Battle of Midway (World War II) war movies

Battle of Midway 4 June 1942

Naval battle near the Midway Island was turning point in World War 2 on Pacific - after Doolittle Raid Admiral Yamamoto was determined to knock out the remaining American aircraft carriers that still could be threat his future operations. In April 1942 he thought frontal attack on Pearl Harbor would be too risky, but small atoll called Midway was more plausible target - if Japan would take over the airfield this would place the rest of Hawaii within range of their land based bombers.

Yamamoto prepared large fleet that would attack Midway and at the same time drove away the attention of US Navy from the secondary target, Aleutian Islands in the north. Four aircraft carriers (Akagi, Kaga, Hiryu and Soryu), 2 escort carriers, 11 battleships, 16 cruisers and the escort gave Imperial Navy a huge advantage. Admiral Nimitz had 2 aircraft carriers (Enterprise and Hornet) plus 8 cruisers, which was not a lot in those circumstances. But Nimitz had one advantage over Yamamoto - the knowledge. American intelligence managed to break the newest Japanese code and from intercepted communication they determined that Yamamoto is preparing his fleet and what will be the target of operation, which means Japanese have lost the element of surprise.

Nevertheless the advantage in number should be enough to secure win, but unaware of Nimitz preparations and the fact that third American carrier, USS Yorktown, was at the last moment repaired and fully operational, Yamamoto was preparing his bombers for operation against land target, the airfield on Midway. When they have detected American naval forces he gave the order for bombers to be rearmed with torpedoes, which meant that most of the bombers were still unavailable to take off.

The Battle of Midway was a disaster for Imperial Fleet - they have lost all 4 carriers, sunk only one of 3 American carriers (USS Yorktown) and they did not managed to take over Midway. This was a turning point for whole war on Pacific - from that point Japanese Navy had very limited capabilities of aerial operations.

Hiryu aircraft carrier

USS Enterprise

Soryu aircraft carrier

USS Hornet

Akagi aircraft carrier

USS Yorktown

Kaga aircraft carrier

F4F Wildcat

Aichi D3A Val

SBD Dauntless

Mitsubishi A6M Zero

TBD Devastator

Nakajima B5N Kate

PBY Catalina

TBF Avenger

B-26 Marauder

B-17 Flying Fortress

War movies about Battle of Midway

Midway 1976

Japanese fleet aproaches the strategically important Midway Atoll ready to destroy the airfield and attack the island, but what Admiral Yamamoto doesn’t know is that American know his plans.

War and Remembrance 1988

Second part of the epic Herman Wouk novels - Pugh Henry and his family are spread around the world when war starts, now they have to find a way to survive.