The Steel Fleet: Naval warfare compendium, discussion and Inquiry thread.

The_Warhawk: Parshall covers that subject in detail in Shattered Sword. Particuarly they argue that the Aleutians attack wasn't actually related to the Midway. It was a seperate attack formulated by junior officers in both the Army and Navy GHQ. The theory being that a base in the Aleutians could be used to stop attacks from the US against the Northern Japanese Islands. (Sort of true, the USAAF did attack the Japan from the Aleutians). Parshall and Tully both further argue that attacks on the Aleutians don't make sense as a diversion, as this planned 'decisive battle' was supposed to take place Southwest of Midway.   But whether or not the Aleutians were a diversion or not is another matter entirely I suppose. The Carriers in question are the Ryujo and Junyo. By May 29 the Ryujo was only carrying 30 of her norminal 48 aircraft. Additionally she only had a single elevator, which would have hampered the already prolonged recovery, rearming and spotting time.   The Junyo's Air Wing left a lot to be desired. While she could carry a respectable 54 aircraft, she only had 33 aircraft embarked. Additionally, she was a converted liner with a 25 knot top speed, which rendered her incapable of launching Torpedo planes. Additionally her Air Wing was a mismatched hodgepodge of aviators from several different ships, as well as pilots fresh from their flight school.   Certainly it would have provided more Aircraft for Japanese CAPs. And provides 60 additional aircraft for the fleet, which is about the Air Wing of another Fleet Carrier, and could have certainly proven useful for additional CAP planes and strikes planes. Would it have made a major difference? I can't say or sure. I'd say I definitely have my doubts as well.  There's no way to tell if the additional planes would have actually provided the extra bit of fire power to knock out Midway. It was entirely possible, but it was entirely possible to knock out Midway's runway with the actual strike force. Similarly, IJN CAPs had insufficient coordination between aircraft and the carriers themselves, would more aircraft be beneficial in that case? Sure in that you have more pilots (theoretically) engaging more enemy aircraft. However, with sup par coordination between the Carriers, and their planes, as well as the planes with eachother, the advantage garnered from additional CAP planes is heavily undermined by the lack of communication.