Sea and air battle in the Gulf of Leyte

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Sea and air battle in the Gulf of Leyte
The course of the battle
The course of the battle
date October 23 to October 26, 1944
place Near the Gulf of Leyte , Pacific
output American victory
Parties to the conflict

United States 48United States United States Australia
AustraliaAustralia 

Japanese EmpireJapanese Empire Japan

Commander

United States 48United States William F. Halsey Thomas C. Kinkaid
United States 48United States

Japanese EmpireJapanese Empire Jisaburo Ozawa Takeo Kurita
Japanese EmpireJapanese Empire

Troop strength
8 Aircraft Carriers
8 Light Aircraft Carriers
18 Escort Carriers
10 Battleships
9 Heavy Cruisers
13 Light Cruisers
105 Destroyers 		1 aircraft carrier
3 light aircraft carriers

9 battleships
13 heavy cruisers
6 light cruisers
31 destroyers
losses

3,000 dead

1 light carrier
2 escort carriers

3 destroyers

10,000 dead
1 aircraft carrier
3 light aircraft carriers
3 battleships
10 cruisers
9 destroyers

The sea ​​and air battle in the Gulf of Leyte (sometimes referred to as the Battle of the Gulf of Leyte or Leyte ) took place from October 23 to 26, 1944 during the Pacific War in World War II in the waters of the Philippines . 173 Allied and 63 Japanese warships took part in it, not including transporters and smaller ships as destroyers . The battle marked Japan's last serious attempt to stop the Allied advance in the Pacific . The Imperial Japanese Navy attempted to repel the landing operation of Allied troops in the Philippines, which began on October 17th, with a massive attack on the Allied fleet. Under the umbrella term "Battle of the Gulf of Leyte" four independent but strategically connected battles are conducted, none of which actually took place in the Gulf, where Allied transport ships deposited troops. The Gulf of Leyte itself is the bay-like sea area between the islands of Leyte and Samar .

prehistory

The Japanese naval command firmly expected further large-scale landing operations by the Allies in the fall of 1944 after they had conquered the Mariana Islands in the summer . The Japanese had already lost the military initiative in 1942 in the costly Battle of Midway . For each of the next possible targets - the Philippines, Formosa (today's Taiwan), the Ryūkyū Islands, or the Japanese mainland itself - a separate defense plan called Sho was worked out.

A landing in the Philippines had not yet been arranged for the US commander-in-chief. The original idea was to proceed gradually. It was planned to land in the Philippines on December 20th after the conquest of various smaller islands. In addition, the idea arose of setting up airfields only on the Philippines island of Mindanao , while the main strike would be against Formosa and the Chinese mainland . The Commander-in-Chief of the Southwest Pacific Armed Forces, General MacArthur, successfully protested against this plan to President Roosevelt : The American-friendly Filipino population, who MacArthur had promised to return as liberators in early 1942, should not be abandoned. After little resistance from carrier-supported air strikes on the Philippines in mid-September, MacArthur's request was not only accepted, but the landing time was brought forward to October 20.

The introduction of the forces

The conquest of various smaller islands in the sea area around the Philippines and New Guinea , such as Peleliu , Morotai and Ulithi , formed the framework for the US deployment. MacArthur were assigned additional units of the Central Pacific Forces from Admiral Chester W. Nimitz . The command of the 3rd Fleet with the aircraft carrier groups led Admiral William F. Halsey . In the weeks leading up to the landing, this fleet systematically decimated the Japanese air forces in the Philippines, destroying a total of 1,200 aircraft. The Japanese counter-attacks could only damage two US cruisers. However, the Japanese leadership reported the sinking of eleven aircraft carriers, two battleships and three cruisers - a fatal exaggeration that led to more Japanese warplanes being dispatched to the area to destroy the "remnants" of the Allied fleet. This misjudgment led to the Japanese reinforcements being destroyed as well.

The American fleet on the way to the Leyte Gulf

The Japanese naval forces were distributed between the motherland and Indonesia due to oil supply shortages caused by the Allied submarine operation. When US ships began clearing the Gulf of Leyte on October 17 and advance teams landed, the Commander in Chief of the Japanese Navy, Admiral Toyoda Soemu , triggered the Sho-1 defense plan . Due to the dispersal of forces, the Japanese ships were supposed to run separately in four groups to the Gulf of Leyte and take action against the landing fleet:

  • An association of aircraft carriers with escort ships, which was in their home waters, was supposed to approach the combat area from the north as bait and attract the American aircraft carriers of Task Force 38 . Destruction of the carriers used as bait was accepted.
  • While the US carriers were moving away from the Gulf in this way, the remaining units - battleships, cruisers and destroyers - were to penetrate in three groups from the west into the Gulf of Leyte and defeat the American ships with their artillery .

Ships

(CV = aircraft carrier; CVL = light aircraft carrier; CVE = escort carrier; BB = battleship; CA = heavy cruiser; CL = light cruiser; DD = destroyer)

Japanese armed forces

Name of the association Commander Ships
Carrier group Ozawa 1 CV, 3 CVL, 2 BB, 3 CL, 8 DD
1. Combat group A Kurita 5 BB, 10 CA, 2 CL, 15 DD
1. Combat Group C Nishimura 2 BB, 1 CA, 4 DD
2nd combat group Shima 2 CA, 1 CL, 4 DD
Total: 1 CV, 3 CVL, 9 BB, 13 CA, 6 CL, 31 DD

Allied forces

Name of the association Commander Ships
TG 77.2 Oldendorf 6 BB, 3 CA, 2 CL, 15 DD
TG 77.3 Berkey 1 CA, 2 CL, 6 DD
TG 77.4 T.Sprague / C.Sprague / Stump 18 CVE, 27 DD
TF 38 Halsey 8 CV, 8 CVL, 4 BB, 5 CA, 9 CL, 57 DD
Total: 8 CV, 8 CVL, 18 CVE, 10 BB, 9 CA, 13 CL, 105 DD

Including two heavy cruisers and two destroyers of the Australian Navy .

Start of the landing operation

Japanese 65,000 ts battleship Yamato
The light carrier USS Princeton with the assisting cruiser Reno . The carrier's explosion also killed 85 crew members on the cruiser Birmingham , which had come alongside to fight the fire.

On October 18, an allied formation of six older battleships and five cruisers, Task Group (TG) 77.2 under Admiral Jesse B. Oldendorf , began to bomb the coast. On the 20th the landing of the Allied troops began, and on the same day the bulk of the Japanese battle fleet under Admiral Takeo Kurita from Singapore and the aircraft carrier group under Admiral Jisaburō Ozawa ran out of the Japanese inland sea. On the 22nd, the battle fleet ran after a stopover in Brunei , now divided into two combat groups under Kurita and Vice Admiral Shōji Nishimura , in the direction of the Gulf of Leyte. The Kuritas Association consisted of five battleships, including the Yamato and Musashi , the largest battleships ever built, ten heavy and two light cruisers with 15 destroyers . Nishimura commanded two battleships, a heavy cruiser and four destroyers. The associations were supposed to run north (Kurita) and south (Nishimura) of the island of Samar and "take hold of the invasion fleet". Behind Nishimura followed a smaller formation with three cruisers and four destroyers under Vice Admiral Kiyohide Shima .

On the day after the start of the landing, with little resistance from the Japanese army , 132,000 men with 200,000 tons of supplies had already landed. The transporters lying east of Samar were mainly covered by the battleships of the TG 77.2 and the 18 escort aircraft carriers of the TG 77.4, while the American main force, the TF 38, cruised east of Luzon .

On October 23, the American submarines Darter and Dace attacked the Japanese main unit Kuritas west of Palawan , sank the heavy cruisers Atago and Maya and damaged the cruiser Takao so badly that it had to return to Brunei. When trying to overtake the Takao and finally sink it, the darter ran into a reef and had to be abandoned; the crew was saved by the Dace . Based on the contact reports from the two boats, the aircraft carriers of the TF 38 were brought into position east of Luzon and Samar. Land-based Japanese planes attacked one of the carrier groups the next day and were able to damage the light aircraft carrier Princeton so badly that it had to be abandoned and sunk in the early evening. Kurita, meanwhile, continued his way into the Gulf with his decimated force.

Course of the individual battles

The battle in the Sibuyan Sea

Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita, Commander of the Japanese Main Forces off Leyte

Between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. on October 24, the two Japanese combat groups were discovered by reconnaissance personnel. The southern Japanese association Nishimuras was attacked by them, with the old battleship Fuso suffered slight damage. Halsey's porters led the main strike against the northern Kuritas association, which had no cover from its own fighters - all land-based aircraft were used for the attacks on the American porters. Several Kurita's ships were damaged in the ensuing waves of attack; the cruiser Myōkō so heavy that he withdrew to the west. The Musashi was hit so badly that it lagged behind the rest of the bandage. The last of the total of five attack waves only attacked the Musashi and scored no fewer than 19 torpedo and 17 bomb hits , which capsized the ship. Kurita initially set an evasive course, but on Toyoda's orders soon headed back towards San Bernardino Street , which separates Samar from Luzon. But he could no longer hope to encounter the American invasion fleet during the night - it could not be reached before 7 a.m., which would again expose his units to the danger of American air strikes. His formation had now shrunk to four battleships, six heavy and two light cruisers with their destroyer escort.

The Battle of Surigao Street

While the main force was under constant air strikes, Nishimura and Shima drove south of it according to plan towards the Surigao Strait , in order to penetrate the Gulf of Leyte from the south . This intention was recognized by the US high command; the task of blocking the passage through the street fell to the old battleships of TG 77.2 Oldendorfs. They were patrolling the street in a classic keel line when at around 2:30 a.m. on October 25th, Nishimura's unit approached, which had been fighting for hours with the unsuccessful attacks by American speedboats .

The US destroyer divisions began radar-guided massed torpedo attacks at 3 a.m. A torpedo hit the Fusō , which broke up after half an hour and sank. Three of the four Japanese destroyers were also hit and incapacitated; two of them sank. The other battleship, Yamashiro , was also hit by a torpedo. Nishimura continued on his way in spite of everything and ran straight for the US battleships and cruisers. The American keel line ran across the Japanese and could therefore use all guns, while the Japanese ships could only fire with the front turrets, which is called Crossing the T in naval warfare theory . The American ships also had radar-guided fire and could fire and hit over a distance of over 20 km, while the Japanese could only capture and unsuccessfully fire at the advanced American cruiser wing during the entire battle. At 3:51 a.m., the Americans opened fire and covered the Japanese ships with so many hits within a few minutes that they turned and tried to escape south. The Yamashiro was hit by two more torpedoes at 04:11, which finally caused her to sink. Accidentally, there were numerous American hits on the advanced operating destroyers Smoots, especially the Albert W Grant , which caused almost all of the American personnel losses in this battle.

A few minutes later, the following Shimas unit arrived, recognized the catastrophic course of the operation and turned around after the light cruiser Abukuma had been torpedoed by speedboats and Shima's flagship had been rammed by the almost incapable of maneuvering heavy cruiser Mogami . It was sunk by airplanes the next day (also later Shima's flagship , the heavy cruiser Nachi , off Manila ). After the shot Mogami and the previously damaged destroyer Asagumo were sunk in the early hours of the morning, only one destroyer, the Shigure , remained of Nishimura's group .

The battle off Cape Engaño

The sinking aircraft carrier Zuikaku off Cape Engaño
The destroyer Akizuki explodes off Cape Engaño

While the American carrier aircraft attacked Kurita's battle fleet on the afternoon of October 24, the approaching carrier fleet of Ozawa was sighted north of Luzon. Admiral Halsey saw this group as a primary target and regrouped his fleet. The battleships, including the flagship Admiral Halseys, the USS New Jersey , and a number of cruisers were taken out of the carrier groups and formed the TF 34 under Vice Admiral Willis A. Lee with a total of six battleships, two heavy and two light cruisers and 18 destroyers. Three of the carrier groups of Task Force 38 and the newly formed TF 34 then ran north to intercept the Japanese carrier combat group.

No forces remained to cover the San Bernardino Strait and thus the landing forces and escort carriers against the Japanese medium attack group under Admiral Kurita (the US carrier group TG 38.1 under Admiral John S. McCain had been for refueling and Ammunition on the way to Ulithi and was called back too late to be able to intervene significantly).

Admiral Halsey took this risk, assuming that the fighting of the previous day had weakened the Japanese middle attack group so much that it was in retreat and was no longer able to engage in further combat operations. The ambiguously worded radio messages with which this regrouping and marching north were reported to Admiral Nimitz in Hawaii and to Admiral Kinkaid led them to believe that Halsey was only hurrying north with three carrier groups to intercept the Japanese carriers and the task force 34, the battleships, had stayed behind to cover San Bernardino Street. Indeed, Halsey was steaming north with all his might. At dawn on October 25th he was within range and launched the first waves of attacks from the porters.

Ozawa was hardly able to resist: The training level of the Japanese pilots was extremely low at this point and its porters were not fully occupied anyway. The first wave of attacks from the United States destroyed one carrier and damaged another. After the fourth wave of attacks, all four Japanese carriers ( Zuihō , Zuikaku , Chitose and Chiyoda ) and two destroyers were sunk, only the two battleships of the Ise class , which had been converted to "semi- aircraft carriers" and had no aircraft on board, could enter with the escort ships escaped the following night. Despite the immense losses, Ozawa had achieved his operational goal: The 3rd US Fleet with the TF 38 clung to his heels and given up guarding San Bernardino Street.

The battle of Samar

American escort aircraft carrier Makin Island

With Halsey's fleet moving north, Kurita, with his decimated but still fighting force, could move unhindered through San Bernardino Street . At dawn on October 25, they encountered the escort aircraft carriers of TG 77.4 (Rear Admiral Thomas L. Sprague ), which were providing air cover for the transporters remaining in the Gulf of Leyte. The third division of the group (callsign Taffy 3 ), six escort aircraft carriers , three destroyers and four destroyer escorts under Rear Admiral Clifton Sprague , came under fire from the Japanese heavy units at 7 a.m. Sprague immediately sent calls for help, but most of the porters' aircraft were on the move, and Oldendorf's battleships from the Strait of Surigao could not arrive for three hours and had also used up much of their ammunition in previous battles against the southern Japanese attack group.

The sea battle of Samar

Sprague's ships began to cloud over and were fortunate enough to be temporarily obscured by a wall of rain. Kurita, who felt compelled to cause as much damage as possible in the shortest possible time due to the danger of air attacks, dissolved his keel line and had his ships operated individually. Sprague's destroyer and escort destroyer launched torpedo attacks to force the Japanese to evasive maneuvers, three of which were sunk. The carrier's few operational aircraft flew air strikes, including a few bogus attacks. They scored torpedo hits on several Japanese cruisers, of which the Chikuma , the Chōkai and the Suzuya sank in the course of the battle. Another was badly damaged and later sunk by aircraft on the march back. The Americans only lost one of the escort carriers, the USS Gambier Bay , which was partly due to the armor-piercing ammunition of the Japanese ships, whose shells often only penetrated the light side walls of the carriers without detonating.

Kurita called all units back at 9:11 a.m. He had lost track of his units and wanted to regroup them, but the increasing intensity of the air strikes and the news of the destruction of Nishimura's combat group eventually prompted him to break off the engagement and retreat to the west, where he was still a light one the next day Lost cruiser. Instead, land-based kamikaze planes attacked the escort carriers of TG 77.4. They damaged several carriers and sank one of them, the USS St. Lo .

Summary

The Japanese Navy used almost all operational ships that were left to it at the time to prevent the Allied reconquest of the Philippines . This goal was important enough to risk high losses, as the loss of the Philippines threatened to sever the connection between the main Japanese islands and the resource-rich possessions in Indonesia. The losses of the Japanese in the Battle of Leyte were exorbitantly high: three battleships, four aircraft carriers, ten cruisers and nine destroyers were lost - that was about half of all larger units. Of these ships, five cruisers were sunk by submarines when they were approaching or returning - that is how superior the Allied naval rule had meanwhile been. Japan remained four battleships (plus the two carrier battleships), five heavy and five light cruisers; almost all more or less badly damaged. A few aircraft carriers were under construction, but for some time there has been a lack of even halfway experienced pilots.

It was different with the Allies: A single American aircraft carrier association already comprised almost as many units as the Japanese still had overall. The loss of the light carrier USS Princeton , two escort carriers, three destroyers and a submarine did not in any way limit the operational capabilities of the US fleets; from now on the Japanese navy was no longer a serious threat. After Leyte, the US Navy lost only the heavy cruiser Indianapolis to larger units in the Pacific .

No other naval battle of World War II ended in such an overwhelming victory for one side. The Japanese Navy had lost all ability to influence the Allied advance; it was only sufficient for suicide commands, as carried out by Yamato on April 6 and 7, 1945 off Okinawa . The Japanese garrison on Leyte fought a losing battle; At Christmas 1944, General Douglas MacArthur announced the collapse of the Japanese resistance.

See also

literature

Video

  • Battlefield - The Battle of the Leyte Gulf. Documentation 1997 (VHS).

Web links

Commons : Sea and Air Battle in the Gulf of Leyte  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thomas J. Cutler: Decision in the Pacific ( The battle of Leyte Gulf ), Ullstein Verlag , Berlin / Frankfurt am Main 1996, ISBN 3-550-07081-0 .
This article was added to the list of excellent articles on May 25, 2005 in this version .