Combined Fleet destroys USN at Midway? Effects?

A point I've not seen considered here yet it the tactical effect of the Saratoga on the tail end of the battle. On the fourth it was in PH reconfiguring for combat. OTL it joined Spruances command on the 8th, with a double load of aircraft. Would Nimitz bother sending it west, or keep it around

Also how far east was the BB fleet & it's escort carrier?
 
Presumably they try to take Midway with the Landing Force, but this will be a far harder nut to crack, and US Subs will be active in the Area.

Long term, the USN can replace every one of those ships, but the USN is likely to scale back Dugout Doug's efforts, and a laser focus on the Central Drive. Might see the B-36 bumped up in priority, for bomb to be put on Japan sooner than later in waiting for the B-29 bases in China, when the B-36 could fly from the West Coast or Alaska

Basically, this.

We've discussed this scenario...more times than I can count.

The ground assault on Midway Atoll will proceed, and it will be bloodly repulsed, for the reasons given by Parshall and Tully in Appendix 6 of Shattered Sword (you can read the whole thing in the preview). Or go read any of @CalBear's past posts on this. Of course, sinking three USN fleet carriers is more valuable to Japan than that atoll.

No question that MacArthur's campaign into New Guinea gets scaled back, but the real change in US strategy is indeed buterflying away the Solomons Campaign. The Solomons meatgrinder gets shifted up to the Marshalls and Gilberts when Nimitz finally has the first flood of the Two Ocean Navy Act tonnage on hand to kick off his Central Pacific Offensive.

The one thing you didn't mention is what Yamamoto does next. He would surely execute Operation FS, probably in August, timing and scope dependent on air crew losses at Midway. This will fail because the objectives were far better defended than the Japanese realized and anyway it can't be sustained logistically.

Interesting thought on the B-36's.
 
Thanks for the useful chart on air strength in the UK.

Away from my office so I cant pull up assortment of charts and graphs. But, more than one historian has trawled through the Luftwaffe records & the short version is the Germans took 68% of their losses in the west in 1943. From early spring the losses in pilots were unsustainable and the losses in aircraft were made up by replacing twin engine production with interceptors only. A drop in production quality occured as well, adding to the non combat operating losses.

Ellis in 'Brute Force' provided summaries of the Luftwaffe operating strength for 1942-1945. In 1943 the number fluctuated between momentary lows of 4500 & peak spikes of near 6,000. The average was between 5,000 & 5,500 for the year. About half that was on the Eastern Front until the autum of 1943. The other half was spread from Norway (250-300) to the MTO, with the numbers in each area fluctuating widely as the year passed. At the start of the year Germany was increasing its Mediterranean strength to offset declining Italian air strength & to defeat the Allies in Tunisia. For the first half or the year the MTO asorbed a bit over half the operational aircraft in the west, & between 800 & 1200 were spread across France & the Low Countries, or defending Germany.

Three times the Luftwaffe tried to make a stand up fight in the MTO. Over Tunisia in the winter & early spring, over Sicilly during the summer, and southern Italy in September. Each time the combined Axis air forces were shot out of the air & broke off the campaign as losses became unsustainable. The ground forces were left exposed to Allied air attack & the Italian navy ceased effective operations in early spring. That the Brits were able to run cargo ship convoys unmolested through the Sicillian Strait in June, when the Axis still control Sicilly speaks loudly. The Axis air commanders felt it was more important to preserve strength than to keep the Mediterranian sea route closed. In October the Luftwaffe leaders threw in the towel in the MTO and engaged only when conditions were very favorable. Units were withdrawn to Germany & air strength in the MTO declined by half in the remainder of the year.

Also in the autum 600+ interceptors were moved from the Eastern Front to Germany. (One source stated 800, but that may have included some bombers.) This was in response to the increasing 8th & 15th AF raids. That is the core strength of the Luftwaffe became confined to Germany & operations in the periphrial regions shrank significantly. Anyone who thinks the German air force could defeat the Allied air forces over France in 1943 needs to study closely the Mediterranian campaign. The weather & inadaquate infrastructure hindered the Allied air effort there more than the combined Axis air forces. Yes the Axis had some spectacular tactical sucesses in the MTO in 1943. Blowing up a ammunition ship in the center of the invasion fleet off Sicilly got everyones attention, the Brindisi raid was a great sucess, its correct there was a favorable attrition rate for the Germans in fighter vs fighter combat. Yet the Germans lost and badly. At the stratigic & operational levels they lost pilots faster than they could train them and could barely replace losses in aircraft. Conversely the Allies increased training time for their rookies, and doubled their operating strength in the UK and MTO for 1943

The Luftwaffe failed to do that in the MTO. What would be different in France?

No Allied Tac Air, for one; even with the Allied air advantage the Germans came close to destroying the Salerno landings anyway in late 1943. Operating over France also plays heavily to the Luftwaffe's advantages as far as distance (Unlike Tunisia) and local support. Also, it appears the numbers are pretty close to being equal if you include fighters slated for air defense of the Reich.
 
Plus there may be more Cleveland CL-> Independence CVL Conversions.

I've long contended this to be a high probability. It is the only way the U.S. can put flight decks for fast carrier forces in the water in a hurry. There are no available slipways for additional rush job Essex's, and CVE's will not be able to do the job.

So maybe you get an additional 3-6 Independence class decks, rush order.
 
In addition to green American divisions there would have been veteran Commonwealth divisions.

If the Allied main effort is in NW Europe it makes no difference, Luftwaffe is simply destroyed there instead of MTO. As for Operation Avalanche it cannot be compared to a main landing in 1943 due to resources available. Furthermore, in a scenario without Torch but Libya captured the Germans would have to guard Sicily, Italy, Sardinia, Corsica and possibly French Mediterranean coast against possible Allied invasion.

The resources for OVERLORD simply aren't there and those Commonwealth Divisions is why HUSKY and AVALANCHE were done in the first place; the Brits, having most of the available forces, were dead set against invading France in 1943 and couldn't be ignored on a political basis. American planners also basically conceded when the logistical issues-not enough landing aircraft or available shipping, for one bottleneck-made SLEDGEHAMMER impossible. So you'd be sending in a far smaller Allied invasion force, no experience with NGFS or amphibious ops on a mass scale against and without air support. You're basically asking for a massive Dieppe.
 
A point I've not seen considered here yet it the tactical effect of the Saratoga on the tail end of the battle. On the fourth it was in PH reconfiguring for combat. OTL it joined Spruances command on the 8th, with a double load of aircraft. Would Nimitz bother sending it west, or keep it around

Also how far east was the BB fleet & it's escort carrier?

Hard to see Saratoga trying to intervene solo, after all three of Fletcher's decks are sunk. Nimitz was working on the premise of "Calculated risk." The risks are too high here, and he will need that deck.

Perhaps it hangs around just beyond range, uniting with Fletcher's escorts, keeping tabs on Nagumo, maybe hoping to pick off cripples and rescue survivors after Nagumo withdraws, which he'll have to before long.
 
No Allied Tac Air, for one; even with the Allied air advantage the Germans came close to destroying the Salerno landings anyway in late 1943. Operating over France also plays heavily to the Luftwaffe's advantages as far as distance (Unlike Tunisia) and local support. Also, it appears the numbers are pretty close to being equal if you include fighters slated for air defense of the Reich.

Why would there be no Tac Air? The Brits had their techniques well developed by 1943 & the US techniques in May 1944 were little better than in November 1942.

I think if you measure it out on the maps you will find the air campaign ranges in the MTO were not short.
 
Ranger was not really a combat capable platform, even when the U.S. was down to one deck in the Pacific the Ranger stayed in the Atlantic.

This is my only quibble with your post, CB.

No question that Ranger is not as capable a deck as . . . well, all the others. Still, it can do 29 knots, and its air wing is still big enough to be useful. After a disaster like this, I really do think that desperation will rule the day. There will be something of a freakout. Ranger almost certainly gets sent to the Pacific. Anyhow, it's not like Nimitz will be undertaking any offensives. He just needs a carrier task force big enough to parry any new Japanese offensive. Though to be fair, Nimitz wouldn't really *need* it to stop Operation FS, a plan doomed to failure anyway (not that he or King might fully appreciate that at the time).

Still, you can do TORCH without Ranger. Substitute in a Brit deck. It would still happen.

Once the Essex's and Independences start arriving at Pearl, Ranger of course gets sent back to the Atlantic.
 
The Imperial Japanese Navy just bought itself 3 to 6 months of existence.

Or maybe not.

The flood of Essex's and construction will still arrive in the Pacific at the same time.

The meatgrinding that happened in the Solomons OTL now happens in the Marshalls.

There's no reason that Nimitz couldn't reach Okiniawa in the spring of 1945. You likely just see more Japanese garrisons isolated.
 

CalBear

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Again, it is shockingly unlikely that there will be any substantive change in the ETO. Germany First was the policy and nothing in this scenario changes that.

Midway was a great opportunity for the U.S. to bushwhack the Kido Butai (which, of course, makes the scenario under discussion here extremely unlikely, keep in mind that the Japanese never did locate TF 16 IOTL, so there is little chance of a complete elimination of the U.S. carriers) which, in turn allowed the U.S. (technically the WAllies since Watchtower had to be approved by the Combined Chiefs-of-Staff) to mount a shoestring, one division operation at Guadalcanal. Prior to Midway the WAllied strategy in the Pacific was to simply hold what was left (Fiji, New Caledonia, etc.) and conduct enough offensive hit and run operations to bleed the Japanese and keep them off balance. The WAllies will still be reading Tokyo's mail, something that provides then with an enormous advantage.

It is also extremely unlikely that the Kido Butai will be in any shape to conduct serious offensive operations, even if they suffer no ship losses (again vanishingly unlikely). The Japanese lost 13% of their total aircraft in the single strike on Midway and the two attacks against TF 17 resulted in the loss of 2/3 of the D3A on just one of the strikes. American AAA was, even that early in the war, quite robust, and the F4F was a much better fighter when properly handled than is usually credited (a look at the Japanese losses reveals a large number of losses to U.S. fighters). It is probable that overall IJN airwing losses, simply from air-to-air and AAA shoot-downs and "damaged beyond practical repair" would exceed 50%, especially if a couple strikes are needed against TF 16. It also needs to be remembered that the American carriers were close enough to Midway that many of their aircraft aloft (which would be most, since the U.S. had not yet abandoned the flawed "SBD is a a decent heavy fighter against torpedo bombers/recon flights" concept (which was true, provided the torpedo plane/snooper didn't have fighter escort, but not at all true if escort was present) at the time the last carrier was lost (or even before, as happened a couple times at Guadalcanal) could fly to Midway to augment the air wing there. That means the Japanese will need to have at least one, probably two more goes at Midway before landing the relatively undermanned landing force. So the U.S. carrier force is now two decks, pending the early 1943 arrival of Essex, but the Japanese are also effectively down to two decks until they manage to rebuild their air wings thanks to the IJN practice of considering the air wing and carrier to be a single operating unit.

The Japanese are NOT going to be able to successfully raid Hawaii again. That barn door was well and truly barred. The AAF had well over 200 fighters on Oahu at the time of Midway, headed toward 300+ by late summer IOTL. Throw in the on-going output from Douglas, Grumman and Vought that IOTL wound up on carriers that, in this scenario have no deck to land on, and there are better than 400 fighters, about 100 Navy/Marine dive bombers, mostly SBD, and well over 100 TBF now waiting for new construction sitting on Oahu and Maui. All of this is operating under strong radar (with the operators actually being listened to now) and a robust AAA, largely radar directed, heavy AAA and numerous medium AAA umbrella. To quote Sherman "If they will come this far, I'll send them rations".

In all there is little to no need to divert a single K-Ration from the ETO from what happened IOTL.
 
Again, it is shockingly unlikely that there will be any substantive change in the ETO. Germany First was the policy and nothing in this scenario changes that...In all there is little to no need to divert a single K-Ration from the ETO from what happened IOTL.

It seems extremely unlikely that the US losing 4 carriers would not have any butterfly effects.
 

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This is my only quibble with your post, CB.

No question that Ranger is not as capable a deck as . . . well, all the others. Still, it can do 29 knots, and its air wing is still big enough to be useful. After a disaster like this, I really do think that desperation will rule the day. There will be something of a freakout. Ranger almost certainly gets sent to the Pacific. Anyhow, it's not like Nimitz will be undertaking any offensives. He just needs a carrier task force big enough to parry any new Japanese offensive. Though to be fair, Nimitz wouldn't really *need* it to stop Operation FS, a plan doomed to failure anyway (not that he or King might fully appreciate that at the time).

Still, you can do TORCH without Ranger. Substitute in a Brit deck. It would still happen.

Once the Essex's and Independences start arriving at Pearl, Ranger of course gets sent back to the Atlantic.
The Navy didn't think she was capable of playing with the big kids. As a starter she had no real torpedo storage, at all. It was omitted to save weight, stay inside Treaty limitations, and reduce construction costs (same general reasons she was four knots slower than other U.S. CV except Wasp, which was also a Treaty tonnage victim). She was, as you noted, slower than most of her siblings, and was generally seen as very much part of the JV (to the point that Ernest King, who loathed two things above all else: 1. Letting anyone else play in HIS ocean & 2. The British, just in general, approved of "borrowing" HMS Victorious to operate with the Sara rather than call Ranger up to The Show).
 

CalBear

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It seems extremely unlikely that the US losing 4 carriers would not have any butterfly effects.
Three decks.

And it would change things, somewhat dramatically. It simply wouldn't do so in the ETO.

Changes happen almost immediately, starting with Watchtower. It is almost inconceivable that the Solomons Campaign unfolds as IOTL. That in turn has a probably impact on Cartwheel, as an offensive operation, although the Munda Trail operation is still very possible as a defensive blocking campaign. Any recapture of the Philippines is unlikely before early Spring of 1945 and is unlikely to be completed before the Japanese are hit with the 1-2-3 combo of Hiroshima, Soviet DoW, Nagasaki. What that does to the post-war map is difficult to determine.

So huge changes, just in a different hemisphere. The Pacific was ALWAYS the sideshow, now it is just making a couple fewer stops.
 
It is also extremely unlikely that the Kido Butai will be in any shape to conduct serious offensive operations, even if they suffer no ship losses (again vanishingly unlikely). The Japanese lost 13% of their total aircraft in the single strike on Midway and the two attacks against TF 17 resulted in the loss of 2/3 of the D3A on just one of the strikes. American AAA was, even that early in the war, quite robust, and the F4F was a much better fighter when properly handled than is usually credited (a look at the Japanese losses reveals a large number of losses to U.S. fighters). It is probable that overall IJN airwing losses, simply from air-to-air and AAA shoot-downs and "damaged beyond practical repair" would exceed 50%, especially if a couple strikes are needed against TF 16.

This is all plausible, even probable. It is something that scenario spinners of an IJN victory must contend with: Even if they roll sixes and sink every Yankee deck, it's going to cost them in air crew. We know how how big a price they already paid just bombing Midway. And this, on top of air crew losses in the Coral Sea.

On top of that, the IJN is hobbled by the practice of not breaking up squadrons to reconstitute air wings. Which is why Zuikaku was stupidly left behind before Midway, rather than handover Shokaku's remaining aircraft.

I still think Yamamoto will feel the need to do something. He knows better than anyone that Japan is on the clock, and it's running out. I noted that he would still undertake Operation FS, but I do concede that with air crew losses this high, he may modify his plans. He could just use 2 or 3 decks and re-run Operation MO and try to take Port Moresby (which, given Allies strength there in August, he would likely lose); or he might try to truncate FS and just take Espiritu Santu or Efate. Yes, he had a lot of his teeth knocked out, he will think, but the Americans will have to look for their dentures 15,000 feet down on the ocean floor. They have one, maybe two carriers they can use against him now. A limited operation could have acceptable risk now.

The other thing is, responses like moving Ranger to EastPac, or converting more Independence's actually might not be fully rational - certainly we can see that Nimitz would not really *need* either to destroy Japan, or stop any IJN offensive he might face in 1942-43. But there would be something of a panic - West Coast governors screaming bloody murder, morale back in the tank in the Pacific Fleet. But more importantly, U.S. leadership did not have perfect information about Japanese capabilities, no matter how much mail they read. They'll want to play it safe.

Still, things like this will not change ETO, as you say, materially. TORCH will go on ahead, then HUSKY, etc., etc.
 
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The Navy didn't think she was capable of playing with the big kids.

Oh, I agree.

But I think they'll be desperate enough to do it anyway.

Hey, I might be wrong. But that's my sense of how they would be thinking at this point. Re: the torp issue, they might just use it for air defense and let Wasp and Sara handle strikes. (Of course, odds are, this ramshackle carrier force is unlikely to see action anyway for the balance of 1942. Nimitz might not even think that in this situation that the New Hebrides or Moresby are worth risking his remaining decks.)

I mean, the U.S. piled forces and fortifications onto Oahu in 1942 well past the point of necessary defense against even the most massive assault the Japanese could mount; but then, we didn't fully know what they had, so we played it safe.
 
Why would there be no Tac Air? The Brits had their techniques well developed by 1943 & the US techniques in May 1944 were little better than in November 1942.

I think if you measure it out on the maps you will find the air campaign ranges in the MTO were not short.

The U.S. literally didn't have a full air group of Tac Air in Summer of 1943 as opposed to nine in June of 1944.
 
The U.S. literally didn't have a full air group of Tac Air in Summer of 1943 as opposed to nine in June of 1944.

& Rommels appreciation & warning about the strength of Allied tactical air support he made in December 1943 was based on what? Imagination? Labeling air groups Tactical support does not make them instantly that, & labeling air groups something else like 'Bombardment' does not mean they can't do tactical air support. When the US Army AF came to the MTO in November 1942 they did not want to do tactical air support, thinking it inefficient. After some shouting and hurt feelings Dolittle, Eaker, & the others got with the program and added it to the mission list. The P40s, P38, P47, A20s, B25, & B26 tapped for the missions were from groups with other labels, but they did it.

The mix of aircraft in the UK during 1943 reflected the missions expected. This was not set in stone handed down from the heavens. Had a crossing of the Channel been planned the aircraft mix would have been different.

This bit of thread drift has gone on long enough. Theres plently of other past threads concerning the details of a 1943 cross Channel attack. Tho personally I'd want to discuss the Brits wandering ashore on the deserted Madeline beach 23 June 1941 :p
 
This is all plausible, even probable. It is something that scenario spinners of an IJN victory must contend with: Even if they roll sixes and sink every Yankee deck, it's going to cost them in air crew. We know how how big a price they already paid just bombing Midway. And this, on top of air crew losses in the Coral Sea.

They lost aircrew attacking Pearl Harbor, in the December thru February supporting operations, During operation C. For six months there was a steady attrition of the elite pilots. Anti aircraft artillery, botched landings, bad navigation, mechanical failures, and the occasional lucky enemy pilot contributed.

... They have one, maybe two carriers they can use against him now. A limited operation could have acceptable risk now. ...

The equation is a lot more complex than carrier vs carrier. The US won the Guadalcanal campaign because Henderson Field was never neutralized. All the air and naval bombardment attacks failed to suppress the air field for more than a couple hours. Even when some 300 Japanese infantry infiltrated through Bloody Ridge and made it to the air field the ground crews & rifle battalion held in reserve simply gunned them down and carried on with air ops. At the crisis in the campaign the USN had no operational carriers, but still won. Attacking into the Fiji Samoa region the IJN is confronting multiple airfields, and better capable of mutual support. Henderson Field was at limits in the ferry flight range for single engine aircraft and had combat support from only the long range B17s & a few PBY. In the FS operation Japanese forces attacking one island will often be subject to supporting attacks from one or more other islands.

Then there is the matter of more aircraft. Guadalcanal represented the point of the USN spear. It was too small to accommodate a fraction of the aircraft in the SE Pacific. A larger number existed from which the replacement of losses on Guadalcanal were drawn from. A Japanese advance east engages increasing numbers of US aircraft while the Japanese numbers decrease from logistics constraints and losses.
 
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Attacking into the Fiji Samoa region the IJN is confronting multiple airfields, and better capable of mutual support. Henderson Field was at limits in the ferry flight range for single engine aircraft and had combat support from only the long range B17s & a few PBY. In the FS operation Japanese forces attacking one island will often be subject to supporting attacks from one or more other islands.

I agree 1000% with this. It's a key reason why any Operation FS offensive deep into the New Hebrides would have failed miserably.
 
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