Midway Deluxe Edition:
Design Notes, Part Two
By Mike Bennighof, Ph.D.
June 2024

While we call the game Second World War at Sea: Midway Deluxe Edition, the game covers more than just the June 1942 Battle of Midway. Midway is the headliner, so it gets the title, but there was more action in the north-central Pacific and we cover that, too.

Midway Deluxe features a greatly enlarged map compared to the edition we published back at the turn of the century. It does a great deal to show the geographic relationship between Hawaii and the Central Pacific island chains. It’s a long, long way from Hawaii to any other land forms, with Wake Island a notable American-held point in the bottom left quadrant of the map. And out past Wake – much closer to Wake than Hawaii – lie a whole string of islands hosting Japanese bases, including Marcus, Eniwetok and Kwajalein.

Wake Island had been formally annexed by the United States in 1899, but mostly ignored over the decades that followed except by Japanese feather collectors and shark-fin harvesters. That changed in 1935, when Pan American Airways began to build a seaplane refueling station for its Manila Clipper service along with a hotel for passengers and maintenance facilities.

The Navy planted a Marine garrison there in early 1941, and built an airfield to operate a squadron of fighter planes. Coastal artillery rounded out the defenses, which were still under construction when the Japanese paid a visit after the Pearl Harbor attack.

The Marines drove off the first Japanese assault with their artillery and the planes that survived the initial Japanese bombing raids. They sank two Japanese destroyers (one by coastal artillery, one by bombing) and radioed for aid. The Pacific Fleet dispatched two carrier task forces to relieve the island. Frank Jack Fletcher’s Task Force 14, built around the carrier Saratoga with three heavy cruisers and eight destroyers, would fly off a squadron of Marine fighters to replace those lost in the Japanese raids. The seaplane tender Tangier would bring additional coastal and anti-aircraft artillery, all manner of defensive radar sets, and massive amounts of ammunition.

The Japanese had also dispatched carrier reinforcements: Carrier Division Two, with the heavy carriers Hiryu and Soryu, diverted from the First Air Fleet as its returned to Japan from the Pearl Harbor strike to lend their support to the next attempt against Wake Island. News of that deployment was enough for the Pacific Fleet’s temporary commander, Vice Admiral William F. Pye, ordered both carrier task forces to break off the mission and return. Some of Fletcher’s staff angrily urged him to ignore the order and press on, but Fletcher obeyed the order and the Marines were left to their fate.

In our Wake Relief scenario, the American player may be called back, or maybe not. If allowed to press on, the odds are fairly even: the two American carriers have 21 steps of aircraft, the two Japanese flattops 20, but the Japanese planes are better aircraft for the most part. The surface lineup is about even: six heavy cruisers on each side, with no battleships involved. The Japanese have some help from land-based aircraft in the Marshall Islands (on the fringe of the Deluxe map).

Much like the Battle of Midway six months later, victory is going to go to the side that can detect and attack the enemy carriers first. The American carriers are in separate task forces, following their doctrine of the time, which means that one Japanese strike can’t knock out both of them, but also means that each only has half of the American cruisers and destroyers to help defend it.

Fletcher had planned to use his cruisers to attack the Japanese landing force, and so we have a battle scenario for that, his three heavy cruisers against four somewhat smaller Japanese ships. And of course, we have battle scenarios for the exchange of air strikes that would have marked such an engagement; neither side had ever engaged in carrier combat at this point and some of their pre-war doctrine would not hold up to experience.

It’s a pretty evenly matched operation; both sides have the same objective (get their troops to Wake Island) and both can’t do that at the same time. One or the other is going to be driven off and defeated.

The Americans returned two months later to bomb Wake Island and the nearby Japanese bases in the Marshalls. And so we have that scenario, and it’s an unusual one. American bombers would attack Japan in April, the famous Doolittle Raid, which is usually portrayed as a total surprise. While that operation itself was not detected by the Japanese, they definitely suspected that the Americans might try to attack the Home Islands with carrier-based aircraft. That was considered unacceptable, and the Combined Fleet’s mission included the defense of Japan against American carrier raids.

When American Vice Admiral William F. Halsey led a carrier raid on the Japanese-held Marshalls in late February 1942, the Japanese responded with a mixed battleship-carrier force led by Vice Admiral Shiro Takasu, commander of the Combined Fleet’s battle line. Takasu actually had a great deal of carrier experience, but had been promoted upward and exiled from the First Air Fleet for his vocal opposition to the planned war with the United States.

This would be a very rare occasion in the Pacific war (and possibly the only one), with the old Japanese battleships operating right alongside the carriers. Ise and Hyuga are not “fast battleships” like the rebuilt battle cruisers that accompanied First Air Fleet, but they’re much faster than the old American battleships and can match the carrier Kaga, herself a former battleship. Takasu doesn’t have Kaga, but does have the two newest Japanese heavy carriers, Shokaku and Zuikaku plus the brand-new light carrier Zuiho. Halsey has two heavy carriers and their escorts; the odds are about even, as long as the Americans don’t fight a surface battle.

If the Americans are quick about it, they can bomb their objectives and run like hell before Takasu can get onto the map – he’s coming from Japan, which is about as far away as Hawaii. That’s what Halsey achieved, but here he may have to fight the Japanese well before the Battle of Midway.

That makes for a good set of scenarios; there’s a lot of open ocean but it’s dotted with islands, most of them hosting Japanese bases that can help Takasu find Halsey with their long-range flying boats. Once again, we have battle scenarios; those American heavy cruisers are at a serious disadvantage against real battleships, even if the Japanese are really, really bad at gunnery.

And that’s the Wake Island chapter. The operations aren’t famous, but they’re evenly balanced and are going to be a lot of fun to play.

You can order Midway Deluxe right here.

You can order Midway: Aftermath right here.

Rising Sun Package
      Midway Deluxe Edition
      Bismarck Playbook Edition
      Midway: Rising Sun 1940
Retail Price: $192.97
Package Price: $155
Gold Club Price: $124
You can experience the Rising Sun Package right here.
Please allow an extra four weeks for delivery.

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Mike Bennighof is president of Avalanche Press and holds a doctorate in history from Emory University. A Fulbright Scholar and NASA Journalist in Space finalist, he has published a great many books, games and articles on historical subjects; people are saying that some of them are actually good. He lives in Birmingham, Alabama with his wife, three children, and new puppy. He misses his lizard-hunting Iron Dog, Leopold.

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