Hey all,
So in college around 2010 I had this professor for American Military History and he was so old that he probably bled dust. Anyways, a retired Army COL. from Korea, he had news paper clippings, told stories from his friends and his personal research that I cannot find anywhere. I highly doubt he was making any of this up but there is complete lack of proof however at the same time one cannot capture every story that happened seventy years prior during a war that circumvented the globe.
He told a story that if I remember it correctly went something like this.
Battle of Midway a carrier (cannot remember which one) was spotted by the Japanese and would surely be sunk. The carrier launched a squadron to keep the Japanese occupied which the commanding officer (a Lieutenant Commander) knew it was a suicide mission. Even if the squadron would have succeeded the carrier would be too far for the planes to even return without running out of fuel. The LT Commander knew this and opted to fly and lead his crews anyways. They all launched and were killed.
Does this sound familiar to anyone or can someone shed some light on this who might be a Midway expert? My digging and research have been unsuccessful. Long shot I know but worth it. Thanks!
The story seems to be mixing up some details about the airstrikes Hiryu launched on the afternoon of 4 June in the wake of the destruction of the other three Japanese carriers. The "fateful five minutes" at 1022-1027 saw American dive bombers deal fatal damage to Kaga, Akagi, and Soryu. Hiryu by chance was able to be out of position for an American attack and that left her as the only Japanese carrier that could strike at the American carriers. The Japanese reconnaissance aircraft had identified the rough location of Yorktown and Hiryu launched two airstrikes to sink the American carriers.
While the distance between the Japanese and American forces was nothing to sneeze at, it was well within the operational range of Japanese aircraft. The problem for Hiryu's aircraft was not the range but they were tasked with doing too much with a somewhat battered force. Not only was her airgroup somewhat small for the task at hand, but it was quite damaged. The airstrikes against Midway that morning had led to some planes being damaged by AA fire and fighter aircraft. This was clearly a problem for Hiryu's second airstrike, which consisted of B5N torpedo planes. Two of the ten B5Ns for this airstrike had been repaired, but the repairs were incomplete. One of the B5N's fuel tanks ruptured, and this happened to be the plane of the commander of Hiryu's torpedo aircraft, Lieutenant Tomonaga Joichi. This plane could only carry enough fuel for a one-way mission and Tomonaga refused offers from his other pilots to switch planes. For Tomonaga, the second airstrike was a one-way mission.
Hiryu's airstrikes against Yorktown were not suicide missions or akin to the latter Kamikaze attacks. The Japanese did plan on returning to their carriers. Nine of the sixteen B5Ns and Zero escorts for the second airstrike did return to Hiryu. Nonetheless, the actions of Tomonaga do show that the Japanese were willing to risk one-way missions to achieve their goals. But such self-sacrifice was at this stage in the war was more determined by circumstances rather than being a reflection of a deliberate tactic.
Parshall and Tully's Shattered Sword goes in depth on the Japanese view of Midway and provides a good basis for what happened there.
Edit
As for American one-way planes, no.
The semi-facetious answer is that the American airstrikes were too poorly coordinated to demonstrate such deliberate, if cold, foresight. For one thing, the Americans were not really aware that they had been spotted when they launched their attack. Part of the problem for the American attack was that the Japanese forces were so large that it as difficult to gain an accurate picture of where exactly the Japanese carriers were on 4 June. Aerial sightings themselves were prone to errors and could lead to wild goose chases in the days before airborne radar. Wade McClusky, the commander of dive bombers that sunk three Japanese carriers, only returned to his carrier with the barest margin of fuel. But McClusky did not have a death wish. Later on the evening of 4 June, Spruance's chief of staff Browning came up with a plan to deal with a hypothetical fifth Japanese carrier in which the American SBD's would take off with 1000 lbs bombs. This would have made the missions close to one-way and McClusky had very sharp words with both Spruance and his chief of staff. Spruance eventually gave way to McClusky and the SBDs were rearmed with 500 lbs bombs for an airstrike against a carrier that did not exist.