It had to do with the extreme range (175 miles) of the strike launched by Fletcher. This was at the edge of the American round trip envelope. (The IJN was 225 or so.)
All of the SBD Dauntless’s where launched first, then the torpedo planes (TBD Devastators), then the F4F Wildcat fighter escort. The aircraft with the best range were launched first.
Fuel permitting, the groups launched first would normally orbit the assembly area, waiting for the other groups to form up, then the whole shebang would head on out, hopefully as a coordinated strike. The SBD’s would fly at 12 to 15 thousand feet, the fighters near that, and the torpedo planes at about 5000. (Attack-run altitude of the TBD was about 100 feet, IIRC.)
However, it was decided to forego the assembly, as that would burn fuel and, more importantly, time (he who strikes first lives to tell about it), and order the strike(s) in by squadron/type. All aircraft were given a heading to the IJN force. Hornet’s SBD’s went out on the wrong heading, but all other strike aircraft eventually found the Kido Butai.
It was an effective plane in 1939/40, but by 1942 ,hopelessly obsolete. With fixed landing gear and a top speed of barely 300 knots, it was toast when engaged by modern fighters.
Yet the Germans were still using them in Russia, in 1944.
I’d hate to be a Stuka pilot pulling out of a dive, with a Shtormovik fighter on my tail.
Just as clarification, the Ilyushin Il-2 was not a fighter, it was another ground attack aircraft. In fact, the Western name of “Shturmovik” is not a nickname but the Russian type description. That said, the Il-2did take on Ju-87’s fairly regularly when they met and usually won. Not so much due to speed, ( Il-2 top speed = 257mph, Ju-87 top speed = 242mph) but because the Stuka’s rifle-caliber guns couldn’t penetrate the Shturmovik’s armor.
Agree with everything you say, but have to nitpick your choice of Sturmovik. This wasn’t a fighter, but a ground-attack aircraft, much like the Stuka itself.
IIRC, one of the reasons the dive bombers were so effective at Midway was that the Japanese carriers were refueling and refitting their own bombers at the time so lots of combustible materials were on the decks for the bombs to set off. Attacking from high altitude and high speed made dive bombers harder to hit with AA but it also made it harder to hit the ships. Plus the shape of ships make it much easier to hit with torpedos.
At the beginning of WWII, the IJN had the best torpedos in the world-the so-called “LongLance” oxygen-fueled torpedo. They were fast and very reliable. In contrast, USN had tones og problems with the standard USN torpedo-many had bad detonators, and qite a few went off-course.
Did the aircraft launched torpedos include the LongLance type?
The “Long Lance” was the name given to the Type 93 torpedo, which was deployed on DD’s, CL’s, and CA’s. It was a 24inch diameter weapon, and had a 1000 pound warhead. (The Type 95 torpedo, which was smaller, was used on subs.)
The Type 91 torpedo was the air dropped torpedo: 18inch, half the weight, slightly smaller warhead, much reduced swimming range.
