World Battlefronts: BATTLE OF THE PACIFIC: The Face of Victory

The U.S. had not merely won a great battle in the Pacific and averted a great disaster: The U.S. had proved its skill and might in a new form of warfare at sea. For, in the Battle of Midway, U.S. forces met and drove back the first full battle fleet, organized on the grand scale for modern war, which any nation has yet put to sea.

In the Japanese Fleet of battleships, cruisers, destroyers and submarines, the capital ship was the aircraft carrier. That fleet, built around seaborne air power, had to retreat...