Pacific Carrier War

Pacific Carrier War PDF Author: Mark Stille
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1472826353
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 503

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Book Description
A detailed and comprehensive study of the carrier formations of the Pacific War, including their origins, development and key battles from the Coral Sea, through Midway and Guadalcanal to the battle of the Philippine Sea. The defining feature of the Pacific Theatre of World War II was the clash of carriers that ultimately decided the fate of nations. The names of these battles have become legendary as some of the most epic encounters in the history of naval warfare. Pre-war assumptions about the impact and effectiveness of carriers were comprehensively tested in early war battles such as Coral Sea, while US victories at Midway and in the waters around Guadalcanal established the supremacy of its carriers. The US Navy's ability to adapt and evolve to the changing conditions of war maintained and furthered their advantage, culminating in their comprehensive victory at the battle of the Philippine Sea, history's largest carrier battle, which destroyed almost the entire Japanese carrier force. Examining the ships, aircraft and doctrines of both the Japanese and US navies and how they changed during the war, Mark E. Stille shows how the domination of American carriers paved the way towards the Allied victory in the Pacific.

Pacific Carrier War

Pacific Carrier War PDF Author: Mark Stille
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1472826353
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 503

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Book Description
A detailed and comprehensive study of the carrier formations of the Pacific War, including their origins, development and key battles from the Coral Sea, through Midway and Guadalcanal to the battle of the Philippine Sea. The defining feature of the Pacific Theatre of World War II was the clash of carriers that ultimately decided the fate of nations. The names of these battles have become legendary as some of the most epic encounters in the history of naval warfare. Pre-war assumptions about the impact and effectiveness of carriers were comprehensively tested in early war battles such as Coral Sea, while US victories at Midway and in the waters around Guadalcanal established the supremacy of its carriers. The US Navy's ability to adapt and evolve to the changing conditions of war maintained and furthered their advantage, culminating in their comprehensive victory at the battle of the Philippine Sea, history's largest carrier battle, which destroyed almost the entire Japanese carrier force. Examining the ships, aircraft and doctrines of both the Japanese and US navies and how they changed during the war, Mark E. Stille shows how the domination of American carriers paved the way towards the Allied victory in the Pacific.

Pacific Carrier War

Pacific Carrier War PDF Author: Mark Stille
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1472826345
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
A detailed and comprehensive study of the carrier formations of the Pacific War, including their origins, development and key battles from the Coral Sea, through Midway and Guadalcanal to the battle of the Philippine Sea. The defining feature of the Pacific Theatre of World War II was the clash of carriers that ultimately decided the fate of nations. The names of these battles have become legendary as some of the most epic encounters in the history of naval warfare. Pre-war assumptions about the impact and effectiveness of carriers were comprehensively tested in early war battles such as Coral Sea, while US victories at Midway and in the waters around Guadalcanal established the supremacy of its carriers. The US Navy's ability to adapt and evolve to the changing conditions of war maintained and furthered their advantage, culminating in their comprehensive victory at the battle of the Philippine Sea, history's largest carrier battle, which destroyed almost the entire Japanese carrier force. Examining the ships, aircraft and doctrines of both the Japanese and US navies and how they changed during the war, Mark E. Stille shows how the domination of American carriers paved the way towards the Allied victory in the Pacific.

The Ship that Held the Line

The Ship that Held the Line PDF Author: Lisle A Rose
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
ISBN: 1612512097
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 283

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Book Description
The American fleet aircraft carrier Hornet is widely acknowledged for the contributions she made to the war effort. The Doolittle Raid, launched from the Hornet's deck, inaugurated America's Pacific counteroffensive and transformed the aircraft carrier into one of the world's prime strategic weapon systems. She was one of three carriers to participate in the victory at Midway and the fighting around Guadalcanal. Through the experiences of this key warship and the eyes of her crew and the aviators who flew from her deck, Lisle Rose recreates the first desperate year of the war in the Pacific. He tells how the Hornet was molded into a deadly weapon of war, how the ship was fought and ultimately lost, and what it was like to live aboard her at a time when the fate of the United States depended on the Navy's tiny carrier fleet. In chronicling the carrier's operational history, the author contends that the fate of the Hornet's air group at Midway remains one of the great controversies in modern naval history and that the ship's importance in helping to keep the Japanese juggernaut at bay during the most critical period of the Pacific war is incontestable. His arguments ring true today as the controversy continues. Rose succeeds both in letting the reader see things the way the men of the Hornet did and in placing their experiences in a broad historical context.

Japanese Carriers and Victory in the Pacific

Japanese Carriers and Victory in the Pacific PDF Author: Martin Stansfeld
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781399010115
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Japanese Carriers and Victory in the Pacific focuses on the pre-war debate between building a new generation of super-battleships or adopting aircraft carriers as the capital ships of the future. An Asian power in particular sees carriers as a way of challenging the USA and the colonial empires initially losing the contest yet coming out all right in the Cold War aftermath. Martin Stansfeld examines the much-overlooked genesis of Japan's so-called shadow fleet that was a secret attempt to bring about parity with the US in carriers--albeit only with slower speed conversions of liners and auxiliaries but along with the super battleships cluttered launch facilities when these could have been devoted to keel-up fast fleet carrier Production. This first analytical look at what major launch facilities were available in Japan shows that the Imperial Japanese Navy could have doubled its fast carrier fleet thereby able to give sufficient air cover for an invasion of Hawaii rather than just the raid on Pearl Harbor, but only providing nobody noticed they were building all these carriers. This is shown to have been entirely possible given the IJN's extraordinary success at covering up their super battleship and shadow fleet production. This secret fast carrier fleet program is given the name "phantom fleet" by Stansfeld who proceeds to demonstrate how the strategy of the Pacific War would have been transformed. Weaving through the chapters is an exotic cast of characters led most notably by Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, the conceiver of Pearl Harbor and a figure of mythic status to Japanese today and famous around the world thanks to the movies. Stansfeld dwells on the ironies of war, notably how, without the "day that will live in infamy", America might never have become the worldwide super-power it is today.

Sustaining the Carrier War

Sustaining the Carrier War PDF Author: Stan Fisher
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
ISBN: 1682478483
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
The ability of the United States Navy to fight and win a protracted war in the Pacific was not solely the result of technology, tactics, or leadership. Naval aviation maintenance played a major role in the U.S. victory over Japan in the second World War. The naval war against Japan did not achieve sustained success until enough aircraft technicians were available to support the high tempo of aviation operations that fast carrier task force doctrine demanded. When the United States realized war was imminent and ordered a drastic increase in the size of its aviation fleet, the Navy was forced to reconsider its earlier practices and develop new policies in maintenance, supply, and technical training. Not only did a shortage of technicians plague the Navy, but the scarcity of aviation supply and repair facilities in the Pacific soon caused panic in Washington. While the surface Navy's modernization of at-sea replenishment was beneficial, it did not solve the problems of sustaining war-time aircraft readiness levels sufficient to a winning a naval air war. Fisher outlines the drastic institutional changes that accompanied an increase in aviation maintenance personnel from fewer than 10,000 to nearly 250,000 bluejackets, the complete restructuring of the naval aviation technical educational system, and the development of a highly skilled labor force. The first comprehensive study on the importance of aircraft maintenance and the aircraft technician in the age of the aircraft carrier, Sustaining the Carrier War, provides the missing link to our understanding of Great Power conflict at sea.

Task Force 58

Task Force 58 PDF Author: Rod Macdonald
Publisher: Frontline Books
ISBN: 1399007580
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 653

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Book Description
The new breed of American fast aircraft carriers could make thirty-three knots, and each carried almost 100 strike aircraft. Brought together as Task Force 58, also known as the Fast Carrier Task Force, this awesome armada at times comprised more than 100 ships carrying more than 100,000 men afloat. By 1945, more than 1,000-combat aircraft, fighters, dive- and torpedo-bombers could be launched in under an hour. The fast carriers were a revolution in naval warfare – it was a time when naval power moved away from the big guns of the battleship to air power projected at sea. Battleships were eventually subordinated to supporting and protecting the fast carriers, of which, at its peak, Task Force 58 had a total of seventeen. This book covers the birth of naval aviation, the appearance of the first modern carriers in the 1920s, through to the famous surprise six-carrier _Kido Butai_ Japanese raid against Pearl Harbor on 8 December 1941 and then the early US successes of 1942 at the Battles of the Coral Sea and Midway. The fast carriers allowed America, in late 1942 and early 1943, to finally move from bitter defence against the Japanese expansionist onslaught, to mounting her own offensive to retake the Pacific. Task Force 58 swept west and north from the Solomon Islands to the Gilbert and Marshall Islands, neutralising Truk in Micronesia, and Palau in the Caroline islands, before the vital Mariana Islands operations, the Battle of Saipan, the first battle of the Philippine Sea and the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot. The strikes by Task Force 58 took Allied forces across the Pacific, to the controversial Battle of Leyte Gulf and to Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Task Force 58 had opened the door to the Japanese home islands themselves – allowing US bombers to finally get close enough to launch the devastating nuclear bombing raids on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Task Force 58 participated in virtually all the US Navy’s major battles in the Pacific theatre during the last two years of the war. Having spent many years investigating naval shipwrecks across the Pacific, many the result of the devastating effectiveness of Task Force 58, diver and shipwreck author Rod Macdonald has created the most detailed account to date of the fast carrier strike force, the force that brought Japan to its knees and brought the Second World War to its crashing conclusion.

Carrier Warfare in the Pacific

Carrier Warfare in the Pacific PDF Author: E. T. Wooldridge
Publisher: Smithsonian Books (DC)
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 344

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Book Description
Capturing the times when lives and victory were in peril, this book records the exploits of the men who fought in WWII in the air and on the sea, including pilots and air crewmen of carrier squadrons, officers and men of the ship's company, and admirals and their staffs. Compelling personal accounts. Illus.

War in the Pacific

War in the Pacific PDF Author: Harry Gailey
Publisher: Presidio Press
ISBN: 0307802043
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 560

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Book Description
Historian Harry Gailey offers a fresh one-volume treatment of the vast Pacific theater in World War II, examining in detail the performance of Japanese and Allied naval, air, and land forces in every major military operation. The War in the Pacific begins with an examination of events leading up to World War II and compares the Japanese and American economies and societies, as well as the chief combatants' military doctrine, training, war plans, and equipment. The book then chronicles all significant actions - from the early Allied defeats in the Philippines, the East Indies, and New Guinea; through the gradual improvement of the Allied position in the Central and Southwest Pacific regions; to the final agonies of the Japanese people, whose leaders refused to admit defeat until the very end. Gailey gives detailed treatment to much that has been neglected or given only cursory mention in previous surveys. The reader thus gains an unparalleled overview of operations, as well as many fresh insights into the behind-the-scenes bickering between the Allies and the interservice squabbles that dogged MacArthur and Nimitz throughout the war. NOTE: This edition does not include a photo insert.

USN Carriers vs IJN Carriers

USN Carriers vs IJN Carriers PDF Author: Mark Stille
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1780968426
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 82

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Book Description
The IJN was a pioneer in naval aviation, having commissioned the world's first carrier, which was used against the US fleet at Pearl Harbor. The Americans followed suit, initiating a huge aircraft carrier development program. As the War in the Pacific escalated into the largest naval conflict in history, the role of the carrier became the linchpin of American and Japanese naval strategy as these rival vessels found themselves locked in a struggle for dominance of this critical theater. This book provides an analysis of the variety of weaponry available to the rival carriers, in particular the embarked aircraft as well as the powerful ship-borne guns. Study the design and development of these revolutionary ships and 'live' the experiences of the rival airmen and gun crews as they battled for victory in a duel of skill, tenacity and guts.

Santa Cruz 1942

Santa Cruz 1942 PDF Author: Mark Stille
Publisher: Osprey Publishing
ISBN: 9781849086059
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Santa Cruz is the forgotten carrier battle of 1942. Despite myth, the Japanese carrier force was not destroyed at Midway but survived to still prove a threat in the Pacific theater. Nowhere was this clearer than in the battle of Santa Cruz of October 1942. The stalemate on the ground in the Guadalcanal campaign led to the major naval forces of both belligerents becoming inexorably more and more involved in the fighting, each seeking to win the major victory that would open the way for a breakthrough on land as well. The US Task Force 61 under the command of Rear Admiral Kinkaid and consisting of the carriers Hornet and Enterprise, as well the battleship South Dakota and a number of cruisers and destroyers, intercepted the Japanese fleet, which boasted four carriers - Shokaku, Zuikaku, Junyo and Zuiho - as well as four battleships and numerous other ships, on 26 October. Though US aircraft managed to damage the Japanese carriers seriously, in turn Hornet was so badly damaged that shed had to be sunk, while Enterprise was hit and needed extensive repairs. Both sides withdrew at the end of the action. The Japanese were able to gain a tactical victory at Santa Cruz and came very close to scoring a strategic victory, but they paid a very high price in aircraft and aircrew that prevented them from following up their victory. In terms of their invaluable aircrew, the battle was much more costly than even Midway and had a serious impact on the ability of the Japanese to carry out carrier warfare in a meaningful manner.