Very good.Thanks Bob.
Wayne

This is one of the most interesting war stories.  It was a fair fight that could have gone either way.
 
Each comparison states the USA first & Japan second.
Airplanes involved 128 to 127.
Ships involved 27 to 54 (including troop transports).
Ships lost 4 to 9.
Men killed 656 to 966.
Planes lost 69 to 92.

As stated before, this was the world's first (maybe only) pure carrier-to-carrier battle.  Neither side had any experience in this.
A long way from both the USA & Japan.
Could have gone either way with a few lucky breaks.
Interdicted Japanese troop transports that would have caused a lot trouble if not stopped.
USA was much better able to replace losses.

I like the battle of Wake Island.  A small force of Army, Navy and Morrison Knudsen beat back a 15-ship Japanese flotilla.  This was the first and only seaborne invasion that was defeated in the entire war.  The commodore of the flotilla was embarrassed, humiliated, replaced and maybe worse.

The island was later taken by a much-bigger fleet, but the successful resistance took something of a bite out of the enemy and forced him to redeploy his forces from other commitments.

After two years of slavery the MK workers were executed and maybe eaten by the enemy.

Wake Island was never retaken, but used as a live-fire practice bombing target for rookie Navy pilots including President Bush.