end of the Solomon Islands, they were seeking a “Cannae”—a double envelopment—of American forces in the Coral Sea and concluded that Fletcher was irresponsible to let Hara get in behind him. John Lundstrom, however, points out that the initial objective of the Japanese end run was an attack on the Australian air bases. Bates,
Battle of the Coral Sea;
Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 137–40. See also H. P. Willmott,
The Barrier and the Javelin: Japanese and Allied Pacific Strategies, February to June 1942
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1983), 87.

8
. John B. Lundstrom,
The First South Pacific Campaign: Pacific Fleet Strategy, December 1941–June 1942
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1976), 98; Willmott,
Barrier and Javelin
, 208.

9
. Bates,
Battle of the Coral Sea
, 32; Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 145.

10
. In his postwar memoir, the captain of the
Lexington
, Frederic “Ted” Sherman, called Fletcher’s decision to withhold fighter support for the attack force a “serious mistake.” Had Hara’s carriers been within range, it might well have proved so. Sherman,
Combat Command: The American Aircraft Carriers in the Pacific War
(New York: Dutton, 1950), 93.

11
. One reason the
Okinoshima
survived was that the American bombs were armed with impact fuses, so that, while the ship suffered significant topside damage, no bombs penetrated to her vital engineering spaces. Nimitz to King, June 17, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2, p. 3; Samuel Eliot Morison,
History of United States Naval Operations in World War II
, vol. 4,
Coral Sea, Midway and Submarine Actions, May 1942–August, 1942
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1949), 25–26; Lundstom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 146, 149; Bates,
Battle of the Coral Sea
, 36; Willmott,
Barrier and Javelin
, 217–18.

12
. Stuart D. Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around at Coral Sea and Midway: Going to War with Yorktowns Air Group Five
(Bennington, VT: Merriam, 2000), 70.

13
. Nimitz to King, June 17, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2, p. 3; Paul S. Dull,
A Battle History of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1941–1945
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1978), 120; Lundstrom, “Failure of Radio Intelligence,” 113.

14
. Nimitz to Fletcher, May 5, 1942, CinCPac message file, Nimitz Papers, Operational Archives, NHHC, box 1:422. See Lundstrom,
First South Pacific Campaign
, 103–4, as well as Lundstrom, “Failure in Radio Intelligence,” 108–10, 115; and Willmott,
Barrier and Javelin
, 234–35.

15
. Neilson is quoted in Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 73–74; John B. Lundstrom,
The First Team: Pacific Naval Air Combat from Pearl Harbor to Midway
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1984), 193.

16
. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 165; Lundstrom,
First Team
, 194–96. Fletcher is quoted in Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 77.

17
. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 165.

18
. Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 74.

19
. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 176–77; Lundstrom,
First Team
, 191; Dull,
A Battle History
, 124.

20
. Lundstrom,
First Team
, 200; Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 78.

21
. Both Burch and Taylor are quoted in Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 76–77.

22
. Office of Naval Intelligence,
Combat Narrative: The Battle of the Coral Sea
(Washington, DC: Office of Naval Intelligence, United States Navy, 1943), 15–16; Lundstrom,
First Team
, 199, 205; Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 169; Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 79, James H. Belote and William M. Belote,
Titans of the Seas: The Development and Operations of Japanese and American Carrier Task Forces during World War II
(New York: Harper & Row, 1975), 76; Sherman,
Combat Command
, 100.

23
. The conversation was remembered by Taylor and is recorded in Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 80.

24
. For the rest of this life, Biard (who died in 2010) insisted that Fletcher missed a great opportunity by not listening to him. It is possible that Biard’s assertions found their way to Washington and contributed to Admiral King’s growing unease about Fletcher’s aggressiveness. Author’s interview of RADM Donald “Mac” Showers (May 4, 2010). See also Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 78, 167–68, 170–71.

25
. Belote and Belote,
Titans of the Seas
, 76–77; Lundstrom,
First Team
, 212.

26
. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 176–77; Sherman,
Combat Command
, 102; Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 82; Judson Brodie interview (March 13, 2007), NMPW, 28.

27
. Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 176–77; Belote and Belote,
Titans of the Seas
, 77. In his memoir, Sherman insisted that postwar evidence proved that the Japanese carriers had been just where he claimed they were—only thirty miles away—and this proved that Fletcher should have ordered a night surface attack. In fact, postwar evidence places those carriers about a hundred miles to the east, in which case a night surface attack would have been futile and probably dangerous. Sherman,
Combat Command
, 102.

28
. Matome Ugaki,
Fading Victory: The Diary of Admiral Matome Ugaki, 1941–1945
, ed. Donald M. Goldstein and Katherine V. Dillon, trans. Masataka Chihaya
(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1991), 128 (diary entry of May 18, 1942). Burch is quoted in Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 80.

29
. The official Navy reports credit the sighting by Smith without mentioning Dixon, though Dixon’s postwar testimony makes it clear that he, too, played a crucial role. Buckmaster to Nimitz, May 25, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2, p. 3; Belote and Belote,
Titans of the Seas
, 78; Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 84–85.

30
. Pederson to Buckmaster, May 16, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2; Dull,
Battle History
, 126; Samuel Eliot Morison,
History of United States Naval Operations in World War II
, vol. 4,
Coral Sea, Midway and Submarine Action, May 1942–August, 1942
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1949), 47–48; Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 87.

31
. Burch and Short are quoted in Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 87–88; Office of Naval Intelligence,
Battle of the Coral Sea
, 24–25.

32
. Pederson to Buckmaster, May 16, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2. American torpedo plane pilots reported dropping nine torpedoes and making four hits. See Office of Naval Intelligence,
Battle of the Coral Sea
, 23. Taylor’s quotation is in Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 86.

33
. Noel Gayler oral history (Feb. 15, 2002), Naval Historical Foundation, 6; Morison,
Coral Sea
, 49–51.

34
. Sherman,
Combat Command
, 31.

35
. Ibid., 109–10.

36
. Buckmaster to Nimitz, May 25, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2, pp. 7, 40.

37
. Frederick D. Parker,
A Priceless Advantage: U.S. Navy Communications Intelligence and the Battle of the Coral Sea, Midway, and the Aleutians
(Ft. Meade, MD: Center for Cryptologic History, National Security Agency, 1993), 29–30.

38
. Ronald Russell, “Sam Laser in Sky Control,” transcript available at BOMRT,
http://www.midway42.org/vets-laser.html
.

39
. Sherman,
Combat Command
, 111, 114; Buckmaster to Nimitz, May 25, 1942, Action Reports, reel 2, p. 10; Paul Stroop oral history (Sept. 13, 1969), 144, U.S. Naval Institute Oral History Collection, USNA; Judson Brodie interview (March 13, 2007), NMPW, 30.

40
. Sherman,
Combat Command
, 115; Judson Brodie interview (March 13, 2007), NMPW, 31.

41
. Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 96.

42
. Ugaki,
Fading Victory
, 128 (diary entry of May 18, 1942).

43
. Ludlum,
They Turned the War Around
, 96, 100; Lundstrom,
Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
, 194.

44
. Sherman,
Combat Command
, 117; Walter Lord,
Incredible Victory
(New York: Harper & Row, 1967), 11; Ugaki,
Fading Victory
, 122 (diary entry of May 7, 1942).

1
. Hiroyuki Agawa,
The Reluctant Admiral: Yamamoto and the Imperial Navy
, trans. John Bester (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1979), 302; Matome Ugaki,
Fading Victory: The Diary of Admiral Matome Ugaki, 1941–1945
, ed. Donald M. Goldstein and Katherine V. Dillon, trans. Masataka Chihaya (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1991), 118 (diary entry of May 1, 1942).