Turning the Tide in the Pacific
On December 7, 1941, six Japanese aircraft carriers launched a massive air strike against the United States Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. All eight American battleships were moored in port and were caught totally unprepared. Four were sunk and four were severely damaged. More than three hundred aircraft were destroyed, mostly on the ground. There were thousands of American casualties. By crippling the U.S. Pacific Fleet with one stroke, Japan hoped to achieve clear dominance in the Pacific for years to come. They came tantalizingly close to total success. Unfortunately for them, all three American aircraft carriers were away from Pearl Harbor on the day of the attack.
On December 8th the United States declared war on Japan. Japan’s allies, Germany and Italy, immediately declared war on the United States. America found herself facing adversaries with powerful and effective military forces, victorious so far on all fronts. In the Pacific the Japanese Fleet was superior in every category. Three American aircraft carriers faced an overwhelming naval force of ten carriers, well-trained veteran aircrews, and superior aircraft. The United States Army, numbering only one hundred ninety thousand in 1939, was frantically expanding for war.
Almost simultaneously with the Pearl Harbor strike, Japanese attacks were launched against Wake Island, Guam, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaya, and the Gilbert Islands. All fell before the onslaught. In early March 1942 the conquest of Java and the Dutch East Indies was complete. Japan had accomplished all her immediate war aims in half the planned time and with virtually no naval losses.
Desperate for some success, the U.S. Navy carried out a daring strike of its own on April 18. The carrier Hornet took sixteen B-25 bombers into Japanese waters. Led by Jimmy Doolittle, the American airmen bombed Tokyo and other Japanese cities. The minimal damage inflicted caused a furor within the Japanese high command, which was disgraced for allowing such a strike against the homeland. Strategically, the Japanese had to face the need for defense of their home waters for the first time.
In June a vast Japanese armada of more than two hundred ships and seven hundred aircraft returned to the central Pacific to finish the job started at Pearl Harbor. The objective was destruction of America’s three remaining aircraft carriers, the last vestige of U.S. naval power in the Pacific. The stark contrast in forces made victory in this engagement as close to a sure thing as it is possible to achieve in war. The Japanese again came very close to achieving their aim.
On the morning of June 4 the opposing forces came within striking distance of each other north of Midway Island. Both sides employed heightened air search efforts to find the other side, but the Americans got the earliest sighting and launched their attacks. After an amazing sequence of events, U.S. dive-bombers found the Japanese carrier strike group and delivered fatal blows to four enemy carriers. Even though he still had superior forces on the scene, the Japanese commander ordered a full retirement. Japanese expansion in the Pacific had reached its limit.