Not sure if it has been mentioned but a 3rd wave requires a night time recovery of those 3rd wave aircraft
Does it?
But I have mixed feelings about the 3rd wave - there is a lot of aspects that negate carrying it out - Risk to the KB - further losses to its aircraft - Fuel in its DDs etc
In the Apollo program the level of risk that was acceptable depended on the point of the mission at which the risk had to be taken. So, for the launch from the Cape, the level of acceptable risk was very low. But, in orbit, the level of risk acceptable was much higher. This is because in orbit a NASA mission had already overcome a great deal of risk associated with launch. With the Hawaii attack, a great deal of the risk was taken and overcome getting to, and sending in, the first wave. Nagumo after the recovery of the attack was in a position similar to Apollo in orbit.
And the whole op was a risk to the KB they were there already why not hang around for a 3rd strike?
Mainly because Nagumo had not done any scouting and had no idea about his tactical situation outside the results of the attack and the area his seaplanes had scouted, (which was close to the carriers and therefore not too instructive).
Japan had a large pool of trained Carrier Pilots - Grey cells tell me 4000 odd available - granted not all to the highest standard but they could replace any losses relatively quickly.
Carriers in the IJN actually were low-priority to land based air on replacements - this could have been altered for more Zeroes allocated to the carriers, and even a bit for the bombers carried. The carriers had about 250 x 2nd-line aircraft, meaning, older types of aircraft, that could have been employed for the Southern Drive if necessary. (ie, D1A1's, B5N1's, A5M4's). (If losing large numbers of aircraft at Hawaii, the IJN carriers would have to carry more Zeros because there were more of them, and more numbers of obsolescent, but still capable, carrier aircraft in 2nd-string units and tasking).
And as for DD Fuel - if that was really the case then they have planned it increadibly fine if they cannot risk staying on station for another 6 hours??
Nagumo's DD fuel state was about 60% on the 9th, after 48 hours of high speed running. He could have stayed and launched attacks on the 8th, but if staying for the 9th, he would have had to have refuelled his destroyers from his capital ships.
That all being said if I was to place myself in Nagumos shoes then I think I with teh same information would have made the same decision (especially given the IJNs attitude regarding placing the conservation of fleet assets over damage to the enemy) but I still have major doubts over the decision as I am sure he did.
Nagumo should have sent out more scouting aircraft in the morning once he received the information that the US carriers were not in port. Given the hasty nature of training and planning for the attack, the two-wave plan was fixed early. But I think it's probably also the case that if Nagumo had one do-over on Hawaii, he'd have done a double-strength wave like at Port Darwin and hit Oahu, maybe around 0830 with 352 aircraft at once.
Genda indicates that he wanted to withdraw and come back a few days later, like how it was done during the IO raid. Given the devastation of the PBY defenses and the repairs needed on aircraft on his carriers, and the lousy C3I caused by not doing proper recon that morning, this might have been the best option.
