On June 7, 1942, the Battle of Midway—one of the most decisive
U.S. victories in its war against Japan—came to an end. In the
four-day sea and air battle, the outnumbered U.S. Pacific Fleet
succeeded in destroying four Japanese aircraft carriers with the
loss of only one of its own, the Yorktown, thus reversing the tide
against the previously invincible Japanese navy.

On June 4, 1942, the Battle of Midway—one of the most decisive
U.S. victories against Japan during World War II—began. During
the four-day sea-and-air battle, the outnumbered U.S. Pacific
Fleet succeeded in destroying four Japanese aircraft carriers
while losing only one of its own, the Yorktown, to the previously invincible Japanese navy.

On May 3, 1942, during World War II, the first modern naval
engagement in history, the Battle of the Coral Sea, began. A
Japanese invasion force succeeds in occupying Tulagi of
the Solomon Islands in an expansion of Japan’s defensive
perimeter.

The United States, having broken Japan’s secret war code
and forewarned of an impending invasion of Tulagi and Port
Moresby, attempted to intercept the Japanese armada. Four
days of battles between Japanese and American aircraft
carriers resulted in 70 Japanese and 66 American warplanes
destroyed.

In this Sept. 2, 1945 file photo, U.S. General Douglas MacArthur, left, watches as the foreign minister of Japan, Mamoru Shigemitsu,
signs the surrender document aboard the USS Missouri on Tokyo
Bay. Lt. General Richard K. Sutherland, center, witnesses the
ceremony marking the end of World War II, with other American
and British officers in the background. (Source: AP Photo)

Aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay, Japan formally surrendered to the
Allies (above) bringing an end to World War II.

By the summer of 1945, the defeat of Japan was a foregone conclusion. The Japanese navy and air force were destroyed. The Allied naval blockade of
Japan and intensive bombing of Japanese cities had left the country and
its economy devastated. At the end of June, the Americans captured
Okinawa, a Japanese island from which the Allies could launch an invasion
of the main Japanese home islands. U.S. General Douglas MacArthur was
put in charge of the invasion, which was code-named “Operation Olympic”
and set for November 1945.

Akagi Japanese aircraft carrier.

Deep-sea explorers and historians on Sunday announced they apparently
found a second World War II-era Japanese aircraft carrier that sank during
the Battle of Midway.

Director of undersea operations for Vulcan Ind. Rob Kraft said a review of
sonar data captured Sunday showed either the Japanese carrier Akagi
or the Soryu resting in nearly 18,000 feet of water in the Pacific Ocean
more than 1,300 miles northwest of Pearl Harbor. Hawaii. 

The researchers used an autonomous underwater vehicle, or AUV,
equipped with sonar to find the ship. The vehicle had been out
overnight collecting data, and the image of a warship appeared in
the first set of readings on Sunday morning.

Officials said the crew planned to deploy the AUV for another eight-hour
mission where it will capture high-resolution sonar images of the site to
measure the ship and confirm its identity.  
     
The finding came on the heels of last week’s discovery, another Japanese
aircraft carrier, the Kaga, which U.S. forces also sank during the Battle of
Midway in June 1942.

Until now, only one of the seven ships that went down in the air-and-sea
battle, five Japanese vessels and two American ships, had been found.

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