(a) "in a windowless basement near the [US Pacific] fleet's Pearl Harbor headquarters, codebreakers under Cmdr [or Captain] Joe Rochefort pored over intercepted Japanese radio traffic. * * * Rochefort's team could decode about one-eighth of an average message, filling in the gaps by educated intuition. For example, the messages called the proximate Japanese objective 'AF.' But where was 'AF'? Midway, Rochefort concluded. The authorities in Washington scoffed. Why would Japan dispatch a massive armada to seize a tiny atoll?
Commander of Pacific Fleet (Dec 31, 1941-Nov 24, 1945) Admiral Chester W (for William) "Nimitz, responsible for millions of square miles of ocean, had scant means to repel the Japanese anywhere, let alone everywhere. With his fleet, and perhaps the entire Pacific war, at stake, 'I had to do a bit of hard thinking,' he would recall.
"As the Navy's heavyweights vacillated, Nimitz decided to gamble on the out-of-step Rochefort. He recalled his three carriers [Japanese thought 2: USS Enterprise and Hornet; they did not know USS Yorktown was capable, having badly wounded] from the South Pacific to defend Midway.
(b) "Three weeks later [after the Battle of Midway], flying to San Francisco to confer with his Washington superior, Nimitz was shaken but uninjured when his seaplane, while landing, struck floating debris and flipped over. As the capsized plane sank, he stepped aboard a small crash boat, where he stood watching rescue operations.
" 'Sit down, you!' the coxswain barked—before noticing, with horror, his faux pas. He stumbled out apologies.
"Nimitz sat down. 'Stick to your guns, sailor,' he said. 'You were quite right.'
Note:
(a)
(i) There is no need to read the rest, because quotation 1 shows the main thesis of the article is indisputably false.
(ii) Take notice the author is a professor of English literature, not with a military background.
(b)
(i) Midway Atoll https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midway_Atoll
(View the map whose caption reads: Map showing the location of Midway Atoll in the Hawaiian island chain)
Quote:
"Midway Atoll is an unorganized, unincorporated territory of the United States. Midway continues to be the only island in the Hawaiian archipelago that is not part of the state of Hawaii. Unlike the other Hawaiian islands, Midway observes Samoa Time (UTC-11:00, ie, eleven hours behind Coordinated Universal Time), which is one hour behind the time in the state of Hawaii")
"The atoll was sighted on July 5, 1859, by Captain NC Middlebrooks * * * of the sealing ship Gambia * * * [who] claimed Midway for the United States
View the world maps (there are two). Midway Atoll is UTC-11, whereas Haiwaii, UTC-10. Take notice Hawaii island chain (including Midway Atoll) is in northern hemisphere, but Samoa (as well as American Samoa), in the southern hemisphere.
(B) Samoa Time Zone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samoa_Time_Zone
Quote:
"The zone includes the US territory of American Samoa, as well as the Midway Islands * * *
"The nation of Samoa also observed the same time as the Samoa Time Zone until it moved across the International Date Line at the end of Dec 29, 2011; it is now 24 hours (25 hours in summer) ahead of American Samoa.
(c) bird-eye view of the battle:
Battle of Midway 75th. US Navy, undated https://www.navy.com/battle-of-midway
(US "Navy held their own in the Battle of Coral Sea. This was the first carrier-based fight of the war – a new type of engagement where opposing ships never actually saw or directly fired upon one another. The showdown at Midway was on the horizon")
Quote: "The battle is historically significant as the first action in which aircraft carriers engaged each other, as well as the first in which neither side's ships sighted or fired directly upon the other.
(d) Battle of Midway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Midway
(June 4-7 [actually ended on June 6. See (f)], 1942; section 2.3 Allied code-breaking)
(i) Only take to heart the first day of the Battle, when most of damage was done: June 4 to Americans but June 5 to Japanese (because Samoa time is right east of International Date Line).
(ii) Regarding the text -- read only section 2.3. The rest of the text in this Wiki page is hazy. For example, I wanted to know why Japan would invade Midway Atoll, but fail to grasp after reading it.
My translation: Before Pacific War, Imperial Japanese Navy (IPN) basically took the defensive posture relative to US. Adm Isoroku Yamamoto of Combined Fleet questioned it, instead taking offensive posture. * * * This [reversal] is because: First of all, in view of overwhelming inferiority of its national strength, even if Japan took defensive posture, with time and area (theaters) [as time dragged on and spheres involved expanded] there would be no way to win when facing America's assaults with overwhelmingly superior might. Also to lock in a short war, Japan must in early stage of twar hit the weaknesses, so that the opponent would lose the will to fight. Only this way can detect 勝機 chance of winning/ way to prevail. Furthermore, since before the War, Yamamoto thought that in case of enemy's aircraft carriers carrying out attacks on Japan, they would not just harm the resources to Japan but spirits. * * * American navy, having been incapacitated in the Pearl Harbor raid, operated mobile forces to repeatedly harass mid-Pacific with hit-and-runs. Each time Japanese military was racked by intention of action and judgment of fields. Solomon, wake or home islands were all put on high alert. Additionally, there was no surplus military force so (ship) patrolling was insufficient. The ambushes conducted by American military caused small harms, but Combined Fleet recognized the difficulty of defensive/ passive posture.
My translation: Japanese military knew that once taking Midway Atoll into possession, it would be extremely hard to keep [due to long supply line]. The ultimate goal of this battle was to induce US aircraft carriers to out and then annihilate them. Moreover, after occupation [of the atoll], Japan would fight in other spheres, thereby denying US military any room to retrieve Midway -- until the October [1942] battle to capture Hawaii so as to ensure safety of Midway.
(ii) James Bowen, The Carrier-Launched Doolittle Raid on Japan. In The Pacific War. Pacific War Historical Society, website last updated Nov 23, 2009. www.pacificwar.org.au/carrierwarfare/Halsey_Doolittle.html
Quote:
"Early on the morning of 18 April 1942, when the American [Hornet] carrier force was still 700 miles (1,126 km) east of Tokyo, radar on the Enterprise ['which would provide fighter cover for the task force during the long voyage'] detected one of the picket patrol boats manning Japan's eastern defensive perimeter. Although the Japanese picket boat was sunk by the cruiser USS Nashville, the commander of the carrier force, Vice Admiral William F. Halsey, could not ignore the possibility that a radio warning had been sent by the picket boat to Tokyo. Rather than increase the risk to America's vital carriers, Halsey decided to launch the B-25 bombers 150 miles (240 km) short of the planned launching point. This decision greatly reduced the prospect of the B-25s reaching friendly forces in western China, but Lieutenant Colonel [James] Doolittle agreed with Halsey's decision.
"The raid persuaded Japan's Imperial General Headquarters that Admiral Yamamoto's concern for the safety of Japan's home islands was well founded, and that it was necessary to extend Japan's eastern defensive perimeter closer to Hawaii by seizing and occupying America's Midway islands in the central Pacific. Admiral Yamamoto had developed a complex plan for a Midway offensive to take place in June 1942. Yamamoto's plan was designed to extend Japan's eastern defensive perimeter to the Midway islands and draw the aircraft carriers of the United States Pacific Fleet to a decisive battle in the central Pacific. Yamamoto intended the capture of Midway and destruction of the US Pacific Fleet to be the foundation for a major Japanese offensive against Hawaii in October 1942.
* There is no need to read the rest.
(f) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Midway
(section 2.3 Allied code-breaking: "As a result [of code-breaking], the Americans entered the battle with a very good picture of where, when, and in what strength the Japanese would appear. Nimitz knew that the Japanese had negated their numerical advantage by dividing their ships into four separate task groups, all too widely separated to be able to support each other")
, whose introduction says, "There were seven aircraft carriers involved in the battle and all four of Japan's large aircraft carriers—Akagi 赤城 [named after 赤城山], Kaga 加賀 [after 加賀国 in ancient times], Sōryū 蒼竜 and Hiryū 飛竜 * * * —and a heavy cruiser were sunk, while the US lost only the carrier Yorktown [the other 2 US carriers were Enterprise and Hornet] and a destroyer."
All these four Japanese aircraft carriers were commanded by vice admiral Chūichi NAGUMO 南雲 忠一 中将, in one of the four task groups mentioned in the quotation of (f). The Japanese heavy cruiser Mikuma 重巡洋艦 三隈 (named after a river 三隈川) was sunk on June 6 (American time; Japanese time: June 7), which it and other ships from other task groups came to rescue.
(g) Admiral Nimitz's mishap in a seaplane was real. See