Talk:Battle of Midway

Perspective of a non-military history-inclined editor

I don't normally spend much time in the military history areas of Wikipedia, but I remember Midway being interesting enough from high school that I decided to give this page a read to refresh my memory. Here are some thoughts, judging against the FA criteria:

Criterion 1: Overall, it is generally well-written, with only a few small copy errors that I corrected on my read-through, and a few cliches. File:Battle of midway-deployment map.svg lacks an adequate legend (e.g. it's not immediately clear that the yellow fire icons represent attacks, rather than sinkings, and some of the numbers aren't explained). Also, this is probably hard to avoid, but some of the military terminology got a little hard to parse. After the first wikilinked mention of things like VF-6, I forgot what they stood for, so when I encountered them later, I had to do a ctrl+f search for the first mention to get reminded. This could potentially be addressed with extensive use of {{abbr}}, although I'm not sure whether that'd require a change to the MOS.

1D: It's generally good on neutrality, although a few passages (e.g. about "tears in their eyes") go over the line into sentimentality and Euphemism, avoiding direct phrasing. If those lines are kept in, there also should be some additional description of the extent of the suffering of the casualties (e.g. what was it actually like to be on board one of the burning aircraft carriers?). Qualifications like Fortunately for the U.S. are certainly needed.

Criterion 2: The level of detail allowed me to get a good impression of the military technology of the era (e.g. the difficulty of communications). There didn't seem to be too much extraneous details, although with some of the Americans killed who received individual mention, it wasn't always clear to me why (that's not much of a problem, so long as there's a consistent standard). However, when it came to the larger picture, i.e. the overall sweep of the battle, this article is not where it should be for a FA. After reading the battle section, I got lost in the details so much that I sought out Midway order of battle to try to get a better overview of what the actual major events/turning points were over the course of the battle (that page unfortunately has basically no lead section, and thus didn't help). The importance of aircraft carriers was generally sufficiently reinforced, but without things like section headings that referenced what happened to different carriers at different points, it got a little confusing.

2C: I didn't dive into the citations extensively, but one of the few I did follow was a dead link; those need to be archived.

Criterion 3: The media is generally good; perhaps make some size adjustments. There's room to add more if more good images are out there, and an oral audio account or two might be nice if freely licensed ones are available.

Criterion 4: Length seems fine.

I hope those thoughts are useful for keeping this page maintained and up to status. I'm giving this section a DNAU, since some of these issues may take a while to address. Once they're resolved, feel free to remove it. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 23:16, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

By 1942 the United States was already three years into a shipbuilding program mandated by the Second Vinson Act of 1938

The Naval Act of 1938 was a very small act. it allowed only 40,000t of aircraft carriers and resulted in the construction of Hornet.

What should be linked to instead is the Two-Ocean Navy Act of July 1940. That one was huge and it resulted in a real shipbuilding program. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 158.181.83.72 (talk) 21:24, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

"30 Aircrew of VT-8?"

Trivial question: Is “30 aircrew of VT-8” meant to be “30 aircrews?” Or to tell us that 30 men flew in VT-8?

A quick reality check suggests that the airplane used had a crew of three, so the 15 aircraft in VT-8 would have been flown by a total of 45 men. Perhaps other factors are in play?

Thanks for any insight. I’ll revise as appropriate.

Jdickinson (talk) 07:29, 11 July 2022 (UTC)

Completely correct. the photos show the VT squadrons of avengers and devastators with 3 crew .. its the inbuilt spec for the planes.. 3 seats, 3 crew..

No other factor at play. 15 planes with 45 crewmembers took off that day, all planes lost, only one crewmember was rescued, so VT8 lost 44 aircrew at Midway.

The torpedo bombers at midway ... is downplayed, they didn't want to discourage the deployment of Avengers.. as indeed at Guadacanal they hit fleet carriers, they hit Musashi and Yamato.. as it happens, the different flight altitudes results in their flight time being quite different... less headwind ? So at midway, they get their first and suffer the worst.. But Imagine the war without torpedo bombers... the carnage of a battleship battle versus Musashi or Yamato... how many battleships would the USA lose to sink those ? 220.158.190.47 (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 02:07, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

"Battle for Midway" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Battle for Midway has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 October 5 § Battle for Midway until a consensus is reached. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 07:24, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

Number of US carrier pilots lost at sea

From what I understand, a large percentage of the US carrier dive bomber and fighter aircrews who died were not from combat action, but were lost after running out of fuel and ditching in the ocean on the first day of battle. Do we have the numbers of fuel-depleted, ditched US airplanes and aircrew who perished or were subsequently rescued? 152.130.15.15 (talk) 14:10, 31 October 2023 (UTC)