Hornet mishandled at Midway?

[Richard Young]

I think the most serious error was the choice of approach routes for TF-16 and TF-17 (though TF-17's ingress was more time sensitive since she departed later); straight through possible enemy submarine picket lines. While sub shot was unlikely, even a single contact report could have ended in disaster.

 

 

 

Get rid of all the B-17’s, push the Vindicators into the sea, ground all the inexperienced Marine pilots. Double the number of fighters with the room freed from useless B-17's, and make the fighters all F4F Wildcats. Replace all Marine pilots with Navy aviators, (most of Lexington’s aviators survived Coral Sea, for example). Saratoga showed up a day late and a dollar short (Fletcher transfers flag on 8 June) with 45 Wildcats, 45 SBD’s and 15 torpedo bombers (Lundstrom, 294). Perhaps some of these aircraft and pilots (if not the ship) could have been shipped by freighter to Pearl Harbor in May 1942, and ferried to Midway via carrier at the end of the month. The Midway Strike goes a touch worse if 50 F4F's make the interception, and if aviators had made the Henderson attack, IMO, Hiryu would have been sunk outright.

 

According to the internet, Saratoga herself sortied from Bremerton on 22 May, but still missed the battle due to logistical details.

 

 

The loss of the Langley and no escort carers yet really snafued aircraft shipments. In retrospect, perhaps Ranger should have been used for this....

[glenn239]

The loss of the Langley and no escort carers yet really snafued aircraft shipments. In retrospect, perhaps Ranger should have been used for this....

 

In terms of shuttling from Hawaii to Midway, both TF-16 and TF-17 could have been used, since they were going that way anyway. If just aviators taking over for hopelessly green Marine crews, then shuttle via PBY. Getting from the West Coast to Hawaii (ie, the planes Saratoga showed up with a day late and a dollar short) would probably have required their shipment on deck of cargo ships, assuming no heroic efforts being made with Sara herself. From Pearl, transhipped to a carrier bound for Midway.

Edited June 9, 2011 by glenn239

[Colin]

Admiral Pye sortied from San Francisco in Task Force 1 on June 5. His force consisted of a combination of 6 repaired and other old US battleships plus the light carrier, USS Long Island. Together, they made a lengthy patrol off the western US coast for several weeks duration. Pye did so because of the possibility of the Japanese mounting carrier air raids on key US aircraft factories and other defense plants along the US west coast.

 

The threat of Japanese attack on the west coast was real enough to pour significant amount of material into it's defense both in Canada and the US.

[Mk 1]

The threat of Japanese attack on the west coast was real enough to pour significant amount of material into it's defense both in Canada and the US.

And the perception of the threat was quite real at that time. The US Pacific Coast had suffered a series of torpedo attacks on merchant ships, one shelling of a coastal oil facility (by a submarine), and some (widely believed) false-alarm and (un-recognized) real air raids, all in the first half of 1942.

 

In that same timeframe many of the major aircraft industry facilities in the Los Angeles area were extensively camoflage against air attacks.

 

Japanese attacks were a very real concern in 1942.

 

-Mark 1

[glenn239]

Japanese attacks were a very real concern in 1942.

 

Until Midway, a massive carrier raid on California could never be dismissed as impossible. The USN had just recently learned a bitter lesson at Oahu, that it would be dangerous to assume Japanese carriers could not attack in strength targets thousands of miles from their bases.

Edited June 11, 2011 by glenn239

[AETiglathPZ]

Have to remember the psychology of America in the 6 months post Pearl Harbor was not that much different from the psychology of America post 9/11 with additional reasonable paranoia of further attacks. I'm going from memory by the Time-Life WW2 book The Home Front. East Coast was also seeing U-boat attacks on shipping at the time with burning ships visible from the beaches.

[shep854]

Have to remember the psychology of America in the 6 months post Pearl Harbor was not that much different from the psychology of America post 9/11 with additional reasonable paranoia of further attacks. I'm going from memory by the Time-Life WW2 book The Home Front. East Coast was also seeing U-boat attacks on shipping at the time with burning ships visible from the beaches.

Until coastal blackouts were imposed, U-boats targeted and sank merchies silhouetted against the lights of US coastal cities. Truly a "Happy Time" for unterseebooten.

[Mk 1]

East Coast was also seeing U-boat attacks on shipping at the time with burning ships visible from the beaches.

The U-Boat campaign covered pretty much the entire US Eastern Seaboard, and also reached down to the Gulf States. There was even concern (and Kriegsmarine planning?) of a U-Boat foray / raid up the Mississippi.

 

That effort was rather larger, and produced far more real damage, than what the Japanese achieved on the West Coast. But oddly the reaction of the German activities on the Eastern and Southern coasts did not drive the same degree of concern as the Japanese attacks on the West Coast.

 

The extent of the Japanese attacks, as I understand them, are:

 

1 ) Submarine torpedo attacks on shipping:

Something like 10 ships were torpedoed along the West Coast, some within sight of San Diego, Los Angeles, Santa Monica and Santa Barbara. One tanker that had been abandoned drifted close to the harbor at Eureka, California, causing a hazard to navigation. A total of 10 Japanese I-boats made war patrols to the US coast in 1941 and 1942. Apperantly, there was even a Soviet submarine, L-16, which was torpedoed by a Japanese sub off of the US West Coast in October of 1942.

 

2 ) Shelling of facilities:

The Ellwood Oil facility at Goleta, California (near Santa Barbara) was shelled by the I-17 on February 23, 1942. Total damage was estimated at $500 to $1000. But the scare was quite significant.

 

The Estevant Point Lighthouse on Vancouver Island in Canadian British Columbia was shelled by the I-26 on June 20, 1942. No damage nor casualties were reported, but the subsequent decision to stop the operation of light houses up and down the West Coast had very bad effects on coastal shipping.

 

The I-25 shelled Fort Stevens at the mouth of the Columbia River in Oregon on the night of June 21/22, 1942. The only damage reported was to some phone cables and to the fort's baseball diamond. Coastal batteries were denied permission to return fire, for fear that it was only a recon-by-fire excersize by the Japanese, and that returnning fire would highlight their positions prior to a larger raid/attack.

 

3 ) Actual Air Raids:

Only two single-plane sorties were flown against the US mainland. These were near Brookings, Oregon, both from the I-25, on September 20 and September 29, 1942. The plane was a sub-carried Yokosuka E14Y1 "Glen" seaplane. Two small incindiary bombs were dropped on each sortie, with the intent of causing forest fires.

 

 

Now for a couple items of fun:

 

Little known, even by histories on this period, is the story of a small landing party from the I-17 that came ashore north of Santa Barbara at dawn two days after the shelling of the Goleta oil facility. They were spotted and met on the beach by some farm workers who had been tending local strawberry fields (June being prime strawberry season up and down the coast). Most of the farm hands were Issei and Nisei Japanese (immigrants or first gen US children of immigrants). The small party of sailors were armed with at least 2 rifles. The shift supervisor of the farm hands was fully aware of the growing anti-Japanese immigrant sentiments, and so he approached the sailors, greated them with all proper Japanese courtesy, offered a gift of some fresh strawberries, and then told them they were not allowed to come ashore and would have to return to their submarine, which they promptly did.

 

Evidently the landing party was led by a 20-year-old ensign, their briefing for their shore mission had not been prepared them for the meeting Japanese people ashore, and the young officer felt he had little choice when told that he was not allowed to come ashore by an older Japanese gentleman who was obviously in charge.

 

I found this story, reasonably documented with multiple witness accounts (and one entry from the ship's log obtained post-war) in a local historical society museam in one of the small coastal towns. Think it might have been Cambria (north of Morro Bay, south of San Simeon), but it might have been Cayucos.

 

Also little known is why the I-17 shelled the Ellwood Refinery. The orders given to the submarines for their patrols to the US coast were quite general. The notable exception was the I-25's mission to bomb the forrests of Oregon. But in most cases they were just sent to the area with orders to patrol and inflict damage.

 

The captain of the I-17, Nishino Kozo, was a naval reserve officer who had served as captain of an oil tanker before the war. He had visited the Ellwood facility in the early 1930s. While walking along a cat-walk between storage tanks, in his full dress whites, he had slipped and fell in the mud. He considered this a great loss of face. So when given the order to patrol the coast, he returned, and while he didn't do much economic damage to the facility, he evidently blew out two or three catwalks before he submerged and continued his patrol further north.

 

I found this story reported in a California National Guard in-house newspaper while I was in San Louis Obispo in 1976 or 77. Haven't seen much more on that detail since.

 

-Mark 1

[Jeff]

Little known, even by histories on this period, is the story of a small landing party from the I-17 that came ashore north of Santa Barbara at dawn two days after the shelling of the Goleta oil facility. They were spotted and met on the beach by some farm workers who had been tending local strawberry fields (June being prime strawberry season up and down the coast). Most of the farm hands were Issei and Nisei Japanese (immigrants or first gen US children of immigrants). The small party of sailors were armed with at least 2 rifles. The shift supervisor of the farm hands was fully aware of the growing anti-Japanese immigrant sentiments, and so he approached the sailors, greated them with all proper Japanese courtesy, offered a gift of some fresh strawberries, and then told them they were not allowed to come ashore and would have to return to their submarine, which they promptly did.

 

Evidently the landing party was led by a 20-year-old ensign, their briefing for their shore mission had not been prepared them for the meeting Japanese people ashore, and the young officer felt he had little choice when told that he was not allowed to come ashore by an older Japanese gentleman who was obviously in charge.

 

I found this story, reasonably documented with multiple witness accounts (and one entry from the ship's log obtained post-war) in a local historical society museam in one of the small coastal towns. Think it might have been Cambria (north of Morro Bay, south of San Simeon), but it might have been Cayucos.

And a little known fact is they took a prisoner as well.

 

 

"Let's see you try and find Hollywood now you scrawny little...hey boy, watch that knife!"

 

 

"You sneaky little bastards ain't getting doodly-S**t out of me 'cept maybe my name, rank and social security number. Wood, Hollis P., lumberjack, social security 106...43...2185"

[irregularmedic]

And the perception of the threat was quite real at that time. The US Pacific Coast had suffered a series of torpedo attacks on merchant ships, one shelling of a coastal oil facility (by a submarine), and some (widely believed) false-alarm and (un-recognized) real air raids, all in the first half of 1942.

 

In that same timeframe many of the major aircraft industry facilities in the Los Angeles area were extensively camoflage against air attacks.

 

Japanese attacks were a very real concern in 1942.

 

-Mark 1

 

Boeing was also heavily camouflaged and the US continued to spend large amounts of money on fortifications in the the Pacific Northwest until the last year of the war.