Editorial: Air victory at Saipan
As time passes, the extent of our victory in the great air battle over the Marianas will be more fully realized. The dramatic pursuit of the task force which brought the enemy planes to action, and the escape of the force with four ships lost and 13 damaged, have obscured the decisive nature of the Japanese defeat in the air off Saipan the day before. This defeat broke Japan’s hold on her inner line of defense and seems bound to affect the course of naval warfare in the Pacific for some time to come.
We now have Adm. Nimitz’s final figures on this furious conflict. They are almost incredible. On that memorable Sunday, our forces destroyed 402 enemy planes – 369 in aerial combat, 18 by anti-aircraft fire and 15 on the ground after they had landed to refuel. This is the greatest number of planes ever brought down in a single action anywhere, either over land or sea. It is safe to assume that most of these planes were naval craft based on enemy carriers, for airfields on the Marianas had been pretty well cleared of land-based planes in previous fighting. So far as we know, the largest Japanese carriers do not exceed the capacity of our own Enterprise, which accommodates about 85 planes. The average enemy carrier will barely accommodate 50. Thus at least seven or eight Japanese carriers were stripped of their fighting craft. Such a loss in material and personnel is not easily replaced. The Japanese fleet at Midway lost 275 planes, and it took Japan five months to restore her naval aviation to a point where it could again offer battle. The overwhelming loss in the Marianas will affect not merely the task force engaged in this disastrous venture, but all the task forces Japan has at sea.
The immediate effect of our victory was to speed the conquest of Saipan virtually without interference from enemy planes. That conquest now seems assured with the capture of Mount Tapochau, the island’s central volcanic peak. The broader effects of the victory cannot yet be gauged. Obviously, however, Japan’s control of her vital home waters has been seriously shaken.