I am a die-hard WWII fan and I LOOVE this movie! It is definately one of the most accurate WWII movies that Holywood ever created. As far as history goes; it's pretty much "to the letter." The Battle of Midway (Japanese: ¥ß¥Ã¥É¥¦¥§©`º£`é) is widely regarded as the most important naval battle of the Pacific Campaign of World War II.[5][6][7] Between 4 and 7 June 1942, approximately one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea and six months after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States Navy decisively defeated an Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) attack against Midway Atoll, inflicting irreparable damage on the Japanese fleet.[8] Military historian John Keegan has called it "the most stunning and decisive blow in the history of naval warfare."[9]
The Japanese operation, like the earlier attack on Pearl Harbor, sought to eliminate the United States as a strategic power in the Pacific, thereby giving Japan a free hand in establishing its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. The Japanese hoped that another demoralizing defeat would force the U.S. to capitulate in the Pacific War.[10]
The Japanese plan was to lure the United States' aircraft carriers into a trap.[11] The Japanese also intended to occupy Midway Atoll as part of an overall plan to extend their defensive perimeter in response to the Doolittle Raid. This operation was also considered preparatory for further attacks against Fiji and Samoa.
The plan was handicapped by faulty Japanese assumptions of the American reaction and poor initial dispositions.[12] Most significantly, American codebreakers were able to determine the date and location of the attack, enabling the forewarned U.S. Navy to set up an ambush of its own. Four Japanese aircraft carriers and a heavy cruiser were sunk for a cost of one American aircraft carrier and a destroyer. After Midway, and the exhausting attrition of the Solomon Islands campaign, Japan's shipbuilding and pilot training programs were unable to keep pace in replacing their losses while the U.S. steadily increased its output in both areas.[13]
Japan had attained its initial strategic goals quickly, taking the Philippines, Malaya, Singapore, and the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia); the latter, with its vital resources, was particularly important to Japan. Because of this preliminary planning for a second phase of operations commenced as early as January 1942. However, there were strategic disagreements between the Imperial Army and Imperial Navy, and infighting between the Navy's GHQ and Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto's Combined Fleet, such that a follow-up strategy was not formulated until April 1942.[14] Admiral Yamamoto finally succeeded in winning the bureaucratic struggle by using a thinly veiled threat to resign, after which his operational concept of further operations in the Central Pacific was accepted ahead of other competing plans.
Yamamoto's primary strategic goal was the elimination of America's carrier forces, which he perceived as the principal threat to the overall Pacific campaign.[nb 1] This concern was acutely heightened by the Doolittle Raid (18 April 1942) in which USAAF B-25 Mitchells launched from USS Hornet bombed targets in Tokyo and several other Japanese cities. The raid, while militarily insignificant, was a severe psychological shock to the Japanese and showed the existence of a gap in the defenses around the Japanese home islands.[16][nb 2] This and other successful "hit and run" raids by American carriers, showed that they were still a threat although, seemingly, reluctant to be drawn into an all-out battle.[17] Yamamoto reasoned that another attack on the main U.S base at Pearl Harbor would induce all of the American fleet out to fight, including the carriers; however, given the strength of American land-based air power on Hawaii, he judged that Pearl Harbor could no longer be attacked directly.[18] Instead, he selected Midway, at the extreme northwest end of the Hawaiian Island chain, some 1,300 mi (1,100 nmi; 2,100 km) from Oahu. Midway was not especially important in the larger scheme of Japan's intentions, but the Japanese felt the Americans would consider Midway a vital outpost of Pearl Harbor and would therefore strongly defend it.[19] The U.S. did consider Midway vital; after the battle, establishment of a U.S. submarine base on Midway allowed submarines operating from Pearl Harbor to refuel and reprovision, extending their radius of operations by 1,200 mi (1,900 km). An airstrip on Midway served as a forward staging point for bomber attacks on Wake Island.
Typical of Japanese naval planning during World War II, Yamamoto's battle plan was exceedingly complex.[21] Additionally, his design was predicated on optimistic intelligence suggesting USS Enterprise and USS Hornet, forming Task Force 16, were the only carriers available to the U.S. Pacific Fleet at the time. At the Battle of the Coral Sea just a month earlier, USS Lexington had been sunk and USS Yorktown damaged severely enough that the Japanese believed it also to have been sunk. The Japanese were also aware that USS Saratoga was undergoing repairs on the West Coast after suffering torpedo damage from a submarine.
However, more important was Yamamoto's belief the Americans had been demoralized by their frequent defeats during the preceding six months. Yamamoto felt deception would be required to lure the U.S. fleet into a fatally compromised situation. To this end, he dispersed his forces so that their full extent (particularly his battleships) would be unlikely to be discovered by the Americans prior to battle. Critically, Yamamoto's supporting battleships and cruisers would trail Vice-Admiral Nagumo Ch¨±ichi's carrier striking force by several hundred miles. Japan's heavy surface forces were intended to destroy whatever part of the U.S. fleet might come to Midway's relief, once Nagumo's carriers had weakened them sufficiently for a daylight gun duel;[23] this was typical of the battle doctrine of most major navies.[24]
Yamamoto did not know that the U.S. had broken the main Japanese naval code (dubbed JN-25 by the Americans). Yamamoto's emphasis on dispersal also meant that none of his formations could support each other. For instance, the only significant warships larger than destroyers that screened Nagumo's fleet were two battleships and three cruisers, despite his carriers being expected to carry out the strikes and bear the brunt of American counterattacks. By contrast, the flotillas of Yamamoto and Kondo had between them two light carriers, five battleships, and six cruisers, none of which would see any action at Midway. Their distance from Nagumo's carriers would also have grave implications during the battle, since the larger warships in Yamamoto and Kondo's forces carried scout planes, an invaluable reconnaissance capability denied to Nagumo
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Reviewed in the United States on March 23, 2024
Reviewed in the United States on March 24, 2024
Excellent movie and actors
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Reviewed in the United States on March 6, 2024
Reviewed in the United States on November 18, 2007
Top reviews from other countries
Pedro from Santander (Spain)
Versión BluRay en español con extras.
Reviewed in Spain on December 22, 2022
Darth Maciek
One of the best war films ever made, although harmed by the bad use of war footage
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 28, 2012Mr. R. E. J. Hyson
Worth it for the bonus features
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 29, 2023