Could the Japanese player suffer anti-aircraft losses under the Midway reduction rules?

Question

One optional feature of the game, "Midway reduction," forces Japan to conduct an air (or sea) bombardment of Midway before the transports accompanied by the Atago invade it. There is a detailed table of the damage inflicted by Japanese bombers on Midway's firepower. But the rules don't provide for Japanese aircraft losses.

Could there be a house rule providing for some such losses? One might use the air to ship tables to estimate Japanese air losses. That would still result in "disproportionate" damage to Midway but the Japanese would not go unscathed.

Put another way, did Midway historically have anti-aircraft capability to inflict "some" losses on Japanese aircraft?

Answer 1

Historically, Midway had both fighter defense (although mostly older fighters) and anti-aircraft, both of which inflicted some losses on the Japanese.

Midway-based Marine fighters led by Major Floyd B. Parks, which included six F4Fs and 20 F2As,[64] intercepted the Japanese and suffered heavy losses, though they managed to destroy four B5Ns, as well as a single A6M. Within the first few minutes, two F4Fs and 13 F2As were destroyed, while most of the surviving U.S. planes were damaged, with only two remaining airworthy. American anti-aircraft fire was intense and accurate, destroying three additional Japanese aircraft and damaging many more.

(Source: Wikipedia)

(And they also had bombers that did attack the Japanese fleet, and after the first attack, would still have been able to fly bombers from Hawaii to hit any ships that tried to do seaborne gun assault though I'm not aware of any way the game models that part.)