The Roundtable
Forum
Official Newsletter of the Battle of Midway Roundtable
9 February 2011
Issue Number: 2011-04
Our 14th Year
~ IN THIS ISSUE ~
1. Jimmie Thach at Midway
2. Morison History Reissued
3. BOM Article In Air Force Magazine
4. Book Review: War and Remembrance
5. Featured Link: USS Hornet (1943 film)
6. Editor’s Notes
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JIMMIE THACH AT MIDWAY
Over the years we’ve
had a lot of intense focus on many of the principal personalities of the BOM,
both the heroic as well as the unsuccessful, on both sides. It’s possible that one of the battle’s more
notable heroes hasn’t had as much exposure here as he might deserve: VF-3
commander John “Jimmie” Thach.
Roundtable member James
Nicholson sent in the following list of Thach’s accomplishments in the BOM, and
viewed in this manner, they indeed suggest that Thach’s name probably deserves
to be included among the battle’s most successful commanders.
Here is James’
list. At Midway, Lt. Commander
Thach....
1. Put together a cohesive
squadron out of Yorktown’s VF-42 and portions of VF-3 with little or no
opportunity for adequate preparation.
2. Tragically lost his
executive officer in a flight deck crash only a week before the battle
commenced, but immediately replaced him with VF-42’s Lt. William Leonard and
moved on without hardly missing a step.
3. After planning an
eight-plane escort that would make possible his “Thach Weave” defense against
the Zeros at Midway, he had to come up with an alternate plan at the last
minute when his flight was reduced to just six planes before launch.
4. In spite of that
game-changing handicap, he managed to implement the weave with his revised
formation literally “on the fly” in their gallant fight against Nagumo’s Zeros.
5. In so doing, he led the
only fighters that accomplished anything of merit over the enemy fleet.
6. He led them through a
fight at huge odds, scoring lopsided victories against superior enemy aircraft,
and still brought most of his pilots home
7. In so doing, he
personally got three Zero kills.
8. In the afternoon
torpedo attack against the Yorktown, he launched with the CAP and shot
down the Japanese flight leader.
James was the only
Roundtable member who offered Thach’s name in our “Most Memorable Scene” survey
in recent issues. That might not be
surprising, since the BOM invariably compels focus on the saga of the VT
squadrons and the achievements of the dive bombers. But this tally of what Thach pulled off at Midway with painfully
minimal resources at least suggests that he deserves to be ranked as the
premier U.S. fighter pilot and VF commander in the battle.
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MORISON HISTORY
REISSUED
Naval Institute Press
is in the process of re-issuing Samuel Eliot Morison’s History of United
States Naval Operations In World War II.
Each of the 15 volumes will become available on a sequential basis,
being released approximately two to three months apart. Volumes 1 through 6 are available so far
(Volume 4 covers the BOM).
To view the reissued
works, go to the USNI web site and scroll
down to the “Books” search field in the middle of the page. Open the pull-down menu and scroll down to
“History of U.S. Naval Operations in World War II” and click to highlight it,
then click the search button (magnifying glass).
Roundtable member Tom
Fritz points out that a lot has been learned about the facts of WW2, especially
the BOM, since Morison’s history was written, and “unfortunately, republication means reintroducing falsehoods
that have already been exposed. I
wouldn’t mind republication if each book had an introduction that listed the
truth as we know it today; the Battle of Midway is a prime example.”
Tom has a valid point, and in fact, each of
the re-issued volumes has a new introduction.
Members who acquire any of these books are invited to send us a review,
with particular focus on any new or revised material in the Introduction or
otherwise.
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BOM ARTICLE IN AIR
FORCE MAGAZINE
Roundtable member and
prolific author Barrett Tillman has a very good short overview of the BOM in
the current issue of Air
Force magazine. It covers the basics with very credible
accuracy, as one would expect from one of our author-historian members. Click the link to read it on-line.
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BOOK REVIEW: WAR AND
REMEMBRANCE
Ed. note: as described on our Midway Library page, episode 3 in
Volume 1 of the War and Remembrance television miniseries is one
of the best dramatizations of the BOM available on video. The following review of the Herman Wouk
novel on which the series was based comes from Roundtable member Scott Kair.
War
and Remembrance, by Herman Wouk.
Little, Brown & Co., 1978
Wouk’s magnum opus is
remembered for the television miniseries based upon it, and particularly for
the improved video depiction of the BOM.
The novel follows the family and friends of Capt. Victor “Pug” Henry,
USN, through the cataclysmic events between Pearl Harbor and VJ Day. Readers must suspend disbelief that this
small circle could witness or act to influence nearly every significant battle
and event of the war.
Wouk’s reporting of those events, and more critically,
his analyses of those events in light of more recent evidence is worth
examining. There can be no doubt of his
passion for the subject. After serving as a naval officer in WW2, Wouk wrote The
Caine Mutiny and other works. He
spent 16 years researching War and Remembrance, which required writing a
prequel, The Winds of War; the story he “had to tell in order to tell
this one.”
Wouk’s narrative of the BOM is constrained by the era in
which it was written. Thus his VT
attacks pulled down Kido Butai’s CAP, clearing the air for the dive bombers to
strike unopposed just as Nagumo’s counter-strike began to launch. His account, though, caught an action that
I’ve not seen previously emphasized. He
points out quite explicitly that while McClusky was still trying to find the
Japanese, Gene Lindsey, like Waldron, took his VT squadron almost directly to
Kido Butai.
He is, though, unsparing in pointing out that we bumbled
into victory (a theme that recurs in his battle accounts). His analysis of the morning dive bomber
strike is pungent: “It was a perfect coordinated attack. It was timed almost to the second. It was a freak accident.”
Wouk literally enshrines the members of the fleet VT
squadrons, listing the pilots and gunners by squadron, those lost presented in
black-bordered boxes. Following his
analysis of the bomber strike is a heartfelt tribute to the VT crews: “What was
not luck, but the soul of the United States of America in action, was the
willingness of the torpedo plane squadrons to go in against hopeless odds.”
The value of the book for our purposes lies in Wouk’s
analyses of the BOM. Lest we think that
ranking Midway with Salamis and Lepanto is a recent realization, Wouk hit those
notes and many more over a generation ago.
The triumph at Midway was quickly understood as a turning point in the
Pacific war. Wouk’s gift is the clarity
to see it as initiating a global chain of events that led directly to Allied
victory in all theaters. His prior
casting of Capt. Henry as President Roosevelt’s naval aide allowed for the
character to be present at, or receive reliable reports of the conferences
among the Allied heads of state which determined geostrategic goals and the
means to pursue them. His presentation of analysis by different characters
allows for including differing and challenging perspectives.
Wouk’s analyses
of the impact of Midway astounded me; both Secretary Schlesinger’s speech in
2002 and Robert Morgenthau’s “Newsweek” article in 2007 clearly derived from
Wouk’s 1978 fiction.
Among the many gems is a reminder to all
who study mankind’s self-inflicted cataclysm: “Yet the overwhelming reality
during the war...is that nobody knew how it would go.”
--Scott Kair
11 January 2011
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FEATURED LINK: USS HORNET (1943 FILM)
Pat Doyle in Arizona
has sent us another captivating link, this one a Navy Department documentary on
USS Hornet (CV-8). It includes
some familiar footage, but there is lot more that should be new to most of
you. To view it, click here.
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EDITOR’S NOTES
~ Thanks again to Pat Doyle for another
interesting on-line reference. And to
correct my i.d. of him in the last issue, his status in the Navy is now the
same as his F-14 Tomcat: retired.
~ Scale model fans may appreciate this
rendering of George
Gay’s TBD-1. It’s a brilliant
photograph, and to my eye, the details on the plane are meticulously
authentic. (Thanks to John Greaves for
the link.)
~ This past week I did a check of each entry
on our Links page and found
several of them that had problems or no longer existed. I’ve updated the page accordingly, and
regret that a few very worthy references had to be removed. Each of our members is invited to check the
page and let me know of any other current sites that should be added to the
list. I’m especially looking for
resources that have very good images of the ships and planes of the BOM era.
YOUR COMMENTS ARE INVITED
Members are always welcome to submit comments or inquiries for
publication in the Roundtable Forum.
Well-crafted essays or expanded articles on Midway-related subjects
are especially invited, including book or media reviews, photos, documents, web
links, etc. For guidance with anything
you might like to submit, please view our FAQs.