8th September – 13th September 1943 – Philippines – Part II – Halsey’s Rematch
The first wave of US troops went ashore on Leyte on the 8th of September and this phase of the operation went almost exactly as planned, which was enough to create considerable anxiety among some of the officers directing the operation from offshore. Carrier borne aircraft suppressed what was left of the IJAAF squadrons and heavy naval gunfire shattered much of defensive positions covering the landing zone. Facing only light resistance the men of X Corps and XXIV, part of the US 6th Army, were able to establish a bridgehead and there was certainly relief that the landings had not been the bloodbath that had been feared. However, those who had studied the landings in Borneo were under no illusions about likely reason for this initial success, correctly deducing that the Japanese had given up the beaches in favour of a defence in depth strategy. As with Borneo their depth was limited by the available resources, but things would get much harder for 6th Army as they began to push inland, despite almost total air supremacy and the weight of firepower they were able bring to bear on the defenders even after they moved beyond the range of naval gunfire [1].
Halsey was one of those who was less than impressed by these initial successes, believing that the Japanese were not about to allow the invasion to simply sweep them off Leyte and the most likely response would be to try and destroy the massive flotilla of support ships still sat offshore with the bulk of the materiel for the invasion still aboard. His opinion was confirmed when aerial reconnaissance detected Japanese carriers approaching from the north on the morning of the 12th of September. Far from rushing off to engage Halsey’s reaction was one of indignation that the Japanese were expecting him to fall for the same trick twice. This did not change the basic strategic logic of the situation since the carriers posed a threat that had to be honoured whether they were acting as bait or not. This meant that despite concerns raised by some his subordinates Halsey decided he had to split his forces, sending Taskforce 38.1, led by the fleet carriers
Hornet and
Yorktown, Taskforce 38.2, led by the carriers
Intrepid and
Bunker Hill, north in their entirety. He retained Taskforce 38.3, with
Valley Forge,
Enterprise, and
Essex and also detached the battleships
Iowa and
New Jersey from TF 38.2 as he decided they would be more useful if the Japanese did try another ‘end run’. Combined with the four battleships already attached to TF 38.3,
Washington,
Massachusetts,
Alabama, and
South Dakota, this meant that despite the dispatch of so much of his carrier force to the north he still retained a powerful force covering the landing grounds. In doing so he had already unhinged the entire Japanese battle plan [2].
Despite the losses suffered off Borneo the IJN plan divided up their forces into three groups.The Northern Group that US scout planes had already identified contained the surviving carriers from Borneo,
Jun'yō,
Zuihō, and the hastily repaired
Hiyō. It also included the new fleet carrier
Taihō. This ship should have been the lead of a new generation of Japanese carriers and despite being launched in 1942 it was only now that it was ‘rushed’ into service to flesh out the ranks of the Northern Force, though it was equipped with a more conventional airwing, composed of surviving pilots and crews from the other carriers of the fleet. That the Japanese had embraced suicide tactics before they accepted the necessity of cutting corners on the process of commissioning their warships speaks to the distorted priorities of the Japanese leadership. The crews of the carriers were under no illusions as to their likely fate as they steamed south. Letters written to their loved ones by the crews might have spoken of honour, duty and sacrifice, but this was a necessity to get those letters past the Japanese military censors. Diaries and post war interviews with survivors paint a picture of gloom and resentment, what those safely ensconced in Tokyo called ‘honour’ the men of the Northern force saw as futility [3].
Morale in Central and Southern forces was hardly any better. The Central force was based around the battleships
Nagato, Mutsu, Kongō, and
Haruna while the core of the Southern force was the battleships
Ise, Fusō, and
Yamashiro. Splitting the battleship force reflected the fact that the IJN was hoping that one of the two could slip past the American defences rather than seeking battle with their counterparts. This was a modest display of realism on the part of the Japanese, but one that it also invited defeat in detail by superior enemy forces if they were unable to avoid the USN forces and Halsey had no intention of letting them get by on his watch. The plan for the Northern Force to get off its kamikaze strike against the American carriers while out of conventional operational range was heavily dependent on aerial reconnaissance providing them with a clear picture of where the American carriers were and when they began to move to intercept the Northern Force. As had so often been the case the Japanese were badly let down by their scouting. The scout planes based in the Philippines had been largely destroyed by the American softening up attacks and the Northern Force was dependent on the floatplanes launched by their cruisers. Expecting the Japanese to have their scouts out the US carriers had swung to the east before turning back towards the Japanese carriers.
The manoeuvre meant that the Americans entered the range of their own airwings almost as the Japanese finally located them and were able to launch first at 15:20 hours, a full thirty minutes before the Japanese. When the Japanese did locate the Americans, they were forced to scramble to launch their own strike, made considerably harder by the lack of experience on the part of far too many of the kamikaze pilots and the struggle of trying to launch the kind of fully co-ordinated strike that they had been able to pull off so effectively only a year earlier. Once the strike was away the plan was for the carriers to turn away from the Americans and open the range still further, but the delays meant they left this far too late late as aircraft from the
Intrepid and the
Enterprise caught the
Jun'yō and
Zuihō, unleashing their full weight of bombs and torpedoes against the two carriers, leaving them sitting ducks when the airwing from the
Hornet arrived and administered the coup de grâce, with both carriers going down around 1800 hours [4].
The Japanese counterstrike turned into another ‘turkey shoot’ as American radar detected the approaching enemy aircraft in plenty of time to get up a full combat air patrol and deploy their ships to place the maximum weight of anti-aircraft fire in the path of the approaching kamikazes, who thanks to the breakdown of co-ordination straggled in over the space of 45 minutes, with the first attacks arriving at 1630 hours. Between the US fighters, flak, and the difficulties many of the inexperienced Japanese pilots faced in lining up for their attack runs only three hits were scored by the attackers and only one of these did serious damage when a BN5 Kate hit the deck of the
Hornet. It penetrated to the hanger deck and started a serious fire, but the effectiveness of USN damage control once again saved the ship and all though it would have to make for Singapore for temporary repairs before returning to the West Coast
Hornet was repaired and returned to service in the summer of 1944 [5].
Even as the survivors of the Northern Force withdrew their problems hadn’t ended as the
Hiyō suffered mechanical issues and was reduced to 12 knots. Faced with the prospect of slowing the entire force while the
Hiyō sought to patch up their malfunctioning systems, all while anxiously watching for any enemy submarines intercepting them, the decision was taken to abandon
Hiyō, with the ship being sent down by destroyer torpedoes and finally sinking at 2100 hours. The Japanese had all but thrown away the remnants of its carrier strength in the hopes of inflicting a devastating blow on their American counterparts and creating an opening for the battleships to attack the Leyte beachhead, it failed every bit as comprehensively at the latter as it had at the former.
The IJN Central Force, commanded by Admiral Jisaburō Ozawa, entered the Sibuyan Sea on the morning of the 12th and was located barely an hour after Halsey had dispatched the carrier group to the north. Rather than recalling the ships of TF 38.1 and TF 38.2 he ordered both the carriers and battleships of TF 38.3 to advance and engage judging, correctly, that he still retained a superior force and that the Central Force was lacking in air support, depending as it was on the depleted IJAAF forces on the islands. As the Central Force advanced it initially appeared to Ozawa that they might succeed in slipping through, not aware that they had in fact been spotted and when their own scouts did locate USN ships it was only the light screening element of escort carrier and destroyers positioned specifically to detect the Japanese approach but not engage them. The scout reports that the American ships were withdrawing bolstered the confidence of Ozawa and he pressed forward at the best possible speed of his force. His confidence was shattered when the first alarms sounded of approaching aircraft [6].
The air groups from
Valley Forge, Enterprise, and
Essex had managed to co-ordinate their actions, keeping the bomber and fighter elements from each carrier in contact with one another and ensuring that the strikes from all three carriers went in at about the same time, starting at 1035 hours. With no fighter cover the Japanese warships were entirely dependent on evasive manoeuvres and their anti-aircraft guns to fend off the US planes and it wasn’t nearly enough to protect them from the weight of the attacks that focused on the
Mutsu, Kongō, and Haruna, the
Nagato somewhat further south was left unmolested, which gave Admiral Ozawa the opportunity to watch as the rest of his battleships were hammered by bombs and torpedoes.
Kongō was the first of them to be sunk, as a spectacular explosion wracked the ship and broke its back after being hit by three bombs dropped by Helldivers from the
Enterprise. One bomb penetrated the magazine beneath one of the forward turrets and it was the secondary detonation of this ammunition that destroyed the ship.
Haruna was hit by at least six bombs and four torpedoes, leaving it listing and on fire. With power to its pumps out the crew had no choice except to abandon ship and she slowly went down, finally sinking at 1300 hours.
Mutsu somehow avoided taking any torpedo hits but was struck by eight or nine bombs.
Mutsu didn’t sink but she was a gutted wreck that had to be scuttled by her own supporting destroyers [7].
At this point it might have been prudent for Ozawa to order a retreat, however he reasoned that there was still a chance to push and do some damage before a second American strike could be launched and it was far from certain that even if his ships could turn around, that they would be able get out of range of the American carriers. He thus decided to press on, which led the remaining ships of the Central Force into a gunnery duel with the battleships of TF 38.3, with
Iowa and
New Jersey in the vanguard. With the advantage of gunnery radar and better spotting the USN battleships were able to set the terms of the engagement and the fight was a completely one side affair as the Japanese ships tried to push into close range, potentially looking to ram their opponents if all else failed. The American ships opened fire at 1510 hours and
Iowa and the
New Jersey concentrated on the
Nagato, while the rest of the battleships targeted her supporting cruisers.
Nagato did score several hits on the
New Jersey, only doing minimal damage. The return salvos were far more effective,
Nagato’s forward turret was knocked out within the first ten minutes of the engagement and a hit from the Iowa destroyed the bridge of the ship, crippling its fighting effectiveness. She was completely out of action by 1700 hours and Ozawa was forced to transfer his flag to the cruiser
Noshiro, the only one of the supporting forces that had escaped being hit by this point. He now had no choice but to order his force to try and break off, hoping they might be able to escape under cover of darkness. The remaining destroyers of the Central Force laid down patterns of torpedoes to force the American to evade and allow the Japanese ships to get out of gunnery range. The cruiser
Santa Fe took a torpedo hit that proved fatal and she sank at 1845 hours, though most of the crew were rescued. The destroyers
Gatling and
Gridley were also lost during the gunnery engagment, the latter with all hands. The losses for the Central force were far worse, with three cruisers also lost in addition to
Nagato and several other ships were sufficiently heavily damaged that they had to scuttled or scrapped after the battle. Halsey might have ordered a pursuit, except that as the Central Force was withdrawing reports reached him that another group of Japanese ships had been detected. This was the Southern Force, which had managed to avoid detection by the American, who had concentrated their scouts to the north and west and was now heading for the Surigao Straits. The ships of TF 38 were out of position to intercept this force and the rapid approach of night ruled out a carrier strike. Intercepting the Southern Force would fall to the battleships of Taskforce 77 under Admiral Jesse Oldendorf. The
Maryland,
West Virginia,
Tennessee,
California, and
Pennsylvania had all been damaged or sunk at Pearl Harbor, now they would finally have the chance to engage the Japanese directly rather than simply carry out the fire support role that the US battleships had been relegated to for most of the war [8].
The engagement took place after nightfall and at one time the Japanese had been experts at such battles, that however had been before radar was ubiquitous on the ships of the USN and they had become thoroughly familiar with its use. The IJN on the other hand were woefully short of radar and still didn’t fully appreciate the advantages it offered, especially the gunnery radar that was mounted by the US battleships. Given the numerical advantage the Americans enjoyed the outcome may seem inevitable with hindsight, but the crews of TF 77 were painfully aware that numbers did not always decide the outcome of a battle and that if they failed to intercept the Southern Force the Japanese warships could wreak havoc on the beachhead. The Japanese had received some reports from their scout planes of US ships entering the Strait, but these reports were sketchy and Admiral Kiyohide Shima, commanding the Southern Force from the
Fusō, decided that this was nothing more than a light screening force. They were disabused of this idea when the
Maryland opened the battle 2130 hours, followed by the rest of the American line.
Chaos ensued in the Southern Force as the Japanese warships tried to locate their opponents and deploy to engage them, still believing that they might be able to fight their way through, or at least inflict heavy casualties before they went down.
Fusō did manage to land several good hits on the
California, starting a fire that illuminated the battleship and made her an obvious target. Fortunately for the
California the fire from her sister ships was causing devastating damage to the Japanese force, even as the USN and IJN destroyers skirmished with one another as they tried to get into position to launch torpedoes.
Ise was hammered into a floating hulk by 2230 hours and
Yamashiro was out of action and listing badly to port.
Fusō’s initial success was swiftly negated as she took the full weight of fire from the
Tennessee and
Pennsylvania all her turrets were out of action by 2245 and she lost electrical power soon after, forcing the crew to abandon ship just after 2330 hours, though unlike Ozawa, Shima chose to go down with his ship. The remnants of the Southern force began to withdraw after midnight with the Americans pulling back to avoid exposing themselves to any last torpedo attacks from the Japanese forces [9].
With the destruction of the Southern Force the last hopes of stopping the US invasion were gone. There would be months of hard fighting ahead, but after the 13th of September the liberation of the Philippines was simply a matter of time [10].
[1] With Allied air and naval forces able to operate from the DEI as well as Singapore getting supplies and equipment to Philippines is difficult to say the least, but the Japanese defenders are in a somewhat stronger position than their counterparts on Borneo were.
[2] IOTL those battleships faced a frustrating time pointlessly chasing after the decoy carriers, but not ITTL.
[3]
Taiho wasn’t available IOTL but given the greater losses the Japanese haven’t had much choice but to get her operational, even if she isn’t entirely finished.
[4] Obviously the American carriers do rather better here than OTL as the confusion on the Japanese carriers buys them extra time.
[5] So the Japanese also do a bit better than OTL, but hardly enough to compensate for the loss of two carriers plus all those planes and pilots.
[6] Basically the inverse of OTL, with the screening light carriers and destroyers pulling back drawing the Japanese into range of a superior force, that really is there ITTL.
[7] Its getting progressively worse for the IJN and it isn’t about to take an upturn.
[8] Wasn’t going to leave TF 77 out of the battle.
[9] It’s a crushing defeat for the IJN and basically the end for the surface fleet as a fighting force.
[10] You can expect that the Americans are able to advance somewhat quicker than OTL given the weaker position of the Japanese defenders in the Philippines.
