Thoughts on the sacrifice of Torpedo Squadrons 3, 6 and 8 during the battle of Midway. With obsolete aircraft, pitiful torpedoes the American fliers threw themselves into a hopeless fight, similar to that of the British Light Brigade at Balaclava. In the end only on in six aircraft survived the day, but they helped pave the way to victory by drawing the fury of the Japanese Combat Air Patrol down on them allowing the Dive Bombers of the Enterprise and Yorktown to destroy the Japanese Carriers. Peace, Padre Steve+
Half a league half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred:
‘Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns’ he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Alfred, Lord Tennyson: The Charge of the Light Brigade
They were not six hundred and they were not mounted on horses but the Naval Aviators of Torpedo Squadrons 3, 6 and 8 and their aerial steeds 42 Douglas TBD Devastators and 6 TBF Avengers wrote a chapter of courage and sacrifice seldom equaled in the history of Naval Aviation. Commanded by veteran Naval Aviators, LCDR Lance “Lem” Massey, LCDR Eugene Lindsey and LCDR John Waldron the squadrons embarked aboard the carriers flew the obsolete TBD Devastators and the young pilots of the Midway based Torpedo 8 detachment under the command of LT Langdon Fieberling flew in the new TBF Avengers.
The…
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The Inglorius Padre Steve's World 
You know, I read something a few years ago that I found interesting. A naval think-tank had set up this battle with computers as the opponents (so as to maintain both strategic and tactical surprise as factors) and despite a large number of runs, the US NEVER got near as well as they did in real life. A truly amazing collection of highly unlikely events combined to make the US victory possible,