SS34004 USS SARATOGA SQUADRON AT SEA
(Paperback)

By David Doyle. Faced with the restrictions of the Washington
Navy Treaty, the US Navy had a choice: either scrap their
partially complete, battle cruiser Saratoga, which along with her

sister ship Lexington were intended to be the most powerful in
the world; or convert them into an aircraft carriers. Wisely, the

Navy chose the latter option and created what for many years
would be the largest aircraft carriers built. When commissioned
in 1927, Saratoga's decks teamed with fabric-covered biplanes,
and the ship and her crew projected US military power far beyond
the nation's shores. So impressive was Saratoga that she and her
crew served as a backdrop for two major Hollywood motion
pictures. In 1941 she was called to do what she was built for,
and for the next four years plied the Pacific, her biplanes
replaced by the famed Wildcats, Hellcats, Dauntlesses and
Avengers that prosecuted the war against Japan. Having survived
two torpedo hits by Japanese subs, as well as repeated bomb and
Kamikaze strikes, at war's end she took part in the huge Magic
Carpet operation that transported thousands of US servicemen back

to the mainland. Deemed too old for the victorious Navy's
postwar needs, her final duty was to test the survivability of an

atomic blast. Still afloat after the first nuclear explosion,
she was sent to the bottom of Bikini Atoll by the second of the
blasts, and still rests there today, where she welcomes the
occasional scuba diver. All these exploits, as well as others,
including Saratoga's numerous refits, are presented and profusely

illustrated with 383 color and b/w photos capturing the ship,
her crew and aircraft supplemented by 11 line drawings and 25
color renderings; 160 pages.

ISBN 978-0-89747-712-3 Soft Cover