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Twentieth-Century Battles
Scratch One Flattop: The First Carrier Air Campaign and the Battle of the Coral Sea
A study of the historic World War II naval battle, the first involving aircraft carriers and first in which neither warship was in sight of the other.By the beginning of May 1942, five months after the Pearl Harbor attack, the US Navy was ready to challenge the Japanese moves in the South Pacific. When the Japanese sent troops to New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, the Americans sent the carriers Lexington and Yorktown to counter the move, setting the stage for the Battle of the Coral Sea . . . In this book,historian Robert C. Stern analyzes the Battle of the Coral Sea, the first major fleet engagement where the warships were never in sight of each other. Unlike the Battle of Midway, the Battle of the Coral Sea has received remarkably little study. Stern covers not only the action of the ships and their air groups but also describes the impact of this pivotal engagement. His analysis looks at the short-term impact as well as the long-term implications, including the installation of inert gas fuel-system purging on all American aircraft carriers and the push to integrate sensor systems with fighter direction to better protect against enemy aircraft.The essential text on the first carrier air campaign, Scratch One Flattop is a landmark study on an overlooked battle in the first months of the United States’ engagement in World War II.“His research into sources on both sides is exhaustive and he has used Japanese translators where necessary and appropriate to best illuminate materials. His effort has taken years of meticulous scholarship and it shows. . . . Highly recommended.” —Lisle A. Rose, The Northern Mariner / Le marin du nord
331 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 1, 2019
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
January 22, 2024
The illusion that underpinned Japan's conquest of South-East Asia in December 1941 and early 1942 was that the possession of its oil and other material riches would allow the IJA (Imperial Japanese Army) and the IJN (Imperial Japanese Navy) to defend this empire against counter-attack. Or at least that it would enable them to make the USA and British pay a higher price for driving the Japanese occupiers out, than they were willing to pay. This presumed a strategic defensive.
Robert C. Stern, as many before them, reminds us that a defensive posture was never really adopted. The Battle of the Coral Sea was one of the first serious setbacks for the Japanese, as their attempt to expand further west on Papua-New Guinea was blocked by a counterstrike. It has always been regarded as a strategic defeat for the Japanese; Stern argues that it was a tactical defeat as well. He describes the battle in great detail, and is perhaps more convincing on the detail (which seems very well researched) than on the strategic picture (on which he limits himself to generalities).
To digress, I think we need to see Operation MO, the offensive against Port Moresby, in the light of the array of fundamentally unpalatable operational options that the IJN had.
A first option would have been to remain on the operationally defensive, and feed any reinforcements into selected strongholds such as Rabaul, in the hope that with a concentrated build-up of land-based air power and facilities for cruiser and destroyer squadrons, such bases could dominate their region enough to deter attack. The key problem with that option is that the Japanese stronghold would soon be ringed by Allied bases, and the Japanese could not produce enough aircraft and ships to win the resulting war of attrition. Also, to be an effective block to an enemy offensive instead of an irrelevance that can be safely bypassed, a naval stronghold needs to be capable of offensive action itself. But once forces capable of offensive action are based somewhere, the urge is great to use them, rather than see them steadily degraded by enemy raids and bombardment.
The second option was to remain on the offensive, to deny the enemy the bases for counterattack. That meant occupying them, which is what the IJN and IJA agreed to do at Lae, Salamaua, Tulagi, Port Moresby, and later at Guadalcanal. The essential problem with that option was that the already scarce Japanese forces were scattered over an ever-expanding area, with some of the world's most challenging geography and increasingly tenuous supply lines. Reinforcements would be almost homoeopathically diluted, against an enemy who could pick and choose a point to counter-attack. It might have worked if there had been an identifiable point at which the offensive could be stopped, but the IJA understood that even invading Australia would merely create a long land border to defend. This option too resulted in attritional warfare that Japan could not hope to win.
The third option, favoured by admiral Yamamoto, was to seek out and destroy the US Navy, on the fundamentally correct assumption that it would not be able to mount any counter-offensive without the air cover provided by its carrier forces. The weakness of that option was that it was a gamble with enormously lopsided risks. Because the USN would soon be able to replace any losses several times over and the IJN would not be able to replace its losses at all. Only a perfect victory would buy the IJN time, and not even more than that. The sailors and pilots of the IJN might have had confidence in their tactical superiority, but they also understood the vulnerability of their own forces.
Robert Stern tells the story of the IJN trying to do all of the above at the same time. Somehow, the 5th Carrier Division ended up having to ferry reinforcements (a meagre enough ten A6M fighters) to an existing basis, protecting an invasion fleet seeking to establish a new basis at Port Moresby, and trying to destroy the USN Task Forces built around the carriers USS Lexington and USS Yorktown. Between multiple tasks, complex planning, disagreements between staff officers at several levels, and failing reconnaissance and intelligence, admirals Takagi and Hara manoeuvred their forces along the Solomons and in the Coral Sea until they finally had an opportunity to strike against the American fleet. Their USN counterpart, the cautious and controversial admiral Fletcher, at least had a much simpler task, and generally avoided engaging the enemy unless he had a reasonable idea where they were and what they were doing. An approach that served him well on this occasion, despite the blind spots in the intelligence and his handling of it.
To clear up some of the resulting confusion, this book goes into a lot of detail on the position of the forces, describing the changes of course, the speed, the timing, and the weather. A few maps are provided that help a lot, but as the maps don't indicate all the place names, it's worth reviewing the geography of the region from some other source before you read on. Air strikes are recounted in great detail, and reveal some surprises if you are used to accounts of other battles such as Midway. Notably the crews of the vulnerable TBD Devastator torpedo-bomber were relatively fortunate in the Coral Sea, even if the slowness of their mount was a tactical handicap. Also, it is noteworthy how depleted the Japanese air groups were, even before the Battle of the Coral Sea began.
The strength of this book is the detailed technical account. The weakness, perhaps, is the way it deals with the people. The author has provided short biographies in an appendix, but makes little enough attempt to dig into the personalities, even when personal traits of character clearly mattered. He speculates a bit about them (in general with some hostility) but that isn't very informative. An interesting addition to the book are facsimiles from action reports, on which pilots and sailors sketched the courses and events as they remembered them. But with few exceptions, their personal accounts are not part of this story. There are instead numerous quotes from official reports.
A book for a limited audience, I would say; but very interesting if you care about the topic.
Robert C. Stern, as many before them, reminds us that a defensive posture was never really adopted. The Battle of the Coral Sea was one of the first serious setbacks for the Japanese, as their attempt to expand further west on Papua-New Guinea was blocked by a counterstrike. It has always been regarded as a strategic defeat for the Japanese; Stern argues that it was a tactical defeat as well. He describes the battle in great detail, and is perhaps more convincing on the detail (which seems very well researched) than on the strategic picture (on which he limits himself to generalities).
To digress, I think we need to see Operation MO, the offensive against Port Moresby, in the light of the array of fundamentally unpalatable operational options that the IJN had.
A first option would have been to remain on the operationally defensive, and feed any reinforcements into selected strongholds such as Rabaul, in the hope that with a concentrated build-up of land-based air power and facilities for cruiser and destroyer squadrons, such bases could dominate their region enough to deter attack. The key problem with that option is that the Japanese stronghold would soon be ringed by Allied bases, and the Japanese could not produce enough aircraft and ships to win the resulting war of attrition. Also, to be an effective block to an enemy offensive instead of an irrelevance that can be safely bypassed, a naval stronghold needs to be capable of offensive action itself. But once forces capable of offensive action are based somewhere, the urge is great to use them, rather than see them steadily degraded by enemy raids and bombardment.
The second option was to remain on the offensive, to deny the enemy the bases for counterattack. That meant occupying them, which is what the IJN and IJA agreed to do at Lae, Salamaua, Tulagi, Port Moresby, and later at Guadalcanal. The essential problem with that option was that the already scarce Japanese forces were scattered over an ever-expanding area, with some of the world's most challenging geography and increasingly tenuous supply lines. Reinforcements would be almost homoeopathically diluted, against an enemy who could pick and choose a point to counter-attack. It might have worked if there had been an identifiable point at which the offensive could be stopped, but the IJA understood that even invading Australia would merely create a long land border to defend. This option too resulted in attritional warfare that Japan could not hope to win.
The third option, favoured by admiral Yamamoto, was to seek out and destroy the US Navy, on the fundamentally correct assumption that it would not be able to mount any counter-offensive without the air cover provided by its carrier forces. The weakness of that option was that it was a gamble with enormously lopsided risks. Because the USN would soon be able to replace any losses several times over and the IJN would not be able to replace its losses at all. Only a perfect victory would buy the IJN time, and not even more than that. The sailors and pilots of the IJN might have had confidence in their tactical superiority, but they also understood the vulnerability of their own forces.
Robert Stern tells the story of the IJN trying to do all of the above at the same time. Somehow, the 5th Carrier Division ended up having to ferry reinforcements (a meagre enough ten A6M fighters) to an existing basis, protecting an invasion fleet seeking to establish a new basis at Port Moresby, and trying to destroy the USN Task Forces built around the carriers USS Lexington and USS Yorktown. Between multiple tasks, complex planning, disagreements between staff officers at several levels, and failing reconnaissance and intelligence, admirals Takagi and Hara manoeuvred their forces along the Solomons and in the Coral Sea until they finally had an opportunity to strike against the American fleet. Their USN counterpart, the cautious and controversial admiral Fletcher, at least had a much simpler task, and generally avoided engaging the enemy unless he had a reasonable idea where they were and what they were doing. An approach that served him well on this occasion, despite the blind spots in the intelligence and his handling of it.
To clear up some of the resulting confusion, this book goes into a lot of detail on the position of the forces, describing the changes of course, the speed, the timing, and the weather. A few maps are provided that help a lot, but as the maps don't indicate all the place names, it's worth reviewing the geography of the region from some other source before you read on. Air strikes are recounted in great detail, and reveal some surprises if you are used to accounts of other battles such as Midway. Notably the crews of the vulnerable TBD Devastator torpedo-bomber were relatively fortunate in the Coral Sea, even if the slowness of their mount was a tactical handicap. Also, it is noteworthy how depleted the Japanese air groups were, even before the Battle of the Coral Sea began.
The strength of this book is the detailed technical account. The weakness, perhaps, is the way it deals with the people. The author has provided short biographies in an appendix, but makes little enough attempt to dig into the personalities, even when personal traits of character clearly mattered. He speculates a bit about them (in general with some hostility) but that isn't very informative. An interesting addition to the book are facsimiles from action reports, on which pilots and sailors sketched the courses and events as they remembered them. But with few exceptions, their personal accounts are not part of this story. There are instead numerous quotes from official reports.
A book for a limited audience, I would say; but very interesting if you care about the topic.
January 29, 2022
Admiral Who?
Mr Stern has out done himself. Combing excellent sources and a great talent Stern has managed to create a history with with enough tension to maintain a reader’s interest. Stern’s account is sprinkled with names you’ve possibly not read before and searches for those you believe should be there. One must remember that these are the early days of WW II all the heros have not yet been established.
Mr Stern has out done himself. Combing excellent sources and a great talent Stern has managed to create a history with with enough tension to maintain a reader’s interest. Stern’s account is sprinkled with names you’ve possibly not read before and searches for those you believe should be there. One must remember that these are the early days of WW II all the heros have not yet been established.
June 1, 2022
Detailed and officious, and filled with generally sound judgements of the players and events. Stern is at his best when he shifts the role of weather-- the Intertropical Convergence literally hung over the battle-- in providing the air of mystery, confusion, and ominousness of the engagement, perhaps adding to it being remembered-- unfairly, as Stern effectively points out-- as inconclusive.
November 22, 2025
Very well researched and detailed work about the Battle of the Coral Sea. I knew very little about this Pacific War battle that occurred five months after the events of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 and one month before the Battle of Midway. This battle was the first naval engagement conducted solely with carrier aircraft with the combatants never coming within visual range of each other.
Mr. Stern did a good job if including an introduction with all the abbreviations for both USN and IJN ships, aircraft and personnel. I found this a very useful reference while reading the text. The book also includes numerous photographs, diagrams and maps to help the read follow the events.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. I think you will too.
Mr. Stern did a good job if including an introduction with all the abbreviations for both USN and IJN ships, aircraft and personnel. I found this a very useful reference while reading the text. The book also includes numerous photographs, diagrams and maps to help the read follow the events.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. I think you will too.
May 6, 2020
Scratch one plodding and tedious read.
December 9, 2024
The hardback or paperback versions would have been easier to read. I needed to review the abbreviations not only of the Allied and Japanese vessels, but the geography as well. The drawings were too small for the kindle, but would be easily viewed in the other versions. Overall a fair Naval battle story.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews