The Battle of Midway (Pivotal Moments in American History) (42 page)

Even after they were finally assembled into formation, they had to continue their climb up to 20,000 feet. That climb to altitude took more time—and a lot of gas. While a Dash-4 Wildcat consumed 42 gallons of fuel per hour in level flight, it could burn up as much as 300 gallons per hour in a vertical climb (five gallons a minute). The fact that they had launched first and then had to climb up to 20,000 feet meant that some of the Wildcats used up a significant percentage of their 144-gallon fuel capacity even before the air group headed out for the target. Then, in order to maintain their position above the bombers, which flew at 130 knots, the Wildcats, which cruised at 150 knots, had to serpentine back and forth in a series of lazy’S curves to avoid overrunning the bombers flying below them, and that, too, wasted fuel. The bombers also used up extra gas in an effort to maintain the precise formation of the air group. One pilot recalled, “We flew parade formation and the throttle was in use constantly to maintain position.”
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While the fighters and bombers climbed to altitude, the pilots in Waldron’s torpedo squadron formed up nearly three miles below them, at 1,500 feet. By the time all fifty-nine planes of the
Hornet’s
strike group were in the air, with the bombers and fighters at 20,000 feet and the torpedo planes at 1,500 feet, it was nearly eight o’clock. The launch had taken most of an hour. By contrast, earlier that morning the Kidō Butai had launched 108 planes in just over seven minutes, though they had used four carrier decks to do it. Nevertheless, the
Hornet
air group was at last aloft, formed up, and on its way.

But in what direction?

Without doubt, the most puzzling aspect of the “flight to nowhere” is the course flown by the
Hornet
air group when it did finally set out. A week after the battle, Mitscher submitted an after-action report in which he wrote, “The objective, enemy carriers, was calculated to be 155 miles distant, bearing 239° T[rue] from this Task Force.” Based on that, students of the battle long assumed that Ring led the
Hornet’s
bombers and fighters on a course of 239 degrees—that is, to the southwest. This was also the course indicated on the battle map that Mitscher submitted with his report (shown in gray on the map opposite). According to that report, Ring’s air group missed finding the Kidō Butai that morning because Nagumo reversed course and turned north, and Ring consequently flew south of him. Nonetheless, most other evidence indicates that the
Hornet’s
air group did
not
fly southwesterly at 239 degrees but instead flew almost due west at 265 degrees; it missed the Kidō Butai because that course led the air group eighty to a hundred miles
north
of the target. In addition, the distance to the target may have been very near 155 miles at 7:00 a.m. when the
Hornet
turned into the wind to launch, but because the
Hornet
steamed away from the target at 25 knots for more than an hour in order to launch the air strike, by the time the air group departed, the range to the target was closer to 180 miles.
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While there is no way to know for certain precisely how and why the
Hornet
air group adopted a course of 265 degrees that morning, there are essentially two possibilities. One is that Ring, who was an indifferent navigator, simply miscalculated the course, and Mitscher did not question it amid the haste and eagerness of the morning launch, despite protests from at least two of the squadron commanders. The other is that Mitscher himself calculated the 265 course and ordered Ring to take it in the hope that it would lead him to the two “missing” carriers that none of the American search planes had so far reported.

That first scenario is plausible but unlikely. It assumes that Mitscher, an experienced and self-confident aviator, would not have made his own calculation to the target. Though the black shoe Spruance essentially turned air operations on the
Enterprise
over to his brown-shoe chief of staff, Miles Browning, it would have been highly uncharacteristic for Mitscher on the
Hornet
to turn critical decisions about the air group over to Stanhope Ring or anyone else.

The second scenario takes into account the likelihood that Mitscher would have considered the broader operational circumstances in order to determine how the
Hornet
air group could best contribute to American success. A key concern was the location and disposition of all four of the Japanese carriers. Though they were, in fact, operating as a unit that morning, the Americans did not know that. All the sighting reports so far had indicated that there were only two carriers at the coordinates that had been sent in by the search planes. Like Fletcher, Mitscher very likely asked himself, “Where are the others?”
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Indeed, all of the American flag officers assumed that the Japanese carriers were operating in two groups that morning. In his initial orders to the task-force commanders, as well as to Simard on Midway, Nimitz had suggested that “one or more [of the Japanese] carriers may take up closein daylight positions” for the attack on Midway, while “additional carrier groups” operated against American surface forces. In the briefing that he gave to the pilots the night before the battle, Lieutenant Stephen Jurika, Mitscher’s intelligence officer, announced that “there were at least two carriers, two battleships, several cruisers and about five destroyers in the attack force which would attempt to take Midway.
The support force some distance behind contained the rest of their forces”
(emphasis added). And at 6:48 on the morning of the battle, just before the
Hornet
began launching, Fletcher sent a message to Spruance by TBS (a message which Mitscher no doubt monitored) to remind him that “two carriers [are] unaccounted for.” All of that may have encouraged Mitscher to send his air group to the west rather than the southwest in the expectation of finding that second enemy carrier group. In the only comment Ring ever made about the course he flew that day, he wrote: “Departure from Hornet was taken on predetermined interception course, Group Commander leading.” Predetermined by whom he does not say.
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If this is indeed what happened, it is curious that neither Mitscher nor Ring shared the object of the mission with the squadron commanders, and because of that Waldron became even more frustrated and unsatisfied. He knew that a course of 265 degrees would not lead them to the carriers that had been reported and plotted by all the squadron commanders. As he made his way down to the flight deck, he pulled aside his squadron’s navigator, Ensign George Gay, and told him that he thought the assigned course was wrong. If necessary, he told Gay, he would fly his own course to the target. “Don’t think I’m lost,” Waldron said. “Just track me so that if anything happens to me the boys can count on you to bring them back.”
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Rear Admiral (Select) Pete Mitscher observes flight operations from the bridge wing of the USS
Hornet.
(U.S. Naval Institute)

Over the next hour, the
Hornet
was fully occupied in launching aircraft, and the pilots were busy jockeying into formation. By 7:55 a.m. the entire air group was in the air, and Ring led it westward on a course of 265 degrees. The radar operator on the
Hornet
tracked them as they flew westward until they disappeared off the scope. The pilots flew under radio silence, yet only about fifteen minutes into this flight, Ring’s radio crackled to life and he heard Waldron’s voice: “You’re going the wrong direction for the Japanese carrier force.” Ring was furious that Waldron had broken radio silence, and equally furious to be challenged like this on an open radio net, in effect in front of the entire command. “I’m leading this flight,” he snapped back. “You fly with us right here.” Waldron was not intimidated. “I know where the damned Jap fleet is,” he insisted. Ring was adamant, as well as angry: “You fly on us. I’m leading this formation; you fly on us.” There was a brief silence, and then one more broadcast from Waldron: “Well, the hell with you. I know where they are and I’m going to them.” Three miles below, Waldron banked his plane off to the left, heading southwest, and his entire squadron, most of whom had probably heard the radio exchange, went with him. It was just past 8:30. At about that moment, Nagumo was making his decision to recover the Midway strike force before launching his attack against the Americans.
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Stanhope Ring—perhaps with clenched teeth—flew on with the forty-four bombers and fighters. Below them, nothing was visible save patchy clouds and open ocean. By now the fuel gauges on some of the Wildcats were nearing the halfway mark. Ensign Ben Tappan kept one eye on his gas indicator as he flew. He remembered thinking they’d never make it back. He wasn’t the only one. Ensign John E. McInerny was also unsettled. He looked over to his wingman, Ensign Johnny Magda, and made an openhanded shrug, as if to ask, “What’s going on?” Magda shook his head, which McInerny interpreted as, “I don’t know either.” They flew on.
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