I think Yorktown was turned around in 72 hours, still an unbelievable feat.
Wiki had it at 48 but while they're at the highest accuracy they've ever been, they're still not infallible. You may well have better info, or it may even be that it was 72 hours total from dry-docking to underway again.
I was thinking more about how history is so often presented to us as a series of discrete episodes without the context of the big picture, which tends to reduce our comprehension.
The big picture:
In February 1942 the Japanese held complete control of the Pacific and were even threatening to land
on Australia.
IF the US Pacific based carriers had been damaged or destroyed in Pearl Harbor on December 7th 1941 (as expected), they
would have.
It's a little known fact that the Japanese actually completed and were the first to launch the world's first purpose-built aircraft carrier in 1921
The Imperial Japanese Navy started the Pacific War with 10 aircraft carriers, the largest and most modern carrier fleet in the world at that time.
(those 2 facts lifted from "the usual source")
By February 1942 they had no less than 11 total carriers, albeit that very first one at least, was involved strictly in training, not combat operational.
And 5 more were on the slips and commissioned between May and November. (One of 'em lasted just 4 months: launched in January and sunk at Coral Sea in May.)
The US had a grand total of 7 : Lexington, Enterprise, and Saratoga based out of Pearl, and Yorktown, Ranger, Wasp, and Hornet were in the Atlantic supporting anti-submarine operations.
Yeah we were sweatin' bullets abut the situation in the Pacific and Yorktown was tasked post-haste through the Panama Canal to supplement the Pacific Fleet.
Yorktown was in San Diego by December 30th and after some initial operations was tasked to the Coral Sea with Lexington in February '42 to help block Japanese advances in New Guinea, which would have provided the hopping-off point to Australia.
They'd already sunk the top-of the-line battleships Prince of Wales and Repulse off Singapore on December 18 '41, a major hit to the British Navy.
With naval airpower based in
Saigon (!).
Had this strategy succeeded, Allied (including the UK) logistic supply lines in the Pacific would have been effectively choked off.
That's why Coral Sea was important.
As well, in February '42,
Hornet was training B25 pilots in the intricacies of carrier-based launches, and in April, (between Coral Sea and Midway), carried out the Doolittle raid, then actually headed for the Coral Sea but the battle was over before it could get there, so it turned around to become the core of one of the task forces defending Midway along with Enterprise and Yorktown.
The Battle of the Coral Sea saw the sinking of a brand new Japanese carrier and severe damage to 1 of the 6 carriers that raided Pearl, and Midway saw the sinking of another 4 of those.
The Japanese carrier fleet was now reduced to 5 operational, although 5 more were commissioned and launched by the end of '42.
But Midway saw the gutting of the Japanese
skilled pilot reserves, without which carriers were fairly well useless.
And the US was ramping up production beyond any hope of the Japanese ever catching up.
And Yamamoto's fears and warnings of eventually being out-gunned by the United States if they didn't complete their plans within 6 months were realized.
Within 7 months of the raid on Pearl.
And that's why
Midway was important.
Coral Sea we traded ship for ship. Midway we decimated them and that was the turning point in the war.
Right, but Coral was a strategic win, it halted the advance on Australia and opened up Guadalcanal for attack.
The 'Canal was another strategic choke point on supply lines, if the Japanese had maintained control of their airbase.
Ray Spruance was God at Midway.
And he was put in, to many's surprise, at Nimitz's behest on the advice of Halsey.
I always remember this quote from
Midway (great flick IMHO), and even though it's Henry Fonda as Nimitz who says it, point is
he knew he could count on Spruance to take on the job:
Rochefort: We've already won a great victory, Admiral. Maybe we oughta get our people out of there.
Admiral Nimitz: "You mean... break off, run for home?"
Lt. Comm. Rochefort: Before they can hurt us again. Yes, sir. Admiral
Nimitz:
"Well, that might be the smart play, Commander. Trouble is, I want that fourth carrier."
And he was right.
On both counts.
