On 4 June 1942, three squadrons of U.S. Navy Dauntless dive bombers destroyed Japan's carrier force at Midway and changed the course of the Pacific war. As Wildenberg demonstrates in this book, the key ingredient to the Navy's success was the planning and training devoted to the tactic of dive bombing. Examining how political, economic, technical, and operational factors influenced the development of carrier airpower between 1925 and 1942, he shows why dive bombing became the Navy's weapon of choice. He also pays tribute to the select group of naval aviators who drove the evolution of carrier tactics. Although many books have been written about the Battle of Midway, this is the first to focus on how the Navy came to develop the one aerial weapon that proved to be the decisive instrument of victory