In terms of combat achievements, the aircraft carrier has been the principal U.S. warship for the past 50 years. Pre-World War II doctrine called for great battle-line engagements featuring battleship gunnery duels. That doctrine was wiped away in a single day—7 December 1941. Then it became the role of the rest of the fleet to fight what was initially a defensive war in the Pacific in early 1942 before seizing the opportunity for an offensive against Guadalcanal in the summer of that year. As we continue our commemoration of the 50th anniversaries of various events of the war, we put heavy emphasis in this issue on the role of the carriers. Included is a pictorial on the carriers of ’42, the role of radar in the important Battle of Midway, and a revisionist study by John Lundstrom on a much-maligned carrier task force commander. Rear Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher. In the first installment of a two-part article, Lundstrom argues that Fletcher’s reputation deserves to be better than it is. Despite fighting a type of war for which there was little established doctrine, he managed to win strategic victories at Coral Sea and Midway.
For those who seek to read about things other than the Pacific war, we present our usual variety of features. The Civil War, repopularized by television in the fall of 1990, is covered in a report on the Confederate Naval Museum and an article on a failed Union attempt to recover Charleston’s Fort Sumter in 1863. As the armed services grapple now with the problem of defending single-service interests within a Defense Department that increasingly emphasizes jointness, it is interesting to see how inter-service rivalry was also an issue during the Civil War. Still another article on 19th-century events deals with the Wilkes expedition of the 1830s, a significant contribution to scientific research. We also cover scientific advances of the 20th century in Captain Dick Laning’s memoir of the second nuclear submarine, USS Seawolf, and Paul Garber’s work in preserving the heritage of aviation for the Smithsonian.
One of the oral history selections this time is a tribute to the late James Hair, who died this past January. He was a member of the group known as the Golden Thirteen, the Navy’s first black officers. They were commissioned in 1944 and paved the way for the many black officers now in active naval service. Hair and the seven members of the group still surviving have recorded their memories through the Naval Institute’s oral history program. Altogether, their recollections constitute some 2,000 pages of transcript. Excerpts from the transcripts of the black officers and those of white officers who served with them will be published in book form by the Naval Institute Press early in 1993. In the meantime, we are already receiving inquiries from television producers interested in telling the story of the Golden Thirteen—both in documentary form and in a drama that will feature actors taking the parts of these pioneering officers. We will keep you posted.