The Battle of
Midway Roundtable
Warrant
Officer Tom Cheek escorts Torpedo Squadron 3 at the Battle of Midway,
4
June 1942. Original artwork by John
Greaves, http://www.johngreavesart.ca/
Here is the latest edition of our association’s
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THE ROUNDTABLE FORUM
Official
newsletter of the Battle of Midway Roundtable
"To
promote awareness and understanding of the great battle
and to honor
the men who fought and won it."
19 March 2010
Issue Number: 2010-10
Our 13th Year
~ AROUND THE TABLE ~
MEMBERS’
TOPICS IN THIS ISSUE:
1. Japanese WW2 Documentary
2. Did Midway Know About TF 16 & 17?
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1. Japanese WW2 Documentary ( see issue #09 , Link of the Week)
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12 March 2010
From: RADM D. M. (Mac) Showers,
USN-Ret
Virginia
BOM vet, intel analyst, Combat Intel. Unit, Pearl Harbor (“Station
HYPO”)
Re the
Japanese film clips, Part 9. The photo of Rochefort is as a captain, not
when he was at HYPO. Also, in the other photos of alleged workers at
HYPO, Navy blues were never worn in Hawaii, and none of the background scenery
is familiar to me. No one in HYPO had any cameras and no photos were
taken. I've always assumed the few interior photos that we see from time
to time were taken in Washington.
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2. DID MIDWAY KNOW ABOUT TF 16 & 17? ( see issue #09 )
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12 March 2010
From: John Lundstrom
Wisconsin
author, The First Team, Black Shoe Carrier Admiral
The assumption that
Midway did not know of TF-16 and TF-17 prior to the battle is false. The
dispatches in the CINCPAC Secret and Confidential Message File show that the
commander of NAS Midway (Capt. Simard) was a recipient of CINCPAC Op-Plan
29-42. Incidentally, so was the
commander of NAS Johnston Island. How
could Midway not know of the presence of the US carriers? Its searches spotted them or their planes
repeatedly in the days prior to the battle.
Why would Nimitz keep one of his key commanders in the dark during an
absolutely crucial battle? Simard would
have to warn his PBY pilots that friendly carriers were in the neighborhood so
they wouldn't just blurt out a sighting report and thus risk warning the
Japanese. Remember, Nimitz could
communicate directly with Simard by underwater cable, which greatly facilitated
passing information. The routine was
for Simard to communicate in the clear to CINCPAC via cable, and CINCPAC radio
to relay his messages to the TF commanders.
Here are some examples that show Simard knew about the U.S. carriers prior to 4
June. Message 021105 of June 1942,
Midway to CINCPAC, (2305, 1 June Midway local time), notes the results of the
searches on 1 June and adds: "Saw Raymond Spruance bearing 021 distance
290 at 1400 Y (plus 12) headed 320 into reduced visibility." Simard is reporting the arrival of
TF-16. Message 040459 of 4 June 1942
(1659, 3 June Midway local time), CINCPAC to CTF-16, CTF-17: "This from Midway being passed by
CINCPAC Quote Two patrol planes to north reported sighting observation plane
but continuing search. Believed from
Spruance Unquote."
For the US side of the Battle of Midway, the voluminous CINCPAC message files
remain virtually untapped.
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Ed. note: Many thanks to
John for this important clarification, and it’s noteworthy that Black Shoe
Carrier Admiral is unique among BOM histories in its reliance on the
largely ignored CINCPAC message files.
When I said in the last issue that the defenders on Midway had not been
informed of the presence of TF 16 & 17, I was referring primarily to the
rank-and-file personnel there, not their commanders. Some of the Marines said that the first inkling they had of any
U.S. carriers being in the area was when part of VB-8 landed there—which they
initially tried to shoot down, assuming them to be another Japanese raid.
~ NOW HEAR THIS! ~
NEWS
& INFO IN THIS ISSUE:
- Important Change for the Roundtable
- Link of the Week
- BOM Anniversary and Unit Reunions
- Editor’s Notes
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IMPORTANT CHANGE FOR THE ROUNDTABLE
Some time within the next week or so the Roundtable will
get a new web host. The change should
be transparent to our members, but there are a couple of things you might need
to know.
Right now, all of our web pages are hosted (stored) on the
Comcast Internet site, because the necessary file space is included with my
Comcast account. I will be vacating
Comcast soon; hence the need for a new web host.
You might notice in the web address bar at the top of this
page that the URL has “home.comcast” in it.
That could be slightly confusing, since our domain name is
“midway42.org.” You can get to our
home page directly by typing www.midway42.org in your browser. But what’s really happening is that
“midway42.org” automatically redirects to my Comcast web pages, a service that
I’ve bought from an Internet domain registrar. “Midway42” is a lot easier to remember than that complex string
you see in the title bar above.
So, what happens when I change us to a new host? Nothing if you have created a bookmark
(Firefox) or favorite (Internet Explorer) for the Roundtable in your
browser, using our domain name: http://www.midway42.org. After the switch, that domain name will
automatically go to the new destination.
You won’t have to do anything.
On the other hand, if you have set up a bookmark or
favorite by capturing the URL you found at the top of our home page, which is a
Comcast URL, then it won’t work after the cutover. You should manually edit it to read our correct domain name
(above). Once you’ve done that, you’ll
never again have a reason to be concerned about this subject. Our domain name won’t change.
There is a similar issue with our e-mail address. Some members have my personal Comcast e-mail
address in their address books (____@comcast.net). You should change that to the Roundtable’s permanent e-mail
address, midway.rt@gmail.com. My
Comcast e-mail ID will be gone after the cutover is completed.
None of this has anything to do with the weekly “new issue”
announcement that you get in e-mail.
That message contains the correct domain name and e-mail address.
Bottom line: if
you’ve been using midway42.org and our proper e-mail address, you have
nothing to do. If not, you should make
the necessary changes now to ensure continued contact with the Roundtable and
access to our web site. —RR
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LINK OF THE WEEK
Okay everyone, this
may be the Link of the Week to end all Links of the Week. William Reece sent in the URL to page one of
ten pages of the Life Magazine collection, which has about two hundred photos from Midway, chiefly of VMSB-241 in
November 1942. Click the link for the
first page which has thumbnail versions of 20 images, each of which you can
click to see the full screen view.
Then, continue on for the next nine pages. You may want to bookmark that first page, as this will take you a
while!
Click
here for the link of the week.
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BOM ANNIVERSARY AND UNIT REUNIONS
Here are the BOM anniversary and reunion events for 2010
that have been reported to us. Please click this link to add
or update an event to the list.
Each event has an open invitation for BOM veterans, and many are seeking
guest speakers. Interested members can
make direct contact with an event organizer via the e-mail address provided in
your “new issue” announcement.
Non-members can request info here.
1. May 26: NOUS BOM luncheon, Macao’s
Restaurant, Phoenix, AZ.
2. May 31 - June 5: “Return
to Midway” Pearl Harbor symposium and Midway tour. For details, click here (.pdf
file)
3. June 3: NOUS “Dining Out” at Army-Navy
Country Club, Arlington, VA.
4. June 3 - 6: Annual Yorktown
CV-5 reunion, Little Rock, AR.
5. June 4: USN BOM commemoration at the Navy
Memorial, Washington, D.C.
6. June 4: Naval War College, BOM
commemoration with Jon Parshall as guest speaker, Newport, RI.
7. June 4: NOUS “Dining Out” Newport RI (Jon
Parshall also guest speaker at this one).
8. June 4: NOUS BOM luncheon at the Hess
Club, Houston, TX.
9. June 5: USN BOM commemoration aboard USS Midway
museum, San Diego, CA
10. June 5: Navy League BOM
luncheon, Phoenix, AZ.
11. June 5: NOUS “Dining Out”
at Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA.
12. June 5: NOUS “Dining Out” at Marines
Memorial Club, San Francisco, CA.
13. June 5: NOUS & Navy League “Dining
Out” at Renaissance Center,
near Jacksonville, FL.
14. June ?: (date TBA) NOUS
BOM commemoration, New York, NY.
15. June ?: (date TBA) NOUS
BOM commemoration, Virginia Beach, VA.
NOUS = Naval Order of the United States
TBA = to be announced
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EDITOR’S NOTES
~ For those who remember Roundtable member and
Yorktown vet Chaplain Stan Linzey, click here for
a fine biographical tribute published by his son James Linzey.
~ Interment for BOM TBF pilot Bert Earnest is
scheduled for April 7th at Arlington National Cemetery. Check-in time at the ANC Visitor Center is 2:30 PM, with the honor
guard departing exactly at 3:00 for the Columbarium. Everyone who attends
must have transportation since the Columbarium is some distance from Visitor
Center. (With thanks to Kathy Earnest.)
~ Here’s another request to all members to please remember
the Roundtable when you change your e-mail address. With nearly 500 members on our roster, I get a number of “reject”
messages from e-mail servers every week.
A frequent cause is people who change their e-mail address and don’t
tell us. That makes a lot of extra work
for me, which I’d really like to avoid.
Thanks in advance for your consideration.
~ One more
important point about changing your e-mail address: when you send the announcement to the Roundtable, it has to come
from the new address, not the old one.
I can’t change your address if you’ve manually typed the new one in a
message sent from anywhere else.
That’s an anti-spam requirement imposed upon bulk mail senders, like
me. Our FAQs have more on this
subject. Once again, thanks for your
consideration.
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All original content in this
issue of The Roundtable Forum, the Official Newsletter of the Battle of
Midway Roundtable is copyright 2010 by Ronald W. Russell (see the “About the BOMRT”
page). Permission to forward, copy, or
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