16. Japanese execution of American airmen during the Battle of Midway
The Battle of Midway in June of 1942 is often described as the turning point of the Pacific War. Certainly it was one of the turning points, since it ended the six month period in which the Japanese ran amok throughout the theater. With knowledge of Japanese intentions, the United States Navy was able to prepare an ambush of Japanese strike forces aimed at neutralizing the Midway Atoll and then occupying it with aircraft capable of threatening the sea lanes between Hawaii and the American west coast. On June 4, 1942, American aircraft from three carriers, Hornet, Yorktown, and Enterprise, destroyed four Japanese aircraft carriers, causing the loss of hundreds of aircraft and airmen, and dealt the Imperial Japanese Navy a costly and humiliating defeat.
The United States took heavy casualties too among its airmen, especially those flying torpedo bombers and the Douglas Dauntless dive bombers. Three such airmen were shot down during the battle and subsequently taken aboard Japanese ships as prisoners. The three men were Ensign Wesley Osmus, a flyer from USS Yorktown; Ensign Frank O’Flaherty, who flew a Dauntless from USS Enterprise, and his gunner, Bruno Gaido. All three were “interrogated” by Japanese officers aboard ship before all three were executed by weighing them down and throwing them overboard. The fact that the three men were executed from two different ships indicated that it was a command decision. It was neither the first nor the last of the many brutal executions conducted by the Japanese over the course of the Pacific War. None of the men were honored with medals, but all three were heroes.
