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Quite frankly, I don't think they needed more fleet. What they needed was Midway out of the way, before they met our carriers. Another month would have given us another month to mobilize, too. I'm assuming they catch us the same way in July, i.e., right there on the doorstep with our carriers. Who knows what other resources we'd have been able to bring to bear had we had that extra month? If, on the other hand, you're contemplating catching us unaware in July, I'll say you're underestimating what went wrong for them in June. Had they caught us unaware, they'd have taken Midway out of the fight, before they met our carriers. That striking force they had for that purpose was just that strong. In my honest opinion, anyway. Their battleships, alone, had they had them in range, would have reduced that island to a cinder.I'm reading Craig Symonds' book The Battle of Midway. It's pretty good, lots of backgro und material, but I like Shattered Sword better over all. It got me thinking about how things had been different if the Japanese had waited until July 1942 for their Midway. Perhaps to include Shokaku and Zuikaku in the operation. Would it have gone better or even worse for the Japanese? What do you think? Why?
True. Little doubt the Shokaku and Zuikaku could have been there.That depends on what the IJN do during the month of June 1942.
Do we know this for sure?The Aleutian operation was not connected to Midway
Code books have little to do with superior USN intelligence at Midway.
Midway had 31 long range PBY recon aircraft. Enough to completely saturate airspace around the atoll to a distance of 700 miles. The USN knew approximately where all the IJN fleets were a day before the main battle. In fact the USN had so many PBYs that a handful were employed as torpedo bombers and they scored a hit on an IJA transport the night before the main battle. Japan had to rely on ship based recon aircraft with less then half the search radius. It didn't help that IJN shipboard aircraft were down to about 75% of authorized strength even before the battle started.
Why Admiral Yamamoto chose a battle location where the USN had an overwhelming recon advantage has never been explained. Japan could have fought in the Coral Sea where they had long range seaplanes which would level the recon playing field.
IMO it's more likely the USN retain Wasp and Ranger in the Atlantic.
Your conclusion is for the most part conceded. But I still hear you resolving all your variables in favor of the prosecution. Let's just take one such variable and resolve it in favor of the defense; namely, what another month could have done for Midway, assuming, of course, had we had the drop, as we had. That could very conceivably have meant trained dive-bomber pilots in those SBDs, who were accustomed to the blackouts when they pulled out of those steep, high-speed dives, so they wouldn't instead have had to rely on gliding those bombs in. As it was, those initial strikes faced the heaviest fighter-cover, and yet, they still managed to get off several direct hits. Make those aircraft coming in on dive-bombing trajectories, as opposed to those slower, flatter, and more vulnerable glide-bombing trajectories, and now figure the damage inflicted, bearing in mind, a 500-pound bomb, even a 100-pound bomb, smashing into a carrier deck, is very likely going to disrupt, if not cripple, those operations.I'll play devil's advocate for the Japanese. If they would have had Shokaku and Zuikaku, and if the Americans would have only added Saratoga, then I think the Japanese would have had a fighting chance at a favorable outcome; but only IF American airpower on Midway wasn't greatly enhanced. If they would have changed their codes between June and July, their odds would be improved. Similarly, applying the light carriers (which were assigned the Aleutians mission) to Midway also would have helped their chances.
Both sides showed a history of piling on a crippled ship rather than knocking the most ships out of action. The Americans' target selection in the historical Midway battle was much wiser than average. The Shokaku and Zuikaku both showed they could take a lot of damage and survive. All of the Japanese carriers would not be needed for the strikes on Midway. It is therefore unlikely that a surprise dive bomber attack would find them all fueling and arming aircraft. In fact, it is unlikely that all of the carriers would be found at the same time much less hit at the same time. Hiryu was in the same formation as the other 3 carriers, but Hiryu was left untouched in the first attack. Taken altogether, even if attacked by surprise by an American dive bombers from 4 or 5 carriers, it is likely that some Japanese flattops would remain undamaged or barely damaged. These surviving ships could deliver a hard blow with their planes and the orphan planes of sunk sister carriers. For historical proof of the diluting factor of large carrier groups, I offer an example of the Battle of the Philippine Sea (the Marianas battle). When the American carrier airmen finally got a crack at the Japanese carriers in the Battle of the Philippine Sea, the Americans damaged many ships but only sunk one carrier, and the American carrier force in June 1944 was a lot larger than it was in 1942.
The first team of IJN attack pilots were crackerjacks. If they got a clear shot at American carriers, they would likely score an even higher percentage of hits than the American dive bomber pilots scored in the historical battle. If they would have gotten first shot at the Americans, which would have been more likely with more carriers to share scouting duty, they could have scored hits on 4-5 carriers in the first attack alone.
In a nutshell, if the Japanese had more carriers, it would have diluted the American attacks, with more Japanese carriers surviving the first attack and an even greater proportion of the planes and surviving to make additional attacks. More carriers would have meant better scouting and more chances to find the Americans. (More American carriers would mean that their formations would take up more space, so they would be easier to find anyway.)
One of the tragedies in those Midway strikes is they had dive-bombers they didn't know how to utilize as dive-bombers. Give them another month, I'm suggesting, and it's not inconceivable they'd have had that issue resolved.