7000m.

Try Kaigun, Sunburst, or Shattered Sword.

7000m

Not 700m, 7000m. That painting is art, not history.

Fuchida's book is loaded with errors. Heck, Fuchida has the flight decks crowded with aircraft. Odd, since they were conducting CAP TO and landing within minutes of the strikes, and it took a long time to get a strike from the hangers (where all IJN planes were gassed up, bombed up, and warmed up) to the rear of the flight deck to launch. Fuchida's book was discredited in Japan in the 50s, but since it was the only japanese account in english, it has been repeated. So for some stuff, take it with a grain of salt.

The IJN CVs were in a turn in loose line abreast when the SDBs showed up. They were roughtly 7km apart at that point (some more, some less).

Sorry, it's just true. the packed together ships nonsense is great for movies where you want everything in one shot, but it isn;t real.

tater

7000 meters...7 kilometers...

Are you saying that they were all 4 and a half MILES apart? Standard for most navies was either 500 or 1000 yards. I think you need to not make categorical statements like "Sorry, it's just true."

You belittle Fuchida, which I don't know about, but you don't give any source - let alone a credible one - for your "facts".

Note that even the famous Geddes dioramas have the CVs at least 3km apart (a CV is ~300m long for scale if you see a pic).

Um, 3 sources were given. Sunburst (Naval Institute Press), a history of japanese naval aviation from its inception to the start of the war, Kaigun (also NIP), a history of the IJN from its inception to the start of the war, and Shattered Sword, the best book on Midway for anything related to the japanese side of the battle. The diagram of the standard "tight box" formation used by IJN CVs in 1941 is from an original japanese source, I'd have to dig through the footnotes.

<EDIT> the source for the diagram Peatie used in Sunburst? Genda Minoru (yes, THAT Genda, he was there), Shinjuwan sakusen, pg63

<EDIT 2> (trying to keep the seperate posts down, lol) I just looked at a PH take off video (japanese): http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/himpearlharbor1.htm not a ship to be seen.

tater

Barrett Tillman's TBD Devastator Units of the US Navy ( http://books.google.com/books?vid=IS...SL8d1v5eucdnGo )

"He listed AA last, because although Kido Butai had 17 escorts, they were spread across a 20 nautical mile box to permit the four carriers individual maneuvering room, contrary to US practise which emphasized mutual support."

BTW, we are talking about a battle formation. This is how they arrayed when near an objective, or conducting flight ops, etc. If they were in bad weather, etc, they'd have to tighten up to be able to signal visually (if keeping radio silence). So if they were in fog, or squalls, etc, this distance might shorten hugely.

You're right, you did give those before. I stand corrected (hey, it happens). On the other hand, that could be part of why they lost at Midway.

I came on strong without reading enough. Apologies.

Sorry if I did as well. <S>

BTW, shattered sword is an awesome book to read. The authors (combinedfleet.com is their website, BTW) emailed a japanese guy with questions about Fuchida's book. They knew about politeness and japanese, etc, and they asked in a VERY roundabout way if Fuchida might possibly, maybe be a little tiny bit in error regarding X, Y, and Z. The reply they got was like (paraphrase here) "that hack? his book is self serving crap! No one here (in the history community) has taken him seriously for decades! This is what happened: blah blah blah"

Really the definitive book now, I have Fuchida's book, and used to think it was the definitive book, myself.

BTW, look at that painting again. How would those CVs "comb" a torpedo attack?

How would they conduct landing ops? Planes fly over, peel off to space planes, do thier downwind, then turn to trap on the CV. Is there room for a downwind then turn there? No.

Also, the SBDs are coming out of dives crossing the target. They bombed along the length of a target, not across which would make a hit FAR more difficult.

tater

Jonathan Parshall's comment in a review of Midway (he's the coauthor of Shattered Sword and runs combinedfleet.com):

He says that other than some errors like that the book is quite good and gives it 4 stars.

If its defo true that the japs CV's were 7KM apart then no wonder they lost the battle.
The AA fire to defend the carriers would have been ineffective. No AA Box would have been created to defend the carriers. Basically the Cv's would have been sitting ducks to any Dive bomber getting through the CAP.

Maybe this Thread has stumbled on the real reason for the Japs to loose Midway and not just the fact that the Zero's had gone low level to defend against the TBD attacks thus allowing the Dive Bombers to annihilate the carriers.

Actually, Shattered Sword goes to great lengths to explain that IJN doctrine had everything to do with their losses on many levels.

AAA was poor just 6 months into the war anyway, with IJN ships far less capable than USN ships of the same period. To be fair, USN CV doctrine was similarly in flux. There was a raging battle in the USN regarding how to deploy CVs in TFs, closer together for mutual support, or scattered. Regardless, putting them close together is not much of an option. At the short distances you suggest (remember 700m is just over 2 ship lengths), they would be totally incapable of individual maneuver. None whatsoever would be possible at thgeir 30+ knot flank speed. Spreading out made sense for the IJN. the screen can prosecute subs too far to hit the CVs, and they can fire AAA at incoming planes---warning the CAP, remember the zeros usually had no working radios.

AAA fire was meant to discourage pressing home an attack. Until the USN started using VT fuses (radar fused) AA, it was pretty hit or miss. If VBs get through the cap, it's down to pilot skill and nerve to see who gets hits. Same is true for the USN as the target. The USN also had far far far better DC than the IJN. Most of the CVs the IJN lost probably would have been saved by US crews/doctrine.

This IS the way the IJN fought CV groups. It is also not that far off the way the USN did as well. we had tighter groups, but ships could still turn if they needed to. We're only talking about 4.3 statute miles here. That really is not that far, even if a game like SH only has an 8km view range, it's much farther in RL.

OK, I altered my little mission again. I added the remaing DDs in 2 desdivs steaming as groups zig-zagging (2-3000m spacing between DDs). Made getting into the CV group slightly trickier. I noticed that if my scope was up, the planes would circle, then the DDs turned into me. I dropped the scope, and they kept coming, but stopped short to mill around (presumably looking for me).

The first time I ran it I forgot to reset the waypoint speed, so they were going 5 knots. This time I had them cruise at 19 knots. It was far harder. Surfacing was no option, and underwater I'd have a shot at a given ship, but no way to catch up. Fired a spread at Kongo, and she turned away.

tater

Bug #82 added

Since this looks like there are, or will be, mods to fix this, please post to the bug to help share the work

Other historical inaccuracies I found:

Started campaign commanding an old pigboat in the PI in Dec 41. Sighted a large group of enemy warships, approached submerged and found three Mogami-type cruisers, the version with the flight deck aft. WTF? There was only one ship of this class which got converted to a cruiser/carrier hybrid, and only after Midway (Mogami herself, after the heavy damage she had received) - why are three of them in front of me in Dec 41?!?
Later I found a different convoy (btw, it just sat fat, happy and stopped in the China Sea :confused:), managed to miss a transport (darn TDC) but the fish did hit a ship which overlapped behind. Turned out to be an Agano class CL - but all ships of that class were still under construction at that time historically...

The Dev Team has done good work in the graphics department, but the history buff inside me is driven crazy by 'OOB errors' like that...


EDIT: Sorry, maybe I should have openend a seperate thread - moderator?

Nah, I was largely responsible for a long OT, yer right on the money.