Seventy-six years ago our Navy achieved the greatest at-sea victory in our nation’s history at the Battle of Midway. A mere six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, with the enemy still doggedly seeking to destroy American naval power, our sailors prevailed in the challenge of their lives. As was the case in the 1940s, today, with the support of the country, your Navy stands ready to defend our country and protect our interests around the globe.
Tuesday morning, sailors assigned to the local area will gather at the Navy Memorial to remember our heroic predecessors. If you are commuting on the Yellow Line this morning, you’ll see a “Sea of White” cresting as we converge on Pennsylvania Avenue and 7th Street NW in our summer dress uniforms to commemorate this hard fought victory.
Come on out and join us. Midway heroes who fought between June 4 to 7, 1942, will be in attendance, along with dozens of WWII veterans visiting D.C. as part of the Honor Flight program. We do this every year to remember, learn, and celebrate the hard-fought victory.
We also remember how dangerously close we came to not changing the momentum of the Battle for the Pacific — everything depended on those four critical days in June 1942. But, while we talk about the results, we don’t often celebrate the hard work that got us there.
Celebrating the results of this historic battle as a turning point is important, but so too is to understand that the course to victory at Midway and ultimately in the Pacific theater began well before. Victory was charted in Washington at the War Department, where planners conceived Plan Orange during the interwar years. It passed through the halls of Congress and the Oval Office where resources were allocated to grow the fleet in 1934 and again in 1938. It was set in the shipyards and classrooms of our great country long before the ships and sailors who fought in the Pacific set to sea.
There are important lessons from that era that apply today. Some of the challenges we face — authoritarianism, great power competition, and coercion — are on the rise. Tools and technologies of war are accelerating and the unforgiving maritime environment tests our people and resolve every day.
But, if you go to the Navy Memorial Tuesday morning and look into the faces of our sailors, you will see resolve. They know they are America’s ”away-team,” responsible for keeping the fight far from our shores. They know that threats to our way of life and to our economic prosperity are more real today than they have been in a long time.
So, together, we have work to do. We have choices and plans to make now to ensure we stay ready. Future success will not simply be a product of how much money we spend on ships, submarines, and aircraft we choose to build. Those decisions matter a great deal, but success will ultimately come from the attitudes and commitment of our sailors and support from the American public.
Adm. Bill Moran is vice chief of naval operations in the United States Navy.
