Midway with expanded Kido Butai?

Admiral Beez said:

It is a good point. If you're facing Nagumo's Dilema and have multiple carriers, if you use them as a single organic force one could assign two carriers to keep clear decks for refueling and rearming the CAP, with the other carriers readying, launching or receiving strikes. But that's not what we have here. Instead we're just having Yamamoto assign three more carriers to Nagumo's main force.

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What is the issue with Nagumo's Dilema?, if the aircraft had GP bombs meant for ground targets what does it matter if they are used against carriers?, the US carriers had timber decks, they won't know the difference between bombs, send the damn planes and strike immediately.

Thumpalumpacus said:

You're still gonna have major problems with fighter control and direction.

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Funny how we have had endless arguments about how wonderful Japanese aircraft are yet the result of not having effective radio's and a total lack of protection combined with unrealistic training soon showed why no one else follow that doctrine.

WARSPITER said:

Even if Midway had been more or even completely successful for Japan the woeful production capability
had doomed the IJN from the start.

Taiho was the only purpose built carrier Japan produced from 1941 on and 32 months to complete.
By 1944 Taiho was ready but the USN already the Essex in the water and commissioned in December 1942.
This was followed by a further 16 purpose built fleet carriers during the rest of the war as opposed to one.

The game was over before it started either way. A better result for Japan at Midway would only have delayed the
inevitable.

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Don't forget the Unryū class planned in the aftermath of Midway. Based on Hiryu design with island moved to starboard side and forward. 3 laid down in 1942 and completed Aug-Oct 1944. Another 2 in 1943 plus a single modified Ikoma class which were in the water and 60-84% complete before work on them was stopped in 1945. And more planned.

Of course by the time those first 3 completed in late 1944 the Japanese were having difficulties generating the air groups for them and were running short of oil to run them.

The Essex class are perhaps the best illustration of just how US industrial might kicked into action after Pearl Harbour. By PH:-

11 ordered, with contracted completion dates from March 1944 to the end of 1946.
5 laid down (2 only the week before and Essex completion date was then Jan 1944), None launched.
Another 15 ordered in wartime
Build times accelerated so that Essex completed in Dec 1942 and another 16 completed by the end of the war.

It is the way that a whole year was taken out of the three year build time of the Essex AFTER Pearl Harbour that I always find stunning.

Turn the clock back to mid-1930s and Japan recognised she could not outbuild the USA. That is why she had a "shadow" carrier programme to allow various hulls of auxiliaries (Zuiho, Shoho, Ryuho, Chitose & Chiyoda) to be rapidly converted to carriers and to subsidise construction of various merchant ships for conversion to carriers (Junyo, Hiyo, Taiyo, Chuyo, Unyo, & Kaiyo actual conversions plus other hulls planned for conversion) in time of war. The IJN began the first of these conversions in the latter part of 1940.

EwenS said:

Don't forget the Unryū class planned in the aftermath of Midway. Based on Hiryu design with island moved to starboard side and forward. 3 laid down in 1942 and completed Aug-Oct 1944. Another 2 in 1943 plus a single modified Ikoma class which were in the water and 60-84% complete before work on them was stopped in 1945. And more planned.

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Thanks. Didn't even know about those ones. 1944 is a bit late as you stated.

EwenS said:

It is the way that a whole year was taken out of the three year build time of the Essex AFTER Pearl Harbour that I always find stunning.

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Add to that the other important factor in those ships - they performed very well. With the cuts in time I would not have been
surprised if there were heaps of teething troubles with them but that wasn't the case.

PAT303 said:

Funny how we have had endless arguments about how wonderful Japanese aircraft are yet the result of not having effective radio's and a total lack of protection combined with unrealistic training soon showed why no one else follow that doctrine.

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The Imperial Japanese Navy formed their air force and doctrine based on their experience and local needs.

Being insulated from current European conflicts meant their development was based on foreign observation and nessecity.

The USN and USAAF was in a similar situation and had a steep learning curve from 1942 onward.

SaparotRob said:

The mission wasn't so much to take Midway as it was to to destroy American carriers.

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They hadn't planned on our carriers lying in wait for them. Only in hindsight had they needed more than they brought. As it was, they had their occupation force coming in on their tail. Why have that and for that matter launch the forces in secret were they thinking of encountering our carriers there? They were bringing enough to evict us and occupy, contemporaneously. They didn't need the strength they brought to Pearl for that. They "knew" they were up against the Island defenses, only. This question is like a sudden cold front moves in dropping the temperature from 70 to 40 and, "Gee, I should have brought a sweater." Well, yeah, but I wasn't expecting the cold front. Likewise, given the expectations, the strike force had conceivably more than it needed there.

Peter Gunn said:

So are you saying because they didn't have very good AA (which the IJN certainly didn't) that the extra oh let's say, 32 heavy AA guns of Mogi and her three sisters weren't worth adding to the defensive ring around KdB? Maybe the AA suite of IJN cruisers and battleships was a shadow of 1944 but it makes a lot more sense to have them at the actual point of contact with the enemy rather than 200 miles away burning fuel. As it was, the screen around the four IJN CV's was rather pathetic, so I don't see a downside to adding more firepower to the defensive circle.

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Both the early war Americans and the Japanese had pretty pathetic AA suites compared to what the US would start fielding in 1943.
The older US cruisers had eight 5in/25s that fired at 15-20rpm but the normal allowance was for 200 rounds per gun. I don't know if this was peace or wartime or if there was much extra magazine capacity.
Light AA (1.1in and .50 cal) didn't have enough range for much more than self defense.

The Japanese Cruisers had the 5in/40 type 89 guns, that fired at 8-14rpm, apparently there was a supply problem as the rate of fire fell off over time. The eight gun cruisers had a nominal capacity of 200rpg while any cruiser that had the original four guns had 250rpg. The 25mm AA guns and smaller were also not effective at more than self defense ranges.

In contrast the US Cleveland class cruisers started that showing up in 1942 (5 commissioned from June 1942 to Dec) had twelve 5in/38s that fired at 15-22rpm with 500 rounds per gun gun. Baltimore's were later.
The Cleveland's, as first built, had two quad 40mm guns and two twin mounts. These 40mm guns had 1000-2000 yds more effective range than the 25mm/1.1in light AA guns.
By mid 1944 many of the Cleveland's had four quad 40mm and six twin 40mm.

The Atlanta class (four commissioned in by the end of 1942) had sixteen 5in/38s with 450rpg. 450-500rpg was pretty standard for the larger US ships armed with 5in/38s.
The US Destroyers started with 300rpg in the pre war types and ended with over 425 rounds per gun.

Japanese destroyers had about 150 rpg and many of the destroyer guns were dual purpose in name only.
12.7 cm/50 (5") 3rd Year Type
" The second batch of these destroyers were also the first to use medium caliber guns with high elevations, giving them a DP function. However, the very slow training speeds, hand ramming and lack of AA fire control made these mountings almost useless against the fast-moving aircraft of World War II."
" Surprisingly for this size weapon, these guns fired bag ammunition and used a Welin breech-block."
These guns had to lowered to about 10 degrees between shots to reload so that their high angle rate of fire was much lower than their low angle (anti-ship) rate of fire.


This was a large part of the US Cruiser/Destroyer effectiveness as floating AA batteries, they had a large number of guns, a good rate of fire and large magazines that meant they could shoot for a longer period of time without running out of ammo. This is also totally ignoring the proximity fuse. They also had better AA directors and in 1944 and on the directors were tied to radar and as the end of the war approached the 40mm guns were given their own directors and radar.

If you space your ships out enough to allow for maneuvering to counter bombing and torpedo attacks the light AA guns can't really do much for other ships, unless they happen to close the flight path of torpedo bombers.


US AA capability in 1944 was a totally different world than Japanese AA capability in 1942.

PAT303 said:

What is the issue with Nagumo's Dilema?, if the aircraft had GP bombs meant for ground targets what does it matter if they are used against carriers?, the US carriers had timber decks, they won't know the difference between bombs, send the damn planes and strike immediately.

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It was Japanese doctrine to use large, coordinated strikes.

The big decision to me is steering toward the USN carriers and closing the distance instead of sailing away and opening the distance. Nagumo didn't seem to consider that the American carriers might have already launched a strike at him. Opening the range would have made that strike's chances of success dwindle, given the shorter range of American aircraft. Nagumo could have gotten everything properly ready on his carriers, then steered back toward the USN carriers until they were within range of his own strike aircraft while hopefully staying outside the range of any retaliatory strike.

Nagumo assumed there were two USN carriers and felt he had numbets on his side.

He had no idea the Yorktown existed, it had been sunk.

GrauGeist said:

Nagumo assumed there were two USN carriers and felt he had numbets on his side.

He had no idea the Yorktown existed, it had been sunk.

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If not sunk the possibility of it being repaired in 2-3 days was not considered.
They assumed it was sunk (or soon would be) based on the smoke coming out of it.

Read "Shattered Sword", it gives a good account of "Nagumo's Dilema".

In short, he was on a crowded noisy (and cramped) bridge, nothing like Enterprise or Yorktown where the Admiral had his own workspace on a different deck than the operations staff.

Also he had been under attack for about an hour off and on and had just missed "becoming a hood ornament on a B-26" earlier.

Taking that into account as well as him not really being an "outside the box thinker" and there's very little chance he'd throw IJN doctrine to the wind.

33k in the air said:

It was Japanese doctrine to use large, coordinated strikes.

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^^^ This

33k in the air said:

It was Japanese doctrine to use large, coordinated strikes.

The big decision to me is steering toward the USN carriers and closing the distance instead of sailing away and opening the distance. Nagumo didn't seem to consider that the American carriers might have already launched a strike at him. Opening the range would have made that strike's chances of success dwindle, given the shorter range of American aircraft. Nagumo could have gotten everything properly ready on his carriers, then steered back toward the USN carriers until they were within range of his own strike aircraft while hopefully staying outside the range of any retaliatory strike.

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Not to mention he'd be closing on his "distant cover" of Yamamoto and his battleships that were bumbling around some 200 miles away.

Peter Gunn said:

In short, he was on a crowded noisy (and cramped) bridge, nothing like Enterprise or Yorktown where the Admiral had his own workspace on a different deck than the operations staff.

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This cannot be underestimated, having a table with models showing the positions of all the combatants allowing a visual picture of the situation without officers interrupting, being able to move freely about and having time to calm ones nerves and getting clarity of thought regarding decision making is worth a squadron of dive bombers.

PAT303 said:

This cannot be underestimated, having a table with models showing the positions of all the combatants allowing a visual picture of the situation without officers interrupting, being able to move freely about and having time to calm ones nerves and getting clarity of thought regarding decision making is worth a squadron of dive bombers.

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Training is where you prepare people for the real world, but the real world is what separates the wheat from the chaff.

33k in the air said:

It was Japanese doctrine to use large, coordinated strikes.

The big decision to me is steering toward the USN carriers and closing the distance instead of sailing away and opening the distance. Nagumo didn't seem to consider that the American carriers might have already launched a strike at him. Opening the range would have made that strike's chances of success dwindle, given the shorter range of American aircraft. Nagumo could have gotten everything properly ready on his carriers, then steered back toward the USN carriers until they were within range of his own strike aircraft while hopefully staying outside the range of any retaliatory strike.

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Best answer so far for my money. If you're determined to mount a large, organized strike, you must have time to do so -- and make the time, if you don't currently have it. Closing the distance actually worked directly against Nagumo's desired solution.

Midway being one my favourite ATL subjects, i would say just bringing Zuikaku could have made a huge difference. Numbers differ a bit depending on the source, but after Coral Sea Zuikaku had operational 24 A6M, 13 D3A and 8 B5N from both it's own and Shokaku's air group (whose planes landed on Zuikaku), while repairable planes were 1 A6M, 4 possibly more D3As and 2 or more B5Ns (again sources differ).

Parshall says there could have been 25 A6M, 17 D3A and 14 B5Ns ready for a hypothetical sortie, which seems the best case scenario. If so it only seems the kanko butai is too short of numbers so my idea is to transfer 6 B5Ns from Kaga. I don't agree with the notion that the japanese weren't mixing air groups at all if necessary, Osamu Tagaya gives examples in his D3A book, in Jan or Feb one of the Kakus transfered to the other carriers most of it's planes and also took planes from the other CVs requiring repairs (before returning to the homeland), before Coral Sea CarDiv 5s losses from the Indian Ocean raids has been replenished from the other carriers of CarDiv 1 and 2. And indeed the cobbled together airgroup of Junyo including a land based A6M detachment (!) from 6 ku shows that they were mixing and matching if they felt the need.

So if they felt the need for Midway, perhaps they could have boosted Zuikaku's airgroup in the fashion above, giving Nagumo 5 CVs operating homogenous air groups. Midway battle outcome as is was already on the edge, the USN was incredibly lucky to have Akagi hit by just 3 planes. With Zuikaku in the battle, especially more Zeros for defence, that can be easily butterflied away. So then you have THREE very angry japanese carriers launching against Fletcher and Spruance at 11.00 and 13.30 PM. That will not end well of TF16 and 17.

Oh and regarding US intelligence, actually they were fully expecting Zuikaku to be there as per John Lundstrom's BSCA, TF16 already sortied well before they received intel showing only the 4 CVs participating (but even so they were still half-expecting Zuikaku to show up) and even before it was certain Yorktown could sail, so for a while they were ready to do battle with just 2 USN vs 5 IJN CVs.

Just some ruminations of mine for now, got a few more issues to adress later.

I don't really see how adding Zuikaku stops Dick Best from planting the fatal hit on Akagi, but perhaps it could happen.

But having Zuikaku and Hiryu both still fully operational would have been a different issue later on. However, it still doesn't guarantee TF 16 will be found and attacked, Yorktown may still have borne the brunt of the IJN attacks that afternoon.

And while Fletcher and Spruance were fully aware/prepared to duke it out 2 or 3 vs 5, they had no intention of any "do or die" tactics. In fact Nimitz expressly laid down the law that if the situation started to go south, they were to leg it out of there and let Midway fall to be taken back later. If indeed Midway would have even been captured, they (Midway) were fully ready to repel the IJN invasion forces and the American OOB looks like a pretty tough nut for the Japanese to crack.

They still lose.

The Japanese Carrier doctrine was to sail the carriers in a large dispersed formation to clear the AA gun arcs.
They had not have the doctrine of mutual support that USN had developed that concentrated the escort ships around the carriers sailing in close formation to maximise defensive fire and fighter cover.

Peter Gunn said:

I don't really see how adding Zuikaku stops Dick Best from planting the fatal hit on Akagi, but perhaps it could happen.

But having Zuikaku and Hiryu both still fully operational would have been a different issue later on. However, it still doesn't guarantee TF 16 will be found and attacked, Yorktown may still have borne the brunt of the IJN attacks that afternoon.

And while Fletcher and Spruance were fully aware/prepared to duke it out 2 or 3 vs 5, they had no intention of any "do or die" tactics. In fact Nimitz expressly laid down the law that if the situation started to go south, they were to leg it out of there and let Midway fall to be taken back later. If indeed Midway would have even been captured, they (Midway) were fully ready to repel the IJN invasion forces and the American OOB looks like a pretty tough nut for the Japanese to crack.

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If the IJN did have the fifth carrier, ships and aircraft wouldn't be exactly where they historically were. So maybe Kaga gets mobbed instead or whatever. That's nitpicking.
Other than that, yeah, what you said!

Edit: I accidentally hit reply. Since it's Midway, I had to come up with something.

Macandy said:

They still lose.

The Japanese Carrier doctrine was to sail the carriers in a large dispersed formation to clear the AA gun arcs.
They had not have the doctrine of mutual support that USN had developed that concentrated the escort ships around the carriers sailing in close formation to maximise defensive fire and fighter cover.

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I certainly not agree with such categorical statements, for anyone studying the mechanics of the battle it looks pretty clear that a US victory was far from certain even without Zuikaku there, despite all their knowledge and all their plans there were events completely outside of their control which would have radically changed the course of events. Like for instance the fact that the Chikuma scout passed right by TF17 at 6.30AM but failed to spot it for whatever reason, if contact would have been made this will radically change the course of events, there will definitely be a large strike launched by KB either before 8 AM or before 9 AM.

Or indeed the fact that Akagi, despite all the odds was hit by just 3 SBDs (due to the bondoogle between VB-6/VB-6) when for instance at Coral Sea whole squadrons of SBD missed Shoho and Shokaku. Probably Best had a 10% chance of hitting, if that didn't happened again the course of events for the afternoon will radically change again, with TWO japanese CVs launching strikes at 11.00 and 13.30

Or indeed the fact that Nagumo declined to launch a strike with just the 34 D3As before 9.00 AM which was certainly possible. If Zuikaku and Hara would have been there perhaps Hara would have added his voice to Yamaguchi's in demanding a strike, not to mention having an extra 17 D3As and more Zeros for escort. they could have sent 9-12 Zeros and 51 D3As flown by the likes of Egusa, Kobayashi and probably Ema, their best dive bomber pilots. Any US TF on the receiving end would have been in mortal danger.

Zuikaku being present with it's roughly 60 odd planes there probably weighs the odds even more towards the japanese imo. Of course that doesn't mean they are 100% likely to win, but as we will never know i think we can still say the odds would have been heavily on KB's side.

SaparotRob said:

If the IJN did have the fifth carrier, ships and aircraft wouldn't be exactly where they historically were. So maybe Kaga gets mobbed instead or whatever. That's nitpicking.
Other than that, yeah, what you said!

Edit: I accidentally hit reply. Since it's Midway, I had to come up with something.

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I fully agree with that, probably it's impossible to actually predict the course of events 100% if Zuikaku was there, but still we can try. It is possible IJN might still lose, but i think it's more difficult for them to lose if Zuikaku was present with it's planes, spotters and AA crews who actually seen action at Coral sea (and seen what the US attacks can do)