Germany or Japan: Which military was worse off in 1944?

Right they didn’t stop him. That’s why the Americans were the ones who retreated.

Implying that they could have destroyed Kurita's force if he didn't. . .

I provided the groups and total numbers.

So did I. Subtracting both the TF 78 and 79 bombardment groups and the "Taffies" there would have been at most a light cruiser, 45 destroyers, and 12 destroyer escorts throughout the entire Central Philippines, hardly enough to stop the Center Force from pushing into Leyte Gulf.

Maybe so, but the timeline doesn't fit the story. Would you want to admit your CA got beat by a CVE instead of claiming that an air attack was the culprit?

It was probably more a case of conflicting accounts from different witnesses. For example, of the Japanese that disagree with the claim that it was a bomb attack (there is only one source to my knowledge), there is an assertion that it was caused by accidental fire from Kongo's secondaries, but this doesn't seem particularly credible.

More importantly, where did Combined Fleet.com get 0859 hours as the time of the explosion? Haguro's AAR gives 0851, which, according to CF, was about the same time White Plains opened fire. If the detonation was really closer to 9 o'clock, then it could be better associated with the Avengers, with the implication that either the latter attacked slightly earlier or the ship blew up slightly later. Perhaps "after 0905" really refers to the point at which the TBMs finished their run?

The accurate information is noted in post#52 which does not indicate a lack of ammunition for the BBs. Maybe because MacArthur didn’t have the correct info or couldn’t be bothered to correct himself. If you look at what Dougie said, it made little sense as AP ammo isn't used in shore bombardments. If he can't bother to be accurate on what ammo is used for shore bombardments, how would an objective reader view his accuracy on his story on the status of ammo on the 7th Fleet BBs?

Admiral Kinkaid himself sent Halsey a message saying "My OBBs low in ammunition."
 
Chokai - Haguro's after action report credits the loss to Avengers (https://www.jacar.archives.go.jp/aj...00&IS_KIND=detail&IS_STYLE=eng&IS_TAG_S1=InD&). IIRC it was only recently that James Hornfischer's "Tin Can Sailors" gave White Plains the kill.

About Oldendorf: It was not so simple. Admiral Kinkaid was still concerned about the threat posed by the Japanese Shima Force, which even after Nishimura's annihilation could have penetrated Leyte Gulf if he ordered TFs 78 and 79 northward. With that in mind, he deliberately chose to hold off on engaging Kurita in order to maintain his southern flank. This threat may have been exaggerated in hindsight given that Shima turned around on his own, but only a short time earlier Kurita had previously done exactly the same thing only to double back.
An after-action report that is in Japanese, which I don't read. As this is also an English-language board, I'm going to have to ask you to provide a translation.

Re. Oldendorf: Okay, so bailing out the Taffies wasn't in the cards. I think my point that he could have still easily barred the way into the Gulf itself stands.
 
The Japanese after action says Chokai's torpedoes were hit by "what must of been a bomb" but Haguro's report says she was under concentrated shellfire from the main enemy body when the torpedoes detonated. It can't have been any of the DD's or DE's as they were all engaging other targets at the time which leaves only the White Plains. I am inclined to believe it was the White Plains because Lt Fowler's avenger hit her in the stern which was not where the torpedoes were stored but in the end it doesn't matter.

Based on the performance of Kurita against Taffy 3 the 45 destroyers guarding the transports could have sunk his entire force. But you can't get rid of Oldendorf, he could intercept before Kurita reached the transports and as has already been posted here he had enough ammunition to fight a battle, he just had less than the standard loadout which meant he wanted resupply. Each of his ships had over 100 armor piercing rounds left, and two still had their entire compliment left having never opened fire during the night battle.
 
An after-action report that is in Japanese, which I don't read. As this is also an English-language board, I'm going to have to ask you to provide a translation.

Re. Oldendorf: Okay, so bailing out the Taffies wasn't in the cards. I think my point that he could have still easily barred the way into the Gulf itself stands.

The Japanese after action says Chokai's torpedoes were hit by "what must of been a bomb" but Haguro's report says she was under concentrated shellfire from the main enemy body when the torpedoes detonated. It can't have been any of the DD's or DE's as they were all engaging other targets at the time which leaves only the White Plains. I am inclined to believe it was the White Plains because Lt Fowler's avenger hit her in the stern which was not where the torpedoes were stored but in the end it doesn't matter.

Based on the performance of Kurita against Taffy 3 the 45 destroyers guarding the transports could have sunk his entire force. But you can't get rid of Oldendorf, he could intercept before Kurita reached the transports and as has already been posted here he had enough ammunition to fight a battle, he just had less than the standard loadout which meant he wanted resupply. Each of his ships had over 100 armor piercing rounds left, and two still had their entire compliment left having never opened fire during the night battle.

According to p. 181 of Robert Lundgren's "The World Wonder'd," Haguro's AAR (linked above, the actual text should be around p. 25 of the pdf) gives the cause of Chokai's torpedo detonation as a bomb hit taking place at 0851 hrs. I can't read Japanese, so if there's anyone here who can, then they can provide a word for word translation.

Re. Oldendorf: Okay, so bailing out the Taffies wasn't in the cards. I think my point that he could have still easily barred the way into the Gulf itself stands.
Based on the performance of Kurita against Taffy 3 the 45 destroyers guarding the transports could have sunk his entire force. But you can't get rid of Oldendorf, he could intercept before Kurita reached the transports and as has already been posted here he had enough ammunition to fight a battle, he just had less than the standard loadout which meant he wanted resupply. Each of his ships had over 100 armor piercing rounds left, and two still had their entire compliment left having never opened fire during the night battle.

The timing of Oldendorf's arrival in this scenario depends on Admiral Kinkaid. If the Japanese actually broke through his hand would have been forced, but he was still worried about Shima's fleet pushing through the San Bernardino Strait and for this reason historically avoided ordering TFs 78 and 79 northward. Consequently Kurita would have at least had a few hours to advance before encountering anything substantial, and by that time the damage would be done, both figuratively and literally.

Once Kurita's ships actually penetrate Leyte Gulf it would, of course, be only be a matter of time until his entire force is annihilated, especially when TF 34's super-battleships supported by carrier aviation arrive on the scene. But, the losses among the transports would have been huge and the invasion itself heavily disrupted. Admiral Halsey probably would have been scapegoated and court-martialed.
 
He can't ignore Taffy 3. If he does Taffy 3 pulls away to the squalls as it tried historically and without the pressure of an attack all three Taffy's have time to rearm their strike aircraft. Then instead of facing desperate delaying attacks Kurita is facing a mass strike of 350 properly armed planes which is probably enough to end his attack by itself. If it isn't there are 60 destroyers guarding the landing area plus 4 cruisers and Oldendorf's battleships which massively outclass Kurita's force. He also had quite a bit of steaming from where he encountered Taffy 3 to the landing area which gives TF 38.1 time to launch a strike.

All of this ignores that considering the aggressive training the IJN instilled there was no way that he was going to ignore carriers under his guns even if he had properly identified them.

For fucking real, THIS. The man lost against a handful of destroyers and destroyer escorts. Sixty destroyers would end the Imperial Navy then and there, without the battleships and cruisers involved at all, or the air strikes.
 

"Yes."

In all seriousness, you going to give a bit more of an argument on why a task force which was utterly foiled by a handful of escorts weighing a fraction of its tonnage is going to suddenly become the very model of extreme hyper competence when faced by a force twelve times that weight?
 
"Yes."

In all seriousness, you going to give a bit more of an argument on why a task force which was utterly foiled by a handful of escorts weighing a fraction of its tonnage is going to suddenly become the very model of extreme hyper competence when faced by a force twelve times that weight?

Because that handful of escorts was on the verge of total annihilation when Admiral Kurita ordered a retreat. Several dozen destroyers scattered throughout the central Philippines would never have been able to prevent the Center Force from crashing into Leyte Gulf and causing thousands to tens of thousands of deaths among the shipping there. As I've said many times before in this thread, even if Kurita's entire fleet was subsequently destroyed by the Americans, it would be a pyrrhic victory.
 
Because that handful of escorts was on the verge of total annihilation when Admiral Kurita ordered a retreat. Several dozen destroyers scattered throughout the central Philippines would never have been able to prevent the Center Force from crashing into Leyte Gulf and causing thousands to tens of thousands of deaths among the shipping there. As I've said many times before in this thread, even if Kurita's entire fleet was subsequently destroyed by the Americans, it would be a pyrrhic victory.

Not really. Kurita ordered a retreat, and left possession of the battlefield to his enemy. That is a defeat in my books. And that shipping would have been replaced in a few months at the absolute best. Assuming of course that literally everyone else in the USN was sleeping at the wheel. Japan would never have regained a navy worth the name before the end of the war.
 
Because that handful of escorts was on the verge of total annihilation when Admiral Kurita ordered a retreat. Several dozen destroyers scattered throughout the central Philippines would never have been able to prevent the Center Force from crashing into Leyte Gulf and causing thousands to tens of thousands of deaths among the shipping there. As I've said many times before in this thread, even if Kurita's entire fleet was subsequently destroyed by the Americans, it would be a pyrrhic victory.

Traditionally, pyrrhic victories are attributed to the side that can't replace their losses. That wasn't exactly a problem for the US navy.
 
The bottom line is that the Japanese lacked the skills to win at Leyte, whatever one might argue about the material.

Traditionally, pyrrhic victories are attributed to the side that can't replace their losses. That wasn't exactly a problem for the US navy.

Indeed. If anybody had scored a pyrrhic victory in such a situation, it would have been the Japanese.
 
Except they kinda, well.....did.
Not really. Kurita ordered a retreat, and left possession of the battlefield to his enemy. That is a defeat in my books. And that shipping would have been replaced in a few months at the absolute best. Assuming of course that literally everyone else in the USN was sleeping at the wheel. Japan would never have regained a navy worth the name before the end of the war.

The point isn't whether the Japanese won historically, it's that they easily had the strength to break through the relatively weak opposition in front of them and cause havoc in Leyte Gulf. Even such a relatively minor thing as Admiral Ozawa's northern force radioing Kurita that he indeed was able to draw the American fleet carriers away probably would have guaranteed such a result. The consequences of this, in addition to tremendous loss of life amid the mauling of the transport assembly area, would have been a severe disruption of the Philippines invasion and probably Halsey's court martial. Which leads to...

Traditionally, pyrrhic victories are attributed to the side that can't replace their losses. That wasn't exactly a problem for the US navy.

The victory would have been Pyrrhic in that possibly tens of thousands would have died avoidable deaths owing to their higher leadership being wrong-footed, and Halsey would have lost his job. Leyte island would never have been turned into the great staging base for the Luzon operation envisioned by MacArthur (which, it never was even OTL because of a series of screw-ups, some of which can be blamed on the latter).

Meanwhile, from the Japanese perspective, Kurita's fleet would have died 'gloriously' in battle - a big-gun "Kantai Kessen" advocated by Mahan and Togo - rather than meekly in its home ports or piecemeal on the high seas. They would have gone out with a bang rather than a whimper. For IGHQ, Leyte Gulf was the last opportunity their surface ships ever had to inflict catastrophic losses on an enemy, and Kurita blew it.
 
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The timing of Oldendorf's arrival in this scenario depends on Admiral Kinkaid. If the Japanese actually broke through his hand would have been forced, but he was still worried about Shima's fleet pushing through the San Bernardino Strait and for this reason historically avoided ordering TFs 78 and 79 northward. Consequently Kurita would have at least had a few hours to advance before encountering anything substantial, and by that time the damage would be done, both figuratively and literally.

Once Kurita's ships actually penetrate Leyte Gulf it would, of course, be only be a matter of time until his entire force is annihilated, especially when TF 34's super-battleships supported by carrier aviation arrive on the scene. But, the losses among the transports would have been huge and the invasion itself heavily disrupted. Admiral Halsey probably would have been scapegoated and court-martialed.
*sighs*

You did notice that I'm no longer arguing that Oldendorf would've gone to bail out the Taffy's, right? But you keep taking it as a given that Kurita will be able to penetrate Leyte Gulf and hit the transports and keep poo-pooing Oldendorf's fleet. Yes, he was worried about Shima. Kurita is the bigger threat and he knows it. If Kurita makes past the Taffies - and frankly, I still don't think he'd be able to - it's fairly trivial for Oldendorf, being in the Gulf already, to move to block him, especially with many of Kurita's battleships slowed by the air strikes in San Bernardino Strait.
 
*sighs*

You did notice that I'm no longer arguing that Oldendorf would've gone to bail out the Taffy's, right? But you keep taking it as a given that Kurita will be able to penetrate Leyte Gulf and hit the transports and keep poo-pooing Oldendorf's fleet. Yes, he was worried about Shima. Kurita is the bigger threat and he knows it. If Kurita makes past the Taffies - and frankly, I still don't think he'd be able to - it's fairly trivial for Oldendorf, being in the Gulf already, to move to block him, especially with many of Kurita's battleships slowed by the air strikes in San Bernardino Strait.

AFAIK Oldendorf's fleet never left Surigao Strait for the duration of the battle. His position, between Leyte and Dinagat, was some distance south of the main transport anchorage at San Pedro Bay, here:

Map-of-the-three-sampling-stations-in-San-Pedro-Bay-Leyte-Philippines-Closed-circles.png

401px-surigao_straight.jpg

800px-Samar.jpg

Eye-balling it, if Oldendorf was sent north at 0920 hours, the time Kurita ordered his withdrawal, he could have beaten him handily or at the minimum gotten there at about the same time. But, he wasn't. If Kurita continued pushing south on his established course the window to intercept him would have rapidly diminished. Judging by the charts Kinkaid would have had around two hours to do something, or Kurita would have reached the transports.
 
This Leyte Gulf scenario just begs for a new TL and a discussion thread separated from here. Any takers? :cool:
 
*sighs*

You did notice that I'm no longer arguing that Oldendorf would've gone to bail out the Taffy's, right? But you keep taking it as a given that Kurita will be able to penetrate Leyte Gulf and hit the transports and keep poo-pooing Oldendorf's fleet. Yes, he was worried about Shima. Kurita is the bigger threat and he knows it. If Kurita makes past the Taffies - and frankly, I still don't think he'd be able to - it's fairly trivial for Oldendorf, being in the Gulf already, to move to block him, especially with many of Kurita's battleships slowed by the air strikes in San Bernardino Strait.

Hard to picture the US older BB's doing anything other than what you are suggesting...
 
Leyte island would never have been turned into the great staging base for the Luzon operation envisioned by MacArthur (which, it never was even OTL because of a series of screw-ups, some of which can be blamed on the latter).

I don't see why Luzon would have become any more or less of a staging base then it did IOTL (whatever that amount was). US forces were already securely ashore by the time Center Force reached the Palawan Passage, never mind by the time Samar occurred, and they would have had more then enough supplies landed to last the few days of interruption that would occur. While the Japanese successfully reaching the transports would certainly have imposed delays, I fail to see how it would have fundamentally altered either the campaign or the greater war.
 
I don't see why Luzon would have become any more or less of a staging base then it did IOTL (whatever that amount was). US forces were already securely ashore by the time Center Force reached the Palawan Passage, never mind by the time Samar occurred, and they would have had more then enough supplies landed to last the few days of interruption that would occur. While the Japanese successfully reaching the transports would certainly have imposed delays, I fail to see how it would have fundamentally altered either the campaign or the greater war.

Disruption of the staging areas would have hindered the flow of building materials to develop port and airfield facilities. Even IOTL American forces (despite occupying the Philippine islands for over 40 years prior) had staggeringly little knowledge of the terrain of Leyte, and the ground battle there consumed far more for far less return than was anticipated. Both contemporaries and subsequent historians have since lambasted the US performance:

"Today, we can recall MacArthur wading triumphantly ashore in the Philippines. But what President Truman and General Marshall knew only too well was that MacArthur was supposed to have retaken Leyte with four divisions and have eight fighter and bomber groups striking from the island within forty-five days of the initial landings. However, nine divisions and twice as many days into the battle, only a fraction of that air power was operational because terrain conditions were not fully appreciated (and this on an island which the United States had occupied for over forty years). The fighting on the ground had simply not gone as planned. The Japanese even briefly isolated Fifth Air Force Headquarters and captured much of the Burauen airfield complex before reinforcements pushed them back into the jungle." [Giangreco, "Hell to Pay" p. 151]

---

"The conquest of Leyte eventually involved more than 100,000 additional US ground troops than anticipated and took so long to accomplish that the island never became the major staging base for the invasion of Luzon as intended." [p. 77]

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MacArthur messed up on Luzon too:

"One of MacArthur's biographers, William Manchester, recently characterized the general's campaign on Luzon as "the achievements of a great strategist," and speculated about "what would have happened had MacArthur, not Mark Clark, been the US commander in Italy." Manchester was thinking of MacArthur's advance on Manila and his swift reconquest of the southern Philippines. The fighting on northern Luzon, however, took place in terrain and circumstances quite similar to Italy - and the results were the same. MacArthur's forces in northern Luzon - like those of Clark in Italy - were committed to slow, bloody slugging matches against a well- entrenched enemy who took every advantage of the mountainous terrain to fight a superb delaying action. Ironically, it was MacArthur's "brilliant" campaigns in other parts of the Philippines which drained men from the northern Luzon campaign and guaranteed this result." [Spector, "Eagle against the Sun" p. 530]
 
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