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podcast transcript
In the early days of World War II, a single aircraft seemed almost unstoppable.
Fast, agile and capable of overpowering almost anything in the sky, the Zero became the symbol of Japan’s trans-Pacific air force.
Allied pilots feared them, military planners studied them, and their strengths and weaknesses would determine the future of air warfare.
Learn more about the rise and fall of the Mitsubishi A6M Zero in this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
The Mitsubishi A6M, known as “Reisen” in Japan and simply Zero by the Allies, is one of the most important aircraft of World War II.
It reshaped the way naval air warfare was understood, caught entire armies off guard, and ultimately came to symbolize the limits of Japan’s ambitions and design philosophy that prioritized attack over survival.
The Zero’s story begins in 1937, when the Imperial Japanese Navy issued strict specifications to aircraft manufacturers. The Navy wanted a carrier-based fighter jet with a top speed of more than 500 kilometers (310 miles per hour) at an altitude of 4,000 meters (13,000 feet).
The aircraft also had to climb to 3,000 m in less than 3.5 minutes and had an operating range of about 1,850 km at cruising speed, with drop tanks allowing for a greater range.
In some ways, it was a wish list that seemed technologically absurd considering the level of technology at the time. Nakajima Aircraft Company, Japan’s oldest aviation company, looked at the requirements and concluded they could not meet them.
However, Mitsubishi Corporation stayed and entrusted the project to a young engineer named Jiro Horikoshi.
Horikoshi’s solution was ruthless weight loss. Unnecessary ingredients were cut off by 1g. Zero used a new aluminum alloy called Extra Super Duralumin, which allowed for thinner skin panels while being stronger than conventional aircraft aluminum.
The self-sealing fuel tanks that were standard on western aircraft were completely excluded. The pilot’s armor protection has been removed. The result was an aircraft with incredible lightness, and that lightness made everything possible.
The prototype flew in April 1939, and the Navy accepted it for service in 1940. It refers to the year 2600 in the Japanese imperial calendar, and is where the name “Zero” comes from.
When it entered combat over China later that year, it was truly shocking. In 22 engagements, the Zeros shot down 59 Chinese aircraft without losing a single plane.
During the attack on Pearl Harbor and the opening months of the Pacific War, the Zero outperformed almost every Allied fighter it encountered. Its speed and range far exceeded those of Western naval aircraft.
Maneuverability is unparalleled. The Zero could veer into almost any enemy’s interior, and this advantage was crucial in the diversionary dogfights that characterized early Pacific air warfare.
The Zero’s two 20mm cannons and two 7.7mm machine guns provided real striking power, and its engine, a Nakajima Sakae radial engine, was reliable and well-suited to the aircraft. Allied pilots who first encountered combat returned with a healthy respect that sometimes bordered on awe.
The Zero was the dominant carrier-based fighter aircraft in the Pacific from 1941 until approximately mid-1942. It covered the attacks on Pearl Harbor, the Philippines, Wake Island, and Malaya. Fought at Coral Sea and Midway.
That range made Japanese naval aviation a truly global threat, allowing Japan to project air power over distances that seemed impossible to planners accustomed to thinking in terms of short-range European aircraft.
Americans were desperate to get their hands on the product to see for themselves why it was so good. But they were never able to restore intact Zero. Japanese pilots were instructed to destroy their planes if possible and prevent them from falling into enemy hands.
Americans almost got one at the start of the war. Just hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor began, a Zero pilot named Shigenori Nishikaichi came under ground fire over Oahu and, under his orders, headed to a predetermined emergency rendezvous point at sea.
He couldn’t do it. His aircraft crashed on Nišihau, a small Hawaiian island that Japanese planners mistakenly believed was uninhabited.
Initially, the islanders controlled the pilots, but the situation quickly worsened when news of the attack on Pearl Harbor came over the radio. He was captured by the islanders, but with the help of Japanese-American Yoshio Harada and Mrs. Harada, pilot Nishikaichi recovered the aircraft’s radio and documents and attempted to escape after burning the aircraft.
He was eventually killed by a native Hawaiian named Benehakaka Kanahele after a violent struggle in which Kanahele was shot three times before Nishikaichi used his own weapon.
This incident surprised U.S. military authorities for two reasons. First, it raised questions about the loyalty of Japanese Americans. This incident was used as evidence for the internment of Japanese Americans. Second, and more relevant to the air war, it highlighted how urgent it was for the Allies to get their hands on an intact Zero for study.
That opportunity came on June 4, 1942, during the Battle of Dutch Harbor, Alaska. A Zero pilot named Tadayoshi Koga came under ground fire and attempted to land on a flat island called Akutan, a designated emergency landing site for Japanese aircraft.
The ground that looked solid from the air was actually a swamp. The Zero flipped on landing, killing Koga, but the aircraft itself remained largely intact.
American troops discovered the wreckage a month later and quickly understood what they had discovered. A recovery team carefully extracted the aircraft and shipped it to San Diego, where engineers spent the remainder of 1942 repairing and testing it.
In September 1942, Akutan Zero was in American hands.
The engineers’ findings confirmed some suspicions and overturned others. The Zero was not the invincible machine that Allied pilots feared. There was actually an exploitable weakness.
What Americans finally realized was that the Zero’s performance came at a huge cost. Without armor or self-sealing tanks, Zeros that were hit tended to burn or break apart in ways that Allied fighters with more protection survived. This made them highly vulnerable to incendiary bombs aimed at unprotected fuel tanks.
The reduced structural weight that makes the Zero so agile makes it prone to breaking. At speeds above 300 miles per hour, the controls tightened dramatically, slowing Allied pilots at the very moment they preferred to fight.
These discoveries had a direct impact on American fighter tactics. American pilots were trained to engage on their own terms, using the aircraft’s speed and diving capabilities, called boom-and-zoom tactics. Pilots were instructed not to attempt a slow circular dogfight with the Zero at low altitude under any circumstances.
Another tactic developed to counter the Zero was Thatch Weave. Developed by US Navy pilot John Thach, it had two American fighter planes flying in parallel. As the Japanese fighters moved behind one aircraft, the two aircraft turned towards each other in a criss-cross pattern.
As they crossed the road, the pursuing enemy fighters were suddenly exposed to gunfire from a second American aircraft. The maneuver can then be repeated continuously to create mutual protection between the two fighters.
Rather than outmatching Japanese pilots in traditional dogfights, Thach Weave relied on teamwork and coordinated fire to ensure that slower or less maneuverable American planes could survive against the Zero.
In 1943 the Grumman F6F Hellcat was introduced and the balance changed significantly. The Hellcat was designed with clear knowledge of the Zero’s strengths and limitations. Both Akutan data and combat reports were factored into its development.
The Hellcat is heavier and less maneuverable than the Zero, but is faster, much better protected, has more powerful engines, and can absorb attacks that could destroy the Zero. The kill ratios during the war were: American pilots flying the Hellcat had a kill ratio of approximately 13:1 against the Zero and its variants.
The American Vought F4U Corsair was another major American aircraft that did battle with the Zero. The Corsair was developed in response to the U.S. Navy’s 1938 requirements for a high-performance carrier-based fighter built on the powerful new Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp engine.
It was primarily used by the U.S. Marine Corps for ground operations in the Pacific. If you remember the TV series Black Sheep Squadron, they flew on pirate ships.
Through modifications and improvements to tactics learned after the capture of Akutan Zero, the Corsair became one of the most successful fighters of the war. Its speed, firepower, sturdiness, and ability to absorb damage make it particularly effective against Zero.
The Japanese were unable to adapt in a similar way. Zero was so precisely optimized for a limited set of performance parameters that it was difficult to make significant improvements without a complete redesign.
As the war continued and Allied aircraft manufacturers rapidly iterated their designs, the Zero fell behind. Mitsubishi produced updated variants, but they didn’t make the leap that the Hellcat or Corsair represented.
Towards the end of the war, the Zero was put into service as a kamikaze platform. The long range was now used for missions to transport pilots against Allied ships. It was a grim final chapter for an aircraft that had begun the war with a string of successes.
Zero’s influence on Allied aircraft development was real and direct. Beyond the Hellcat, the design philosophy it implemented influenced the big picture of how to balance the fighter’s performance.
The United States, Britain, and eventually the Soviet Union recognized that fast, vulnerable aircraft would ultimately be a liability as the war of attrition progressed, and they incorporated lessons about pilot protection and structural resilience into their designs.
There are also difficult-to-quantify claims that Zero’s early dominance contributed to psychological overcorrection. Allied pilots were so aggressively warned not to engage in dogfights with the Zeros that some avoided engagement altogether, even though they had the advantage of pressing them.
Akutan Zero was destroyed in a runway accident in 1945. Its fragile body was literally torn apart by the propellers of other aircraft.
Fighter ace William Leonard said of the Akutan Zero: “The captured Zero was a treasure. To my knowledge, no other captured machine has revealed so many secrets at a time when the need was so great.”
Personally, I saw Original Zero at the bottom of the sea while scuba diving in Papua New Guinea. Despite being there for decades, it was still easily identifiable.
The Mitsubishi A6M Zero was one of the most notable aircraft of World War II. At the start of the conflict, the Japanese offered a fighter aircraft unmatched by any other fighter in the skies, combining range, speed, and maneuverability in a way that astounded Allied pilots.
But the very compromises that made the Zero so effective in the early stages of the war eventually became a liability as technology, tactics, and industrial production turned against Japan.
Nonetheless, the Zero remains one of the iconic aircraft of the 20th century, remembered not only for its combat record but also for its leadership in the Pacific air war.
