From the 4th through the 8th of May, 1942, the Japanese and American fleets exchanged blows in their first major engagement. The Americans won, but not by much; the most important battle would take place four weeks later at Midway. But the Yanks were happy with the way it turned out nonetheless:
- from Amazon:
"It was a victory all right - but it was not as decisive as it sounded, to a jubilant America. For in the north in the mandated islands the main Japanese Fleet still stood ready for action at any moment - a fleet as yet largely unscathed, a fleet that has always come back for more, a fleet that does not like the taste of defeat."
Read about the Battle of Leyte Gulf...
Written months after the battle, this is the Yank report on the naval engagement that was "the turning point in the war":
"The Jap had failed to get a foothold on Australia. Strategists reasoned that he would now strike east, at an outpost of the North American continent. Alaska became the No. 1 alert; bombers were flown to Midway; carriers came north and Admiral Nimitz pushed patrols far out toward the Bonins and Wake islands... A navy patrol found the enemy first, in the early hours of June 3 [1942]... Reconnaissance showed a Jap force of about 80 ships approaching Midway."
- the contest that followed proved to be the first truly decisive battle in the Pacific war.
Click here to read more about Midway.
Assorted well-campaigned swab-jockeys lounge-about and discuss their various experiences on both oceans. A short notice from a May, 1944, issue of The Pathfinder reported that there was a fashion among the American sea-going men of the enlisted variety to wear a particular style of earring in their left ear if they'd experienced combat. Don't take our word for it, read on... A World War Two article from YANK MAGAZINE recalling the sinking of a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier off the coast of the Gilbert Islands -
Four graphs from a 1947 Naval study illustrate the amount of Japanese aircraft and assorted sea faring vessels that were destroyed during the course of World War Two. | 
