[Bloody Sam Roberts]

But there were FOUR Jap carriers, right..?

There were five. The fifth was the Zuiho. It approached from the Southwest and was part of the main invasion force.

[gaijin]

yes, thank you.

[Calif Conservative]

There were four at the actual battle of Midway, the 4 that that USA killed.

So it is correct to say there were 4 Japanese carriers in the active battle zone

Zuiho — and the main invasion force — never got close enough to the actual kill zone where the combat took place

the US admirals withdrew back towards Pearl Harbor to avoid a night engagement on June 4th

The Japanese advanced with the main fleet briefly during the night — hoping to lure the US carriers —

but IJN realized their battleships and any carrier with the main invasion fleet would be vulnerable to both the US carriers as well as the attack aircraft on the atoll — so they slunk back to Japan at daylight on June 5