On December 7, 1941,
the United States entered World War II, and it was on that day the numerous
critics of aircraft carrier tactics within US Navy command
realized the degree of their error. Together with the line
warships of the Pacific fleet, the flames of Pearl Harbor
burnt down the very doctrine of absolute domination of heavy
artillery ships in naval war. In an instant, all books on the art
of naval warfare became obsolete, and there was
no time to write new ones. The enemy had to be repelled, and they
had to be struck with their own weapon. Naval Legends
History of the US Carrier-borne Aviation On December 7th, the Navy had
three carriers in the Pacific Ocean, we only had three carriers there,
we only had a total of seven carriers. Japan had fourteen carriers. So, the first thing we
needed was more carriers, but the problem with that is that
it takes two years to build a carrier. The second problem was that the
main fighter aircraft of the US Navy, the F4F Wildcat, was inferior to
the Japanese Zero in all respects. The Mitsubishi A6M "Zeke",
commonly known as a "Zero". This was arguably the premier fighter
in the Pacific Theater until about 1943. It had a number of advantages. Firstly, its light weight—it had an
aluminum magnesium alloy frame, and this meant it was
highly maneuverable. Had excellent firepower—it had
both cannon and machine gun. Had excellent vision from
its high-mounted canopy. The only drawback was it was a tad
fragile. But first, you had to hit it. Zero was much faster; it could out-
climb, out-dive, and out-turn a Wildcat. So how did we use this old airplane
and manage to make it work so well? The first thing
I already mentioned, it was very-very rugged,
very difficult to shoot down. The fuel tank had a self-sealing bladder
in it, so when a bullet went through it, it sealed itself up,
you didn't lose your gas, which was important when you're 100
miles, 150 kilometers from your carrier. The pilot sat in an armored
tub, basically, like a bathtub, he had steel plate all around him,
so the plane was very survivable. The other thing you had
to do if you're a Wildcat pilot, you had to do formation flying, you had to be with another
Wildcat to protect each other. So, if one Wildcat got jumped, he could maneuver and try to pull
the Zero in front of the other Wildcat. Three days after the
attack on Pearl Harbor, American carrier aviation
achieved its first victory. The author of this victory
flew the SBD Dauntless. Dauntless was responsible for the first kill by US naval
aviation on an enemy combatant. The Dauntless was flown
by Lieutenant Dickinson, who was assigned
to the Enterprise Air Group, and he had survived
being jumped at Pearl Harbor with the loss of his rear-seater. On December the 10th, it sighted this Japanese submarine
I-70 and attacked and sank her. Features of the
aircraft related to the wing include the very large and visible
dive-brakes required for its role. Less visible is the fact that
the wing has no internal spars. Now, this makes it lighter,
but a significant drawback is the fact that you cannot
fold this aircraft's wing. Despite this, Dauntless entered
service with the US Navy's fleet. Aircraft specifications
for the SBD Dauntless. Length: 10 m.
Wingspan: 12.6 m. Maximum take-off weight: 4,587 kg. Engine: Wright R-1820-32;
power: 950 hp. Maximum speed: 405 kph.
Service ceiling: 7,680 m. Armament: two 12.7-mm
Browning M2 machine guns and two 7.62-mm
machine guns in rear. Bomb payload: 725 kg. Crew: 2 persons. So, the Dauntless was designed expressly
for one thing and one thing only, and that was sinking ships.
And it was very good at what it did. The Battle of Midway was probably the
definitive battle where everyone knew that airpower was going to be the only
way you were going to win the Pacific. So, at the Battle of Midway,
which we're probably all familiar with, three US Navy carriers—the Enterprise,
the Yorktown, and the Hornet— up against four Japanese carriers. The Japanese had a huge force with them,
including several large battleships and had over a hundred fighting ships,
and then they had an invasion force. The Navy had three carriers and about
20 other ships, not one battleship, because they'd all been
damaged or sunk at Pearl Harbor. Early in the morning of June 4, about 45 Dauntlesses attacked
the Japanese task force. The lightning-fast strike
of the American dive bombers ended in a sweeping
victory. In just a few hours, the Dauntlesses destroyed almost half
the carriers of the Japanese Imperial Navy, thus turning
the tide of the Pacific War. This battle was also notable because it was here that the Avenger
torpedo bomber made its debut. The Grumman Avenger
was the largest aircraft that we operated off
carriers in World War II. It replaced the Douglas Devastator torpedo
bomber, which was obsolete in 1941. Aircraft specifications
for the TBM Avenger. Length: 12.5 m.
Wingspan: 16.5 m. Take-off weight: 7,876 kg. Engine: Wright R-2600-8;
power: 1,700 hp. Maximum speed: 415 kph.
Service ceiling: 7,193 m. Armament: three
12.7-mm machine guns and one 7.62-mm machine
guns under the fuselage. Eight 127-mm HVAR rockets. The aircraft could carry up to 907 kg
of bombs or one Mark 13 torpedo. Crew: 3 persons. Early on they could do torpedo runs or
they could be used as a dive bomber. So, if you were
attacking an airfield, the Avengers could be dive bombers,
they could come back to the carrier, and if somebody saw
Japanese ships were sighted, they can load them with torpedoes
and go out on a torpedo run. By the end of 1942, the Avengers
had distinguished themselves by sinking Japanese carrier Ryujo during
the Battle of the Eastern Solomons and battleship Hiei in the
first battles for Guadalcanal. However, the finest hour of these
torpedo bombers was yet to come, when in 1942, the Avengers joined
the Dauntlesses and Wildcats, which had borne the weight of the initial
phase of the air war against Japan. Meanwhile, US industry
prepared replacements for the battle-battered aircraft fleet. The F6F Hellcat,
known as the Ace Maker, arguably the most significant
carrier-borne aircraft of World War II, and was responsible for
some 75% of the navy's kills. 12,274 were built by Grumman— one an hour, every hour,
24 hours a day, seven days a week. It was simple, it was
reliable, it was rugged. It acclaimed 5,157 enemy
kills for a loss of only 270. Another nickname it earned
was "the aluminum tank", and it earned for the manufacturer
the moniker "Grumman ironworks". Indeed some pilots spoke of returning
home with battle damage so significant, that more air was passing
through the aircraft, than around it. Aircraft specifications for F6F Hellcat. Length: more than 10 m.
Wingspan: 13 m. Take-off weight: 6,754 kg. Engine: Pratt & Whitney R-2800-10W
Double Wasp; power: 2,135 hp. Maximum speed: 629 kph.
Service ceiling: 11,278 m. Armament: six 12.7-mm
Colt-Browning M2 machine guns. Six 127-mm HVAR rockets.
Bomb payload: up to 907 kg. Crew: 1 person. When it was all said and
done at the end of the war, the Hellcat had a 19 to 1 kill ratio, which meant for every
Hellcat shot down air-to-air, Hellcat shot down
19 Japanese aircraft, which at that point in the war,
many of them were fighters. In 1943, the US
Pacific fleet began to put heavy strike aircraft carriers
from the Essex class into service, each of which could carry up
to one hundred planes on board. The war had reached a stage where
the success of combat operations was defined by the economic
power of the warring parties. So, it was a huge, huge advantage that
we had, that the Japanese did not have, they did not have anywhere near the
capability to match us in production. So, by mid-'44,
pretty much everywhere we went, we had a huge carrier force
to back up whatever was happening. In 1943, Grumman—the main manufacturer
of fighters for the US Navy— had to make room
for another company. New aircraft carriers boasted
F4U Corsairs, produced by Vaught, on their flight decks. However, this machine did not become
a competitor for Grumman's Hellcats— the Corsair had other purposes. Corsair’s introduction into service hit
some snags for carrier qualifications. It exhibited some really nasty
low-speed stall characteristics, the landing gear wasn't suitable,
and it also had such a powerful engine that the torque caused roll
as well as yaw due to P-factor. Finally, the long nose
meant that on final approach you couldn't actually see the
carrier you were trying to land on. Although the solution
for that was a long curve, which kept your
eyes on the target. As a result, Corsair entered service as a land-based aircraft
with the Marines in early '43. Aircraft specifications
for the F4U Corsair. Length: more than 10 m.
Wingspan: 12.5 m. Take-off weight: 6,654 kg. Engine: Pratt & Whitney
R-2800-18W; power: 2,380 hp. Maximum speed: 718 kph.
Service ceiling: 12,802 m. Armament: six 12.7-mm
Colt-Browning M2 machine guns. Eight 127-mm HVAR rockets.
Bomb payload: up to 907 kg. Crew: 1 person. The Marines used it heavily, it was more
of a Marine aircraft in World War II, the Navy primarily flew the Hellcat. Corsair first flew in 1940,
it was extremely advanced for its day, it was the first US Navy fighter that
could go 400 mph straight and level. It has a very odd wing
arrangement, it's got a gull wing, and the reason for that is
because of the size of the propeller. If you had a regular wing,
the landing gear would be so long that you'd have to have a huge wing
for the landing gear to fold up into. So, the Vought engineers came
up with that very unusual design. In 1943, on the basis that the war
was going to continue a while longer, work was started on the development
of a successor to the F6F Hellcat. The result was known as
the engine with a saddle on it. It's the F8F Bearcat. An interesting design feature at the time
was the addition of exploding wingtips. The idea was that
if the maneuvers were so hard that there was risk of a complete
structural failure with the wing, the outer meter or so
of each wing would detach. Never really worked
in practice though— either one tip would detach and not the
other, or just simply at different times. The solution was to
add explosive charges. However, it never
worked according to plan and indeed an accident with an
explosion killed a Navy technician. So, production aircraft
soon had that idea removed. Aircraft specifications
for the F8F Bearcat. Length: almost 8.5 m.
Wingspan: almost 11 m. Take-off weight: 6,105 kg. Engine: Pratt & Whitney R-2800-30W
Double Wasp; power: 2,250 hp. Maximum speed: 737 kph.
Service ceiling: 11,247 m. Armament: four 20-mm cannons. Four 127-mm HVAR rockets.
Bomb payload: up to 1,700 kg. Crew: 1 person. By the time the F8F Bearcat was
mass-produced, the Hellcats and Corsairs were already dominating
the skies over the Pacific Ocean while the Helldivers and Avengers were finishing off the
remnants of the Japanese Navy. In October 1944, the Americans sank
27 Japanese ships in the Leyte Gulf, including 4 aircraft
carriers and 3 battleships. The following year, in April,
227 planes from 9 American carriers destroyed the flagship of the Imperial
Japanese Navy, the mighty Yamato. When US troops
began landing at Okinawa, aircraft carrier USS Midway was
launched back home in the USA. She would become a symbol of the American
Navy's power for many years to come. In the early 1940s,
Bureau of Aeronautics learned about the developments of jet
engine technology in England and Germany and asked Westinghouse and Allis-
Chalmers to make American versions. The initial responses
though were not positive. These early jets had
low power at low speed, they were unreliable,
and had high fuel consumption. Add to that the
requirements for swept wings, which seemed
necessary for maneuverability— and it became
unsuitable for carrier use. After the war though, with the development of the threat from
the Soviet Union and their jet program, it became obvious that the Navy
could no longer avoid the technology. In 1947, the FH-1 Phantom
entered fleet service, and with that, the age
of naval aviation jets began. Special thanks to the
US Department of Defense