Midway Campaign - Dramatis Personae

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Fletcher, Frank J. (1885-1973)
Frank Jack Fletcher graduated from Annapolis in 1906, and had a varied and interesting career thereafter. He won a Medal of Honor at Vera Cruz in 1914. During World War I he commanded a destroyer on anti-submarine patrol, and afterwards he served in various line, staff, and academic posts. In late 1941 he was given command of the Yorktown task force by Admiral Husband Kimmel , another non-flyer who thought Fletcher had better qualifications to command than Fitch , a flyer. Fletcher took his command into action in the raids on the Mandates and New Guinea. In overall command at the Coral Sea and Midway (where he conceded command to Raymond Spruance after Yorktown was hit), during the Guadalcanal landings, and in the Battle of the Eastern Solomons . He later commanded all naval forces in the North Pacific, overseeing the occupation of Northern Japan. Fletcher commanded in three of the five carrier battles of the war, a distinction no other officer on either side can claim. While not an outstanding commander, Fletcher was competent, and he won most of his battles.

Nimitz, Chester W., Sr. (1885-1966)
Chester W. Nimitz entered the Naval Academy because he could not secure an appointment to West Point. Graduating from Annapolis in 1905, he began a career in submarines , rising to command the Atlantic Fleet submarine flotilla by 1912. The following year he toured various European nations, studying submarine development, and returned to build the first diesel engine for the U.S. Navy. During World War I he served as chief-of-staff to the commander of Atlantic Fleet submarines . After the war he attended the Naval War College, served on various staffs, and rose steadily upwards. At the time of Pearl Harbor he was chief of the Bureau of Navigation (i.e., personnel), from which post he was almost immediately made commander of the Pacific Fleet, to which, in early 1942, he added command of all U.S. forces in the central and north Pacific, as well as responsibility for coordinating operations with Douglas MacArthur in the southwest Pacific. Nimitz oversaw all U.S. operations in the Pacific for the entire war, approving strategy , selecting personnel, insuring the flow of men, ships, and material, and working with surprising smoothness with the egocentric MacArthur. After the war he was chief of naval operations until his retirement in late 1947. He later served as a special assistant to the secretary of the Navy, director of the U.N. plebiscite in Kashmir, and wrote a reasonably sound history of the Pacific War. A capable man, Nimitz was flexible in command, willing to listen to others, even when it annoyed him. Although a non-flyer, he recognized the logic behind John Towers' argument that all �black shoe�(non-aviation) officers should have a 'brown shoe' (aviation) advisor and acted on it. His relaxed, almost informal style of command masked a great deal of toughness. Like his arch-foe Yamamoto , Nimitz had been injured in the service, and was missing the ring finger of his left hand. He had a schnauzer named Makalepa.

Spruance, Raymond (1886-1969)
One of the most successful American admirals of the war, Raymond Spruance graduated from Annapolis in 1906, made the Great White Fleet's world cruise, commanded a destroyer, and helped complete and commission the new battleship Pennsylvania , all by 1916. During World War I he commanded the destroyer Aaron Ward in the Atlantic. After the war he held various command and staff positions, taught in several Navy schools, and attended the Naval War College. Shortly after Pearl Harbor he was given command of Cruiser Division 5, which served with Task Force 16 on the Doolittle Raid. Due to Halsey's illness, Spruance was in temporary command of TF 16 at Midway , and performed so well in this role that despite not being aviation qualified, he continued thereafter to command carrier task forces, being provided with a staff consisting mostly of aviators. For a time chief-of-staff to Nimitz , Spruance was shortly put in command of what would become the Fifth Fleet (an assignment which he rotated with Halsey , under whom it was called the Third Fleet). With Fifth Fleet Spruance commanded in the Tarawa Operation, at Eniwetok , in the Marianas , during which he won the Battle of the Philippine Sea , Iwo Jima , and Okinawa . At the end of the war Spruance became president of the Naval War college. He retired in 1948, and served for a time as ambassador to the Philippines. Spruance proved surprisingly effective as a carrier commander. However, although he did everything right at Midway, his actions during the Philippine Sea were less perfect. Failing to realize that he had the Japanese carriers at his mercy, he defeated but did not destroy them, despite the urging of several members of his staff. This was a failure without much penalty, as the Japanese force had been basically ruined during the battle, if not completely destroyed. But in other circumstances, such a lack of follow-through on Spruance 's part might have had serious aftereffects. However, considering Halsey�s more disastrous failure during the Battle of Leyte Gulf , which led to the Japanese battleship attack on the escort carriers off Samar , it seems strange that Halsey was promoted to Fleet Admiral and Spruance was not. On the other hand, post-war, Halsey did not receive any plum assignments, while Spruance was made President of the Naval War College, then one of the most distinguished posts in the Navy.

Yamamoto, Isoruku (1884-1943)
Isoruku (or Isoroku) Yamamoto --born Takano-- was among the outstanding admirals of World War II. He graduated from the Japanese Naval Academy in 1904, and saw action during the Russo-Japanese War, losing several fingers while commanding a torpedo boat in the Battle of Tsu-Shima in 1905 (his principal opponent in the Pacific War, Chester W. Nimitz was also missing a finger). During World War I he served as a staff lieutenant commander, but saw no action. He later attended Yale as a graduate student in the 1920s, where he became well acquainted with the military and industrial potential of the United States. It was this experience which caused him to constantly counsel against war with America. The commander of the Japanese Combined Fleet since 1939, Yamamoto was recognized by Americans and Japanese alike as the most capable commander the Japanese had, architect of the spectacular success which had attended Japanese efforts early in 1942. Yamamoto's undoing was the American success at breaking the Japanese naval codes. Yamamoto's staff suspected that their secret communications codes had been broken, but Yamamoto never believed it to be the case, at least he didn't believe it sufficiently to do much about it. As a result, American P-38 fighters ambushed Yamamoto's aircraft and its seven escorts on 18 April 1943, killing Yamamoto in the process. Beyond being an excellent leader and combat admiral, Yamamoto spoke English, having studied for two years at Harvard shortly after World War I. For a Japanese, he was quite an independent thinker and, by Japanese standards, something of an eccentric. For example, Yamamoto had a Bible with him wherever he traveled and regularly consulted it, even though he was not a Christian. What made Yamamoto dangerous to America was his pragmatism. He knew that Japan could not defeat America, but he had the skill and rank to cause maximum casualties to American troops. The Midway operation was a workable plan, if only Yamamoto had known that his codes were compromised and been able to change the codes (thus keeping the enemy in the dark for at least a few months). The Pearl Harbor attack was his doing, and he had many other bold plans to make the American advance across the Pacific as costly as possible. The other obstacle Yamamoto faced was the Japanese Army, which saw him as a dangerous free thinker. If Yamamoto had had his way, Japan would never have gotten involved in World War II in the first place. As early as 1940 he had told senior Japanese officials that war with American would be futile, and disastrous for Japan. But Yamamoto was still very Japanese. He allowed himself to be adopted into the Yamamoto clan when he was 32 years old and already a distinguished naval officer because the higher status Yamamotos would help him overcome the stigma of his original family's lower social status (and because the Yamamotos wanted someone already famous like Isoroku Takano to be the leader of their clan). This was a typically Japanese maneuver. Yamamoto also believed in the Emperor, whom he was obliged to serve as a sailor unto death. Yamamoto was typical of the many (but not nearly all) Japanese admirals who saw the army's policy in China (and eventual takeover of the government) as not in Japan's best interest. But because the army managed to get the Emperor to agree (or at least remain silent) about their plans, there was nothing other Japanese could do but follow "the Emperor's wishes."

Nagumo, Chuichi (1886-1944)
Chuichi Nagumo graduated from the naval academy in 1908, becoming a destroyerman and expert in torpedo warfare. During the 1920s he traveled in Europe and America, before returning to Japan to commence a series of increasingly important ship and squadron commands. Early in 1941 he was given the First Air Fleet, which he commanded in the attack on Pearl Harbor. Although Japan's premier carrier admiral, Nagumo was not an able tactician or a bold leader. At Pearl Harbor his conservative nature caused him to refuse his staff's urging that a third strike be launched to hit the American fuel supplies and other targets at the now devastated base. However, in the following six months he added to his reputation by leading strikes against Allied bases in Australia and the Indian Ocean. His shortcomings didn't catch up with him until Midway, where his indecisiveness contributed to the loss of four Japanese carriers. He survived this debacle and continued to command carrier forces during 1942 as the Japanese attempted to retake Guadalcanal. In these battles he demonstrated again a lack of drive and by the end of 1942 had been relegated to the command of the Saesbo Naval Base. In 1944, he was given command of the forces defending Saipan. On 7 July 1944, he committed suicide as invading American forces completed their conquest of Saipan.

Yamaguchi, Tamon (1892-1942)
One of Japan's most talented carrier admirals, Tamon Yamaguchi graduated from the naval academy in 1912. Over the years he held various posts, studied at Princeton (1921-1923), served on the Naval General Staff, was a delegate to the London disarmament conference, and naval attach� in Washington (1934-1937). Although a non-flyer, in 1940 he was promoted RAdm and given the 2nd Carrier Division, Hiryu and Soryu. With his command he participated in the Pearl Harbor operation, the subsequent operations in the Dutch East Indies and, finally, Midway. At Midway, as Hiryu was sinking he ordered that the Emeror's portrait be saved and then returned to the bridge to go down with the ship. Yamaguchi was known to criticize his superiors for their narrow minded handling of carriers. He would have been a formidable opponent had he had survived Midway.

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