Avoiding Japan's decisive-battle trap

Japanese decisive-battle doctrine expected an American advance to be worn down before a climactic fleet engagement modeled on Tsushima. Pearl Harbor generated the desired anger but destroyed too much of the battle line for politicians to order an immediate charge west. That delay let American planners follow War Plan Orange's more deliberate, consolidated logic. The carrier raids offered controlled attacks that did not surrender the fleet to Japan's attritional sequence. By threatening bases, logistics nodes, and eventually the home islands, they forced Japanese aircraft, armor, and other resources into defense. Those diversions did not decide the war alone, but they altered the cost and pace of later campaigns.