80 YEARS AGO TODAY - PART 3

At 0950 hours, Enterprise CAG McCluskey was seriously worried as he scoured the sea below through his binoculars, searching for the enemy. At maximum range, he had to do something. Where Ring had followed “standard procedure,” McCluskey did the opposite. “I knew they had to be north of us,” he later explained, “and so I turned north. I could hold the course for 15 minutes before our fuel state would require we turn east.” The 37 Dauntlesses turned north, and at 0955 McClusky looked down through a break in the clouds and saw the wake of the destroyer Arashi as it hurried to return to the fleet from its battle with the Nautilus.

Hoping that the ship below would lead him to the enemy fleet, McCluskey turned and followed. Below, the crew of the Japanese destroyer didn’t see the flock of tiny dots high above that turned to onto their course. “At 1005 hours, that decision paid dividends. Peering through my binoculars which were practically glued to my eyes, I saw dead ahead about 35 miles distant the welcome sight of the Jap carrier striking force. They were in what appeared to be a circular disposition with four carriers in the center, well spaced, and an outer screen of six to eight destroyers and inner support ships composed of two battleships and either four or six cruisers. I then broke radio silence and reported the contact to the Enterprise.”

As the Enterprise Dauntlesses approached from the southwest, McCluskey identified the nearest carrier as Kaga, with Akagi beyond, and informed the formation they would attack these two ships. As a fighter pilot, he was unfamiliar with dive bombing doctrine, which called for the lead squadron, VS-6, to fly across and attack the far target (Akagi), while the trailing squadron, VB-6, would attack the near target (Kaga), thus taking on both in a near-simultaneous attack that had the greatest chance of success. McCluskey executed a wingover and centered Kaga in his telescopic sight.

The first thing Dick Best knew of McCluskey's incorrect attack strategy was when the Air Group Commander's SBD flashed past directly in front of him. He turned and saw all the other VB-6 Dauntlesses execute dives, following VS-6. Rocking his wings violently, Best managed to keep his two wingmen, Lt(jg) Bill Kroeger and Ensign F.T. Weber, with him. In an instant, Best was left alone with his two wingmen over the Japanese fleet; according to Navy tactical doctrine, these three bombers were not only insufficient, they were irrelevant. Best led his two wingmen flew across the Japanese fleet, where he pushed over in what would be recorded as the single most accurate, devastating dive bomber attack by any pilot in all of World War II.

"I centered my the sights on that big red rising sun painted on the deck. The flight deck was holystoned yellow and made an excellent target. I dropped my bomb at minimum altitude and as I pulled out I looked over my shoulder in time to see it hit just forward of the meatball." Moments later, Kroeger and Weber, dropped their thousand-pounders. Kroeger's hit close amidships and Weber's close on the stern. They were almost as damaging as direct hits as they opened seams in the hull below the waterline.

Best’s bomb crashed through the flight deck to explode in the confined space of the hangar below, where fully armed and fueled torpedo bombers stood amidst stacks of bombs set aside that had not been taken below to the magazine while torpedoes were slung beneath the planes. The explosion was devastating. Shrapnel holed the planes and leaking gasoline caught fire; flames spread to the torpedoes and bombs which exploded, tearing the hangar apart and spreading the fires to the neighboring hangar compartments, which were filled with gasoline-laden aircraft and their extra bombs. "By the time I leveled off," Best recounted, "the carrier was afire from bow to stern."

McCluskey remembered his attack on Kaga: “I leveled off at masthead height, picked the widest opening in the defending destroyer screen and dropped to deck level, figuring any anti-aircraft fire aimed at me would also be aimed at their own ships. All their ships must have been pretty busy because I was well through the screen before I noted bursting shells creeping up behind. With the throttle practically pushed through the instrument panel, I was fortunate in avoiding a contact with death by slight changes of altitude and varying the getaway course to right and left.”

McCluskey then quickly figured a return course on his chart. “As I raised my head from the plotting board, a stream of tracer bullets started chopping the water around the plane. Almost immediately my gunner, W. G. Chochalousek, opened fire. Then a Zero zoomed out of range ahead of me. A hurried glance around found another Zero about 1,000 feet above, to the left and astern, about to make another attack. Remaining at 20 feet above the water, I waited until the attacking plane was well in his dive, then wrapped my plane in a steep turn toward him. This not only gave him a more difficult deflection shot, but also enabled my gunner to have free room to maneuver his guns. A 5-minute chase then ensued, first one Zero attacking from the right, then the second from the left. Each time I would wrap up toward the attacker with Chochalousek keeping up a constant fire. Suddenly a burst from a Jap seemed to envelop the whole plane. The left side of my cockpit was shattered, and it felt like my left shoulder had been hit with a sledgehammer. Naturally enough it seemed like the end, we sure were goners. After two or three seconds, I realized there was an unusual quietness except for the purring engine of the old Dauntless. Grasping the intercom, I yelled to Chochalousek, but no answer. It was difficult to turn with the pain in my left shoulder and arm, but I finally managed and there was my gunner. facing aft, guns at the ready and unharmed. He had shot down one of the Zeros and the other decided to call it quits. When we got back to the ship, we found our plane had been hit 55 times.”

The 12 TBDs of Yorktown’s VT-3, led by their CO LCDR Lance “Lem” Massey and escorted by six F4F-4 Wildcats led by LCDR John S. Thach, found the enemy a matter of minutes after the Enterprise strike had commenced their attack on Kaga and Akagi. Above them, LCDR Max Leslie led 36 dive bombers, despite the fact he had lost his own bomb when he had accidentally dropped it shortly after takeoff due to his plane’s release mechanism being miswired; three other planes in the formation had also lost theirs and turned back, but Leslie felt he was needed as strike leader. Yorktown’s strike had made their running rendezvous on the way to the fleet and was the only air group to make a coordinated attack.

Thach recalled that the squadron had only a few hops to get used to the new F4F-4 Wildcat with which they had re-equipped just before going aboard Yorktown. Jim Adams, one of the VF-42 pilots who fleshed out the squadron for experience, later recalled, “We went from bad to worse when we picked up the F4F-4 for Midway. We had all kinds of extra weight and a real sluggish aircraft; six guns and less firing time. The reduction in rounds per gun with the increase from four to six guns cut the firing time by six seconds. That doesn’t sound like much, but it can be a lifetime in combat.”

Thach’s formation of six included his wingman, Ensign Robert A. M. "Ram" Dibb, with VF-42 Lt (jg) Brainard Macomber as section leader with wingman Ensign Edgar Bassett, also from VF-42. NAP Aviation Machinist Mate 1/c Tom Cheek and his wingman, Ensign Daniel Sheedy, were just astern of the torpedo planes, all flying about 1,000 feet above the torpedo bombers which were flying 750 feet above the waves. Thach later remembered, “We had to do S turns, to slow down so we wouldn't run away from the TBDs because they were so slow, and we didn't want to be stalling along with no ability to maneuver in case something hit us before we anticipated it. We were flying our standard combat formation that I'd developed and were weaving.”

Torpedo bomber leader Massey made a small change of course to the right. “We took off on a heading of about southwest, and I wondered why he did that. Looking ahead, I could see ships through the breaks in the clouds, and I figured that was it. We had just begun to approach about ten miles from the outer screen of this large force, it looked like it was spread over the ocean, and several colored antiaircraft bursts appeared in our direction, one red and another orange, and then no more. I wondered why they'd be shooting at us because we weren't even nearly in range. We'd been sighted by the surface screen and they were alerting the combat air patrol. A very short time after, before we got near antiaircraft range, Zero fighters came down on us. I tried to count them and I figured there were 20.

“The first thing that happened was Bassett's plane was burning. He pulled out, and I didn't see him any more. He was shot down right away. I was surprised they put so many Zeros on my six fighters. But then I saw they had a second large group that was now streaming in right past us and into the poor torpedo planes.

“Macomber's position was too close to me to permit an effective weave, and I was not getting very good shots at the Zeros. I called him on the radio and said: ‘Open out more. About double your present distance and weave.’ No acknowledgment. His radio was dead. How ironic this situation had become! I had spent almost a year developing what I was convinced was the only way to survive against the Zero, and now we couldn't seem to do it! I couldn't see Cheek and Sheedy so I called Ram Dibb, my wingman, and said, ‘Pretend you are a section leader and move out far enough to weave.’ He said, ‘This is Scarlet Two, wilco.’ His voice sounded like he was elated to get this promotion right in the middle of a battle.

“Several Zeros came in on a head-on attack on the torpedo planes and burned Lem Massey's plane right away. It just exploded in flames. And, beautifully timed, another group came in on the side against the torpedo planes. The air was like a beehive, and I wasn't sure at that moment that anything would work. It didn't look like my weave was working, but then it began to work. I got a good shot at two of them and burned them, and one of them made a pass at my wingman, pulled out to the right, and then came back. We were weaving continuously, and I got a head-on shot at him, and just about the time I saw this guy coming, Ram said, ‘There's a Zero on my tail.’ The Zero wasn't directly astern, more like 45 degrees, beginning to follow him around, which gave me the head-on approach. I probably should have decided to duck under this Zero, but I lost my temper. He just missed me by a few feet with flames coming out of the bottom of his airplane. This is like playing chicken with two automobiles on the highway except we were both shooting as well. That was a little foolhardy; I didn't try it any more.

“Pure logic would convince anyone that with their superior performance and the number of Zeros they were throwing into the fight, we could not possibly survive. ‘Well,’ I said, talking to myself, ‘we're going to take a lot of them with us if they're going to get us all.’ We kept on working this weave, and it seemed to work better and better. I haven't the slightest idea how many Zeros I shot down. I just can't remember, I was absolutely convinced that nobody could get out of there, that we weren't coming back, and neither were any of the torpedo planes.”

As Thach weaved against the Zeros and all but three of the torpedo planes were shot down, the Yorktown dive bombers attacked Soryu. Thach described what he saw: “I'd never seen such superb dive bombing. It looked to me like almost every bomb hit. Of course, there were some very near misses. There weren't any wild ones. Explosions were occurring in the carriers, and about that time the Zeros slacked off. I could only see three carriers. I never did see a fourth one. One of them, probably either the Soryu or the Kaga, was burning with bright pink and sometimes blue flames. I remember looking at the height of the flames noticing that it was about the height that the ship was long, just solid flame going up and a lot of smoke on top of that. I saw three carriers burning pretty furiously before I left; I picked up one torpedo plane, and flew on back to the Yorktown with it. I was over the Japanese fleet a full 20 minutes.”

In six deadly minutes, the Japanese had lost Akagi, Kaga and Soryu. The serendipitous arrival of 64 dive bombers over Kido Butai at its single most vulnerable moment, after the Japanese had defeated every previous American attack, ranks with the discovery by the Persian commander of the Greek fleet’s ambush in Salamis Bay, just when it was too late for him to change course.

One Japanese carrier was left, the Hiryū. As the American attackers flew off, she launched 18 dive bombers and six Zeros at 1100 hours. At 1205 hours, they found Yorktown.

Aboard Yorktown, John Bridgers and the other pilots held back from the morning strike did their best to stay out of the way. “The planes from the fourth Japanese carrier found the Yorktown before we found their ship and, in short order, we were under attack. We pilots had no duties other than to sit in our ready room. Unable to see out, we became more and more tense with no activities to release the tension. This was by far the toughest experience I had during the war. Our antiaircraft guns began shaking the ship, and we figured enemy planes were closing in. In steel ships, there were many plates to rattle and reverberate, so the firing of guns was a noisy din indeed. Most of us gathered around the plate patching the ready room deck after one fellow said, ‘Surely lightning won't strike twice in the same place!’ The response was ‘But do you think the Japs know that?’ Just as quickly, we dispersed to our empty desk-seats, and in short order the ship was struck by a couple of bombs. Since the overhead of our ready room was the underside of the flight deck above, we felt considerable jolts and the lights blinked out, to be automatically replaced by the dim red glare of battle lamps, and smoke was immediately evident. The attack passed quickly. In a few minutes, we were released to move topside and survey the damage. By now, our ship was dead in the water.”

Once on the flight deck, Bridgers was immediately confronted with war’s cost when he saw bodies covered with tarpaulins. Yorktown had weathered the first strike and was soon able get underway and bring planes aboard; then came warning of a second strike. “After the first attack, I observed that many had been injured because they were standing around upright and were either hit by flying debris or knocked up against projecting fittings. This must have been something noticed by the others, for all of us immediately lay down prone on the deck — a precaution well worthwhile. Next, there was a tremendous explosion and I was lifted bodily what felt to be a foot or more off the deck. I now knew what a torpedo hit felt like. Almost immediately, it was evident that the ship was listing to one side and was once again dead in the water. Word was passed to abandon ship. I went back to the ready room and put on my Mae West life jacket. Back topside, knotted life lines had been let down over the low side of the hull and people were beginning to lower themselves into the water. Large life rafts were thrown over the side and the grim business got underway. I walked around the island and across the deck, trying to decide when I would go, secretly hoping someone would change their mind about the whole affair. I passed Captain Buckmaster taking a turn around the deck and he told me to hurry and get off the vessel. In several minutes, I passed him again and he said: ‘Son, I thought I told you get off this ship. Now get moving!’”

Bridgers took a line down as far as it would go and then dropped into the sea below. He soon discovered he had lost his shoes when he hit the water. Several minutes later, he came across a wounded sailor whom he took under tow. After what seemed a long time, the two were picked up by the destroyer USS Hughes (DD-410).

Dick Best landed back aboard Enterprise shortly before noon, one of four left from the original 17 from Bombing Six that had left the ship that morning. He went below to his stateroom. “Suddenly, I felt weak and dizzy and the next thing I knew I was coughing up more blood into the sink than I had ever seen.” During the flight to the Japanese fleet, Best had experienced an accident that would profoundly change the rest of his life. As the formation climbed above 10,000 feet, the crews went on oxygen; at the time, the SBD was equipped with a cranky rebreather system similar to that used by submarine crews for emergency escapes. Several of the pilots and gunners had suffered failures of the system, and had to drop to lower altitude where they lagged behind the formation. Best had remained at altitude, where he was breathing with increasing difficulty, but did not connect his problem to that experienced by the others. Once the attack was made, everyone flew back at lower altitude, where the problem did not recur.

Best reported to sick bay, where he was put in bed while he was checked over. Before the doctors could resolve anything, scouts from Yorktown found the Hiryū at 1330 hours. Following the second Japanese strike that hit the Yorktown, a 24-plane strike was put together from the survivors of the Enterprise squadrons and the now-homeless Yorktown survivors who had landed aboard Enterprise. Every pilot who could fly was needed. Best checked out of sick bay and returned to the flight deck, again leading Kroeger and Weber.

The outbound flight to attack Hiryū was not flown at high altitude, since the problem with the oxygen rebreathers had been identified.. Best and his two wingmen were in the second group to dive on the wildly-evading Hiryū, which hit the carrier and set her afire. Unfortunately, Weber and his radioman were among those shot down by defending fire, though Bill Kroeger survived the mission; he and Best would not see each other again until both showed up at a 50th year reunion of the Enterprise crew.

Best’s landing back aboard Enterprise would be his last carrier trap, and the flight to strike Hiryū would be his last flight as a pilot, ever; he spent the return to Pearl Harbor in the sick bay.

Spruance’s most important decision of his career was made the evening of June 4, when he turned Task Force 16 to the east rather than continue west in search of the remainder of the Japanese fleet, stating that “We’ve done what we came to do.” Had he continued west, he would very likely have run into the ambush Admiral Yamamoto planned with his battleships. A night surface action against a superior force would have completely negated the day’s success. Halsey most likely would have continued on, and there is reason to believe that Yamamoto set the ambush in the belief that Halsey was his opponent.

For his actions at Midway, Spruance was awarded the Navy Distinguished Service Medal and cited as follows: “For exceptionally meritorious service... as Task Force Commander, United States Pacific Fleet. During the Midway engagement which resulted in the defeat of and heavy losses to the enemy fleet, his seamanship, endurance, and tenacity in handling his task force were of the highest quality.” Summing up Spruance’s performance, naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison later wrote: "Fletcher did well, but Spruance’s performance was superb. Calm, collected, decisive, yet receptive to advice; keeping in his mind the picture of widely disparate forces, yet boldly seizing every opening. Raymond A. Spruance emerged from the battle one of the greatest admirals in American Naval history."

There is a likely-apocryphal story in the U.S. Navy that the Battle of Midway has been replayed many times at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, and that each time the Americans lose. More than any other battle in World War II, the Battle of Midway was won as the result of a very fortunate combination of good intelligence, planning, and, most of all, luck. The American fleet was inferior to its Japanese opponents as regards numbers and combat experience, yet was able to sink all four of the Imperial Navy’s aircraft carriers committed to the battle.

While the initial Japanese victories in the Pacific War were the result of western - and particularly American - underestimation of Japanese capabilities, the victory at Midway was the result of Japanese underestimation of American capabilities. The course of the entire course of the Pacific War through to the end would be the result of this continuing failure on the part of the Japanese to fully comprehend the nature, ability and power of their opponent.

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