Episode 26: the Eagle Strikes Back

Six months of Japanese freedom of maneuver in the Pacific came crashing, or perhaps I should say sinking, to an end on June 4th 1942 at the Battle of Midway. The Japanese had blitzed across the Pacific beginning December 7th the year before and had occupied lands ranging from Burma in the west to Wake island in the east, and from Guadalcanal in the south to Attu and Kiska in the Aleutian islands in the north, distances of 4500 and 4200 miles respectively. The Japanese empire was truly vast.