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  • Why didn’t the Captain order the Zeros shot down sooner? I can understand just keeping them under surveillance, but once they fired on an American flagged vessel and killed civilians… He not only doesn’t order his pilots to stop them, he lets them take another run and blow up the yacht! Then, when his pilots are begging him to let them attack because the Zeros are going to strafe the surviving civilians in the water, he finally issues an order: “Do not fire. Draw them off, play with them.” Which the pilots do, and when the clearly marked Japanese planes return fire on the F-14s he STILL doesn’t give the command or allow the pilots to defend themselves. Finally, his XO points out the Zeros are heading towards the Nimitz and he at last gives the order to shoot them down. What on Earth could have been his rationale for letting a foreign plane fire upon and sink an American vessel, kill American civilians, and then giving them the chance to commit a war crime (strafing the civilian survivors)? Dereliction of duty, grounds for court martial, which I hope the Admirals at the end found in their debrief.
    • At that point, Yelland is still trying to wrap his head around the idea that they have traveled back in time. He's a level-headed officer who knows that being trigger-happy usually makes things worse, while all the information he's receiving points to a conclusion that he knows should be impossible. His instinct to proceed with caution is pretty understandable.
    • Also he could be trying to get the Zeros to give him a heading to the Japanese fleet. While a modern carrier's air group would have no issues locating the enemy fleet it would be better to see what direction the Zeros flee in and start the search along those lines.
  • What exactly is the titular Final Countdown? To anything? And when in this movie does it get mentioned, let alone occur?

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