Quote:
Originally Posted by Seadog
If the carriers had been sunk, all of the remaining operations would have relocated to San Diego and the Islands abandoned. What was even more of a mistake by the Japanese, was to not take out the fuel farms and repair facilities. Policy at the time would have meant the same thing, Move everything to the mainland. That would mean that the ships sunk would have not been resurrected, and all actions against the Japanese would have much more distance to travel.
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Very true Sd,
did you watch the entire series I linked there?
Some say there was a general order not to attack 'private industry' and that's why certain facilities were incredibly untouched.
Some even claim that they were deliberately left off the target list in case of a possible future invasion in which the Japanese Navy would need them.
Others say they were to be targeted in the 3rd planned wave that never happened because Nagumo was unjustly worried about the 2 missing carriers(for which he never redeemed himself of that criticism).
I tend to pull for Theory 3.
The problem is that we don't have the original untampered Japanese records on this.
What records we do claim to use are often considered suspect as there are claims we changed them after the war.
I think those targets were left for the 3rd wave. Because if they hit the oil tanks in the first wave, the sky would be too polluted and area too hot for accurate air vs sea operations.
But no doubt Nagumo screwed up. Some say it was deliberate as he resented the 'carrier theory' over the 'battleship theory'.
Regardless, he could have stayed around long enough to find the carriers, or gone looking for them and he I agree with his critics that he should have sent the 3rd wave to finish off the fuel tanks and destroy the port facilities(assuming they were targets), which as you say, would have forced the fleet back to San Francisco anyways.
2 carriers vs 6, he could still launch #3 and fight off 2 enemy cvs till his main attack force returned.
Agreed.