The Heroes of June 4

[Sandman]

Enjoy

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-gelernter3jun03,0,5424943.story?coll=la-news-comment-opinions

[DiabloTX]

I pick up Arnold Brackman's book about Japanese war crimes unwillingly. I don't want to read about the British officer at the Tamarkan camp, near the River Kwai, beaten insensible then kept four days in a trench in six inches of mosquito-infested rainwater. At war's end, he was insane. Or about prisoners of Japan on a torpedoed ship who struggled to reach a life raft, where a Japanese seaman chopped off their hands or split their skulls with an ax. Routine incidents. This is the Japan that almost won the Battle of Midway, and the war. American soldiers refused to let it happen.

Makes Gitmo look like Club Med.

to the Heroes of June 4th.

[oboe]

Not to take anything from the Navy, but I've been convinced the Battle of Midway has been overrated by historians as 'the' turning point of the Pacific War.

Somewhere a thoughtful writer did an analysis of the US Navy's building program and the ships scheduled to come online in 1943 and afterward, and then spotted the Japanese a complete victory at Midway.   In his analysis, we still end up absolutely dwarfing the IJN in number and size of carrier task forces by 1944.   And we have better quality planes, better pilots and more of them.

Midway was a brilliant victory, though Lady Luck played a pivotal role (I'm thinking of the Tone's delayed search plane).   But really, the issue of victory in the Pacific was never in doubt - Midway just shortened the war a great deal, but didn't change its inevitable outcome.    In that sense I now consider it more of a 'tipping' point rather than a 'turning' point.

I can try to find the web article again if anyone is interested.

Oh, and I object in the strongest possible terms to the phrase "It looked like America had shot its wad and lost everything."   Slang bites, man.