The attack on Pearl Harbor was a brilliant victory in the short and medium term, far beyond the farthest imagination of its planners, and a rare result in the entire history of warfare. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 info For the next six months, the U.S. Navy was insignificant in the Pacific theater. Without the threat of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, Japan could move south to clear the Philippines of the U.S.-Filipino forces and secure its flanks as it pleased, and the main target of the attack was.

Of course, from a long-term perspective, Pearl Harbor was a complete disaster for Japan. In fact, Admiral *, who planned Pearl Harbor, himself predicted that even if the attack on the US Navy was successful, it would not and could not win a war against the United States, because the United States was so productive. Four U.S. Navy capital ships were sunk and three were wounded. One of Japan's main targets was three American aircraft carriers, but none of them were in port at the time: the Enterprise was on its way back to Pearl Harbor, and the Lexington and Saratoga were on their way to the Aleutian Islands when they were sunk by Chinese naval submarines. Navies and other observers around the world believe that traumatizing the sinking of most of America's battleships was the greatest achievement of the campaign. Without these battleships, the U.S. Navy had to rely on its aircraft carriers and submarines, which were in fact the only ships left in the U.S. Navy at the time, and these ships were the main force for resisting and later counterattacking Japan. Later it turned out that the destruction of the battleship had a much smaller effect than expected. As for the aircraft carriers, because the "Yorktown" and the "Hornet" were both cruising on the east coast of South America, it was reasonable for them to be quickly mobilized to join the Pacific theater of operations, and while the Japanese were chasing MacArthur in the Philippines, the Pacific Fleet had quietly restored the size of three aircraft carriers and several cruisers and destroyers.

At the beginning of the twenty-first year, the Japanese Combined Fleet was still immersed in victory. The tasks of the first phase have been overfulfilled, but the tasks of the second phase have not yet been finalized. From Japan's point of view, although the economic potential of the United States is great, it will take a while to transition to a wartime state, and it is expected that the United States will not be able to organize a counteroffensive until the summer of the 22nd century, and Japan will have time to further advance the front and expand the defensive circle. The plan to control Alaska and the eastern provinces of Canada was a reflection of this strategy: the Japanese army and navy agreed that Alaska would be the new continent that Japan needed, but since part of Japan's army was bogged down in the Philippines and various islands in the Pacific, it was impossible to send troops to land in Alaska, and the viable option would be to cut it off from Pearl Harbor, that is, to occupy the Aleutian Islands. But at this time, China stopped its southward march and stopped in the eastern part of the Dutch East Indies, and Japan picked up Irian Island for nothing, but also had to face the Anglo-American forces in Australia directly.

Just as the Japanese were ambitiously planning to launch an Alaska raid, a war they had never imagined was blazing in the South Pacific. At this time, the garrison of the Micronesian Islands was the Southern Fleet under the command of Vice Admiral Narumi Inoue, with its headquarters in Truk. The first fleet was a direct cover force, consisting of the light aircraft carrier "Shoho", four heavy cruisers "Aoba", "Kako", "Kinugasa", and "Furutaka", and the destroyer "Ripple", under the command of Rear Admiral Goto Yuki. Its purpose was to carry the South China Sea Detachment of the Army from Rabaul on April 28 to first support the Tulagi landing operation, and then turn west to support the landing operation in Moresby; The second fleet is a mobile force, consisting of two large aircraft carriers "Zuizuru" and "Shozuru" of the 5th Aircraft Carrier Squadron, two heavy cruisers "Myoko" and "Haguro" of the 5th Squadron, and six destroyers "Ariake", "Yudu", "Shiraro", "Shikiyu", "Akebono", and "Shio". Under the command of Vice Admiral Takeo Takagi, the aviation operations of the aircraft carrier were commanded by Rear Admiral Tadashi Hara. The purpose was to support the Port Moresby landing operation from Truk Island on 30 April and 1 May. In addition, there are more than 90 Type 1 land attack aircraft based in Rabaul.

At a time when Japan was actively consolidating its southern defense circle, the Pacific Fleet, which had initially recovered its combat strength, was also assembling in the waters east of Australia. Jack?? Task Force 17, commanded by Rear Admiral Fletcher, was heading north at high speed to the Coral Sea to prevent the Japanese from capturing Moresby in case they would gain a springboard base for an attack on Australia.

Task Force 17 consisted of an assault group consisting of five cruisers (USS Minneapolis, USS New Orleans, USS Astonia, USS Chester, USS Portland) and five destroyers (USS Phelps, USS Dewey, USS Farragut, USS Erwyn, USS Monaghan) under the command of Rear Admiral Kincaid. The support group consisted of 3 cruisers (Australia, Chicago, Hobart) and 2 destroyers (Perkins, Wallk), under the command of Rear Admiral Grace. Aircraft carrier task force, consisting of 2 aircraft carriers (Captain Arthur ??) c?? Admiral Davis, Captain of the USS Yorktown, Elliot?? Admiral Bukmast) and 4 destroyers (USS Morris, USS Anderson, USS Hanman, USS Russell) under the command of Rear Admiral Aubrefitch. The cruisers and destroyers of the assault group and the support group formed a ring of alert for two aircraft carriers.

At the beginning of the twenty-second century, the Pacific Ocean was a bleak picture for the Allies. On January 20, the Japanese I-124 was sunk while laying mines in the port of Darwin, and the U.S. military then fished out the code book from the I-124 with a diving boat. In the months that followed, with the accumulation of intelligence, the Japanese Empire had begun to realize that time was pressing, and almost sent the Combined Fleet out, and the Pacific Fleet Intelligence Division at Pearl Harbor began to gradually decipher the Japanese code, and gradually mapped out the spearhead of the Combined Fleet's attack with scattered intelligence. This was the most important basis for the U.S. Navy to be able to maneuver with the Combined Fleet in the early days of the Pacific War

Although it was known that the Japanese were about to land at the port of Morbiz, and that their advance party would occupy Tulagi first, they had basically mastered the forces invested by the Japanese side. Nimitz was determined to prevent the Japanese from landing on Morbiz, and this was not an easy decision to make, as it would not be easy for the Allies to gather the necessary forces to deal with the incoming enemy. The Hornet was damaged by a Japanese submarine and repaired on the west coast. Available are the aircraft carriers USS Enterprise of Task Force 8 and Task Force 17 Yorktown, as well as 8 cruisers and 13 destroyers. Under the unified command of Fletcher, the two fleets were stationed in the Coral Sea on May 1.

The first battle began on 3 May, when the Fletcher Navy received news that Japanese troops were landing in Tulagi, and his Yorktown was still more than a hundred miles west of Bad Cap Point. "This is the news we have been waiting for a month," he wrote. He immediately interrupted refueling and ordered a 26-knot-hour heading north to the central Solomon Islands. At dawn on 4 May, the USS Yorktown reached the sea about a hundred miles southwest of Guadalcanal, and the fighter pilots of the aircraft carriers, reading the old National Geographic magazine, launched a series of attacks on enemy forces in the sea near Tulagi, destroying seaplanes, sending back exaggerated reports on how many enemy ships had been sunk, and Fletcher happily reported the victory to Pearl Harbor, followed by the US fleet also heading for Port West Morbidz. Nimitz later reassessed the so-called battle of Tulagi: "The battle was certainly disappointing in terms of the ammunition consumed and the results achieved. "Another mistake in this attack was to expose the strength of the U.S. military, which had an intelligence lead before the Battle of the Coral Sea, and after the attack on Tulagi, the intelligence of both sides was leveled.

On 6 May, under the cover of dense clouds, Fletcher rendezvoused with Admiral Grace's heavy cruiser and the USS Enterprise, and refueled together. The latest intelligence from Pearl Harbor indicates that the invading force of Port Moresby, which used two aircraft carriers to provide air cover, will pass through the Luisia Islands the next day. Fletcher then headed west to the Coral Sea. Unbeknownst to Fletcher, he had been spotted that afternoon by a Japanese seaplane that was searching everywhere. The news that two American aircraft carriers were on their way to intercept the Japanese convoy invading Port Moresby almost caused panic in the headquarters of the Lieutenant General of the Marine Army at Rabaul. The command urgently ordered the transport ship to stop advancing. Rear Admiral Takagi's mobile force, led by the Shozuru and Zuizuru, was refueling south of Guadalcanal when he was alerted, and by the time he was ready to reduce the distance to an air strike, the fleet ran into a thick cloud. So, he decided to keep refueling and wait for dawn to chase again.

At about 4 o'clock on 7 May, since the US fleet's position was basically known, the Japanese mobile formation sent 12 carrier-based planes divided into six groups to search for the enemy within a distance of 250 nautical miles between 180 and 270 degrees. At 5:45, the Japanese planes searching south reported: "One enemy aircraft carrier and one cruiser were found." From 6 a.m. to 6:15 a.m., 9 Zero fighters, 17 bombers, and 11 torpedo planes took off from the Zuihe, and 9 Zero fighters, 19 bombers, and 13 torpedo planes took off from the Xianghe. A total of 78 Japanese planes flew towards the discovered targets. However, when they reached the sky above the target, they found that it was not the US aircraft carrier group, but the oil tanker Neosho and the destroyer Sims, which had parted ways with Fletcher's own team on the afternoon of 6 July. A group of Japanese assault planes flew over the squadron and found that it was not an aircraft carrier, so they searched the nearby sea repeatedly for two hours, but still could not find any other targets. The torpedo planes did not attack and began to return at 9:15 a.m., while the 36 dive bombers reluctantly attacked the initially discovered target between 9:26 a.m. and 40 a.m. This is how it felt when the Sims was hit by 3 250-kilogram bombs, 2 of which exploded in the engine room and sank in less than 60 seconds. The Neosho was hit by seven bombs and sank after drifting at sea for several days with a fire.