Battle of Midway (1942): AF ruse · 551

Code, carriers, and a morning in June Midway was an intelligence success that still had to be converted by dive bombers -- and by luck of timing that historians still argue about. May 1942 left Yorktown damaged and Japan short of a clean win. Yamamoto planned a complex operation with feints at the Aleutians. Complexity was itself a risk.

Nimitz, advised by Rochefort's HYPO, concentrated three carriers northeast of Midway. Nagumo's rearming cycle -- land bombs versus torpedoes after the Midway strike -- is the operational hinge in most English accounts. US torpedo squadrons were slaughtered; their sacrifice pulled Japanese air cover down.

McClusky's Enterprise dive bombers and Leslie's Yorktown group found the carriers in a brief, decisive window. Hiryu's counterstrike fatally wounded Yorktown. US aircraft then found Hiryu. The Japanese surface fleet never got its night battle. Airmen and sailors, not battleships, had decided a fleet action -- a doctrinal shock for both navies' older officers.