This Plane was brought to my attention in the Movie Tora, Tora, Tora. I saw that movie in the Theaters back in the early 70s. I tended to like the Kate Torpedo Bomber more. The Planes from the movie were kept at Long Beach Airport after filming.
I would rather take my chances in a dive bomber than i would in a torpedo bomber . . . especially a Devastator launching early war Mark 14 torpedos. Not only a near suicide mission against a competent CAP but your torpedo wasn't likely to function in the unlikely chance that you got to launch anywhere close enough to a vessel to hit it. . One reason VT8 was KIA to one survivor is that Waldron insubordinately left his assigned task group, which admittedly were on the wrong heading, and so he left his fighter cover because he, rightfully or wrongfully resented the fact that they were going to be at altitude to have any advantage in energy over the Zeke CAP and took his men on a suicide mission, no doubt unawares of the proficiency of the Japanese CAP. . VT8s contribution was, along with Midway's land based bombers and VT6 and VT3, was more about running out the clock on Nagumo preventing him from launching anything. There was 40 minutes of time between VT8's attack and VB6 and VB3's arrival, for CAP fighters to climb to altitude and the Zeke could do it in 7 minutes. The CAP pilots just got target fixation and left their priority patrol because of VF3 engaging them with some success in employing the Thatch Weave “beam defense maneuver." Probably some chasing down remnants of VT6 as well. . But Thatch's VF3 fighter group were fighting for survival so none of the fighter groups managed to protect any torpedo bombers that day as VF6 remained above the cloud cover, not hearing any distress call-out from VT6 and VF8 along with VB8 got lost and either landed at Midway or ran out of fuel and ditched with two being captured by the Japanese, interrogated then beaten and killed after a show of cooperation. Only VF8 Commander Mitscher returned to Hornet to fabricate the only post-mission report from Hornet to cover for the Task Group's Airmen, a couple of whom had operational issues on this mission of one kind or another, probably stemming in part from Hornet's preoccupation with the Doolittle Mission leaving them short of practice time as a team.. . Nobody hit a thing all day until VB6 and VB3 arrived to find the Japanese CAP either absent or being recovered and being re-fueled and re-armed. but everybody's effort ran the clock out on Nagumo and that was their contribution. . Otherwise it probably would've been anything from a total loss to even attrition. Even attrition benefits those who can better replace their losses I guess.
The Japanese had another weakness you never hear about. Two Japanese pilots told me that they would not bail out of their damaged planes. Many even had parachutes, but they sat on them. Many were afraid of the shame from being picked up and imprisoned by the Americans, so they would rather die an honorable death. They simply rode their planes into the sea. American and German pilots bailed out and often got picked up by friendlies to fight another day. The Japanese lost all of their experienced pilots very early in the war and replaced them with beginners. It must have been pretty terrible to be forced into a war where the guy you picked a fight with has everything and you have just about nothing. They had this whole sense of shame that we don't have here.
I totally agree with you after Midway World War II in the Pacific was a battle of attrition they were never able to be on the attack again it was the beginning of us being the aggressor and we stayed the aggressor until the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima!
