Leyte’s Enduring Relevance

The entire ship shuddered as a Japanese shell entered the after fire room, severing boiler lines and releasing superheated steam into the compartment. Those not instantly flayed remained trapped under a blanket of scalding steam that rose to the top of the compartment and obstructed their escape. One 17-year-old sailor made it topside alive. In the same instant, another shell punched through to the engine room sending an updraft of hot steam topside into the turret of Gun 53, engulfing its entire crew. Dead sailors, saturated with blood and seawater, crowded the decks as men piled out of the steel confines of their beloved ship, screaming in violent agony, either blistered by steam or scorched by fire and flash.¹

The USS Hoel (DD-533), engaged in a fierce shoot-out with Japanese heavy cruisers and battleships off the island of Samar north of Leyte, did not enjoy the company and support of U.S. Navy cruisers, battleships, and fleet carriers that should have been there to take up the fight. What the Hoel, as well as the other ships of Taffy 3, endured offers a candid testament to the costly events that can transpire under disjointed command.

Now, more than ever, unified command is necessary to establish non-conflicting, overarching objectives to enable subordinate commands to employ their capabilities in a decentralized fashion and facilitate effective joint service coordination in a distributed maritime environment.

After its carriers had been “detoothed as offensive weapons” during the Battle of the Philippine Sea, the Imperial Japanese Navy had to rely on its large-gun capital ship force to deflect a U.S. invasion of the Philippines. To accomplish this, the Japanese high command devised the Sho-1 plan. It consisted of three main Japanese fleets: the Southern Force commanded by Admiral Shoji Nishimura, the Central Force commanded by Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita, and the Northern Force commanded by Admiral Jisaburo Ozawa.²

In theory, the Northern Force would bait Admiral William F. Halsey and his carriers, Task Force 38, into pursuing them northward while the Southern and Central Forces pushed through the Surigao and San Bernardino straits, respectively, to attack General Douglas MacArthur’s invasion force. The Japanese had high hopes for this plan; however, it “relied on the optimistic notion that Japan could fight a complex sequence of battles on its precise timetable.”³

While Ozawa’s force successfully diverted Halsey’s attention away from the Japanese center of gravity, the plan failed to incorporate a critical component that would be necessary for success: air cover. The remnants of Japan’s naval air assets were with the Northern Force. To achieve at least somewhat effective air support for their forces, Nishimura and Kurita had to rely on land-based army aircraft. Longstanding rivalry between the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy, as well as a lack of interservice command, hindered the ability to coordinate any substantial air support for the Southern and Central forces.⁴

After elements of Vice Admiral Thomas C. Kinkaid’s Seventh Fleet obliterated the Southern Force, the Central Force proceeded through the San Bernardino Strait blind, with no air cover. This lack of cover effectively trivialized the large guns of Japan’s heavy cruisers and battleships, and the 18.1-inch guns of the super battleship Yamato, against an entire invasion force. 

While the Battle of Leyte Gulf proved a decisive victory for the U.S. Navy and the Allies, confusion between the two fleet commanders nearly cost the entire battle. The invasion of Leyte marked the convergence of the two primary offensives in the Pacific: the Central Pacific offensive commanded by Admiral Chester W. Nimitz and the Southern Pacific offensive commanded by General MacArthur.⁵ Despite this convergence of forces, the two fleets that conducted and supported this assault—Kinkaid’s Seventh Fleet and Halsey’s Third Fleet—remained under the authority of their separate offensive commands. The Seventh Fleet fell under the command of MacArthur, whereas the Third Fleet fell under the command of Nimitz.

In the preinvasion plans, the Seventh Fleet would carry out the assault as well as provide close protection and fire support for the landing force. The Seventh Fleet’s destroyers and PT craft would patrol for Japanese submarines while its cruisers and battleships bombarded Japanese shore defenses and its carrier-based aircraft provided air cover for the landing force.

The Third Fleet, on the other hand, would support the invasion force by targeting Japanese airfields in the area and defending against any Japanese naval forces.⁶ The invasion’s ununified command led to miscommunication that generated nearly catastrophic results.

MacArthur intended for the Third Fleet to provide critical air cover for his vulnerable transports, prescribing to Halsey that “the basic plan for this operation . . . was predicated upon full support by the Third Fleet . . . consider your mission to cover this operation is essential and paramount.”

But Halsey adhered to Nimitz’s original orders, which directed the Third Fleet to “cover and support the Southwest Pacific Forces” and to “destroy enemy naval and air forces in, or threatening, the Philippines area.” Nimitz later supplemented these orders with an additional directive: “In case opportunity for destruction of major portion of the enemy fleet is offered or can be created, such destruction becomes the primary task.”⁷

MacArthur and Nimitz failed to establish a non-conflicting intent for their naval forces. Ultimately, Kinkaid assumed that the Third Fleet’s Task Force 34, the fast battleships, guarded the San Bernardino Strait, while Halsey assumed the Seventh Fleet oversaw that area when he acted on Nimitz’s orders.⁸ This disorganization left the strait undefended as Kurita’s Center Force steamed through, with one escort carrier task group standing in between the Japanese and the U.S. invasion force.

The outcome of a conflict in today’s Pacific will be decided by the nation that can maintain control of the seas and deny its enemy that critical advantage. In the face of China’s highly capable missile technology and the immense strides that have been made in detection and target systems, concentration of forces and naval assets will not necessarily be a viable naval tactic in a modern conflict.

The distributed maritime operations (DMO) strategy, developed by the Navy in recent years, will govern the way in which a predominantly maritime conflict will be fought. Instead of the concentration of forces, DMO calls for the dispersion of naval assets across a conflicted region. While effectively minimizing the detectability of friendly naval assets, this strategy will promote “distributed lethality,” whereby dispersed forces can produce more axes of attack against enemy combatants. This, combined with various upgrades intended to “upgun” and boost the defensive and offensive capabilities of ships, will allow the U.S. Navy and its allies to exert firmer authority across larger expanses.⁹

In a conflict with an advanced adversary, such as China, history has underscored the importance of unambiguous objectives for subordinates to properly effectuate the sound, decentralized execution of those objectives. Despite the U.S. victory at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the separation of command during the Leyte invasion was a major mistake on the part of the U.S. military. The unconsolidated upper-level command structure of the two Pacific offensive commands generated immense confusion and near catastrophe.

MacArthur and Nimitz had overlapping yet conflicting objectives for their respective naval assets. This discrepancy likely factored into Halsey’s decision to pursue Ozawa’s Northern Force. Fundamentally, Halsey could not accurately assess where his fleet would be most effectively used because he had been provided with two conflicting objectives.

Today, Chinese defense rhetoric has suggested that China will use the space and cyber domains to impede U.S. military communications. China and its military “routinely train to conduct jamming and anti-jamming operations against multiple communication . . . satellite systems in force-on-force exercises.”¹⁰ In an age when a potential adversary may partially or perhaps completely disable communications, clear standing objectives demand the utmost attention.

What if connections between a commanding officer and higher authorities experience interruptions or are severed? What do they do? Where do they go? What mission do they default to?¹¹ Unified overall objectives will allow naval assets to continue pursuing a campaign when faced with interruptions in connectivity and communication. If dispersed assets operate independently under conflicting objectives, the entire force will be unable to act as one powerful, consolidated force.

In such a case, mass deviations from intended missions will be difficult to correct, which could prove disastrous for an entire campaign. Decentralized execution of centralized, overarching plans or mission command enable unity of effort in complex operations.¹² Exercising their own discretion as an extension of clear objectives will be critical for dispersed forces to react and make timely decisions that will allow continued sea control in the event of sudden adverse conditions, such as disruptions in communication.

At Leyte, had the Third Fleet been provided with clear, non-conflicting objectives, the Third and Seventh Fleets likely would have been positioned in such a way that would have rendered Admiral Kurita’s push through the San Bernadino Strait a non-threat to the U.S. invasion force. Without a unified command to establish these clear objectives, modern forces could become subject to the same lack of coordination that afflicted the Seventh and Third Fleets at Leyte 80 years ago.

Within the larger joint service context, traditionally, the Marine Corps’ operations with the Navy have been “sustained operations ashore in support of a traditional naval campaign.” However, the Marine Corps has been enhancing its assets and doctrine to better support its Navy partners by augmenting their sea control and denial capabilities.¹³ The expeditionary advanced base operations (EABO) strategy will allow the Marine Corps to deploy smaller, highly mobile and independent units into contested maritime areas that will extend the Navy’s sea denial authority.

Equipped with advanced mobile sensors and weapons, such as the Navy–Marine Corps Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (an antiship-missile system), these units will establish a powerful, forward presence and have the capability to severely hinder or restrict enemy control while mitigating the effectiveness of adversary strikes.¹⁴

EABO will be critical in the support of sea control and denial missions. However, certain deficiencies highlight the need for a joint approach that must fall under a centralized defensive command. EABO’s Marine Air Defense Integrated System is well suited for low-altitude air defense; it incorporates mobile turret-launched stinger missiles and electronic warfare systems intended to target unmanned aerial vehicles, low-altitude high-speed aircraft, and helicopters.¹⁵

A critical vulnerability: EABO lacks assets for defending airspaces at medium to high altitudes. Certain Chinese aircraft, such as the Wing Loong drone, and some of the older aircraft, such as the H-6 bomber, pose significant threats to Marines on the ground. They can “loiter” for extended periods at altitudes greater than 20,000 feet above islands where Marines are believed to be, making Marine operations highly vulnerable to surveillance as well as aerial strikes.¹⁶

The Japanese heavy cruisers and battleships that spearheaded the Sho-1 defense threatened the U.S. surface ships in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, but the Japanese force’s lack of air defense capabilities, and the failure of its land-based units to compensate for this deficiency, constituted the Japanese Achilles heel.

Likewise, while Marine littoral regiments today boast assets that present substantial dangers to enemy ships and represent a potent extension of the Navy, without sufficient assets to defend high-altitude airspaces these capabilities can be mitigated by enemy air power. A conflict in the Pacific will be inherently maritime. This demands a command structure in which Army and Air Force assets become subservient to the maritime services’ needs so that these assets can be employed in order to supplement or reinforce any gaps in Navy and Marine Corps capabilities.

From a material-asset standpoint, joint service cooperation is important for augmenting the missiles, aircraft, and sensors that a particular service’s strategy can bring to the fight. This, of course, will help that service to better execute its original missions. The cooperative structure also will be invaluable for establishing a “joint single battle concept.”¹⁷ A centralized services command will allow the joint services to best use their assets concurrently so as to optimize warfighting efforts.

The Battle of Leyte Gulf was one of the United States’ greatest displays—and Japan’s last display—of naval power and established that forces must work in tandem, not against each other, with clear overarching mission objectives to achieve combat success. As the United States looks toward the future, the lessons of Leyte Gulf remain as relevant in 2024 as they were in 1944. Only by embracing a unified command structure, defining non-conflicting objectives, and fostering joint service linkages can we hope to achieve the level of optimized operations necessary for success in a modern Pacific campaign.