5 Ways Star Wars Space Battles Resemble WWII Naval Combat

George Lucas drew a lot of inspiration from the Pacific War when writing Star Wars

USS Enterprise in battle (Public domain)

A veteran pilot from the Pacific War would be forgiven if they caught a scene from A New Hope out of the corner of their eye and thought that it was a movie about the Battle of Midway rather than a modern sci-fi epic. George Lucas’s influences would have been much more apparent to veterans of World War II than they are to young folk today. If you study the large scale carrier battles from World War II and read first hand accounts from the pilots and operators from that time the connection between the X-wing and the Dauntless will be impossible to ignore.

Here are five ways that the space combat in Star Wars closely resembles naval warfare of the 20th century.

1. Swarms Of Lethal Fighters

Carrier air group (Public domain)

The hallmark of any large fight in the Star Wars universe is the presence of large numbers of small fighters that pour out of capital ships. These fighters have become famous household names. X-wing. TIE Fighter. Y-wing Bomber. TIE Interceptor. This method of…