REMEMBERING LEYTE GULF: A SECOND TIME

This month's offering reprises my original Leyte Gulf blog entry from October 2019.  I have left the 75th anniversary text intact but I want to acknowledge the 80th anniversary this month.

A quick sidebar: 

In the course of researching and writing Pacific Theater topics since the 1970s, I was fortunate to know a variety of Leyte Gulf veterans.  They included survivors of the escort carrier Gambier Bay (CVE-60), who invited me to accompany them on a 1977 Philippines reunion cruise.  That was a unique opportunity, intended as basis for a book but which produced one of my favorite articles, cited here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Gambier_Bay

The Gambier Bay crew included retired Captain Ed Huxtable, skipper of the ship's composite squadron, an inspiring leader and fellow Arizonan.  

Other Leyte Gulf veterans were Captain David McCampbell, the Navy's leading fighter ace who wrote the foreword for my 1979 F6F Hellcat book. And later Texas Governor John Connolly, the USS Essex (CV-9) fighter director who gave Dave and his wingman "the vector of vectors" to the all-time record interception of Japanese aircraft.

So let's set back the clock--and the calendar--to the October 2019 blog:

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This month marks the 75th anniversary of the greatest naval battle of World War II.  From October 23 to 26, 1944, the U.S. and Imperial Japanese navies clashed in Philippine waters.  The context was General Douglas MacArthur’s promised Return to the islands when he had fled the unstoppable Japanese in early 1942.  Subsequently the Joint Chiefs in Washington decided to merge the Central Pacific and Southwest Pacific offensives in the Philippines rather than Formosa (now Taiwan), thus setting huge forces in motion.

Oddly enough, the Battle of Leyte Gulf had little to do with Leyte Gulf, but it was the dominant feature of the campaign.  The scale could only be imagined today: 236 American and about 80 Japanese warships plus U.S. torpedo boats and submarines while both fleets deployed significant support vessels such as tankers and provision ships.  The Americans brought about 1,500 tailhook aircraft aboard 34 fleet and escort carriers while the Japanese Navy had approximately 300 planes in four carriers and ashore.

The U.S. Third Fleet was led by Admiral William F. Halsey, the jut-jawed seadog who had been at war against Japan since December 7, 1941.  His carrier commander in Task Force 38 was Vice Admiral Marc Mitscher, a pioneer aviator who relied heavily upon his excellent staff.  The amphibious force was led by Seventh Fleet’s Admiral Thomas Kinkaid.

Leyte Gulf has been told and retold dozens of times, and requires little expansion here.  The Imperial Navy deployed three units: two powerful surface forces transiting the islands from west to east, and a minimal carrier force well to the north, which was bound to draw attention of the aggressive “Bull” Halsey.

Leading four Japanese carriers was Admiral Jisaburo Ozawa, who had clashed with Mitscher off the Marianas in June.  “The Great Marianas Turkey Shoot” all but destroyed Tokyo’s carefully hoarded supply of trained carrier aircrews, leaving Ozawa with a small crop of rookies.

Historians still argue whether Leyte Gulf was a carrier battle.  The previous five, dating from Coral Sea in May 1942, all involved mutual exchange of carrier air strikes.  They resulted in loss of three U.S. flattops (plus one to a submarine) and nine Japanese—totaling fewer than the fast carriers Mitscher owned in October 44.  While a few of Ozawa’s planes flew within range of TF-38, none accomplished anything significant.

The battle began with U.S. submarines stalking Japan’s surface forces west of the Philippines on the 23rd.  Events peaked the next day with continuous air strikes that sank the battleship Musashi—one of the two biggest ships afloat—but otherwise did little to deter Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita, who continued toward his goal of attacking U.S. shipping in Leyte Gulf.  His passage through San Bernardino Strait was reported by U.S. night owls but was ignored by Halsey and Mitscher with disastrous results the next day.

Meanwhile, Japanese land-based aircraft sank USS Princeton on the 24th, the first American fast carrier lost since October 1942.

Hours later, Vice Admiral Shoji Nishimura’s southern force was annihilated in the last major surface action of all time, a nocturnal slugfest in the Battle of Surigao Strait.  Outnumbered about six to one, he lost his life and his command, only one destroyer surviving.  

Partly due to unnecessarily complex communications, Halsey assumed that his battleships, Task Force 34, were guarding the Leyte side of San Bernardino Strait.  With word of Ozawa’s flattops to the north, he took TF-38 to destroy Ozawa, leaving Kinkaid’s amphibious command vulnerable to surface ships.  The only American force in the way was “Taffy Three,” six small carriers with their escorting destroyers.  During the Battle Off Samar, the immensely outgunned “small boys” fought back with guns, torpedoes, and whatever aircraft could be launched.  Other escort-carrier planes added to the effort, forcing Kurita to disengage.  

Throughout the day the U.S. Navy lost two escort carriers (one to the first kamikaze mission) and three destroyers.  

Halsey’s aviators and “black shoe” surface warriors sank all four of Ozawa’s carriers, but by then his flattops were almost empty shells.  The execution continued into the 26th, raising the toll to 28 Japanese warships.  The Imperial Navy never recovered.

MacArthur’s forces largely secured the Philippines in April 1945, providing another advanced fleet base for the Pacific Fleet.  

Late that year the U.S. Navy owned 6,000 ships including 90 aircraft carriers of all types.  It was two-thirds more than 12 months before and over three times the figure in 1941.  More than 3,000,000 men and women wore navy uniforms.

Today the Navy has about 490 ships and submarines with 438,000 uniformed personnel.  Congress mandates eleven carriers but at this writing only two are deployed. The new USS Ford (CVN-78), an enduring boondoggle, was delivered incomplete and may not deploy for another four or five years.  Her primary aircraft, the F-35C stealth fighter, is perennially troubled, and in fact took over two years just to qualify in carrier landings.  The Lightning II remains in low-rate production until it meets required mileposts for operational capability.

There’s still a great deal of misty-eyed sentimentality about “the greatest generation,” though none of the hundreds of World War II vets I’ve known, met or interviewed bought into Tom Brokaw’s unsupportable assertion.  But one thing seems certain: the aircrews and sailors who fought Leyte Gulf represented the greatest assembly of naval talent and capability of the era.  

MY FAVORITE BOOKS

The title of this month’s blog might be confusing, so I’ll clarify.  When I mention “my favorite books” I do not mean favorites that I have read, though I’ve read several three times or more.  They include Edward P. Stafford’s The Big E; Michael Shaara’s The Killer Angels ; Stephen Coonts’ Flight of Intruder; and Stephen Hunter’s anthology Now Playing at the Valencia.  

When I say “my favorite books,” I mean my favorite books.  At present 46 volumes have my name on the cover, and I’ve contributed to a dozen others with anthologies, dedicated chapters, introductions and whatnot.

Ask authors with more than three books to name their favorite, and you’ll likely  get “The one I’m writing now.”  That’s understandable, as writers bring enthusiasm to each new project, especially if the money is good.

Sidebar: some critics dismiss an author’s new release by saying, “He’s writing for money now.”

Like that’s a bad thing?

You don’t hear people saying, “He’s flying for money now” or “She’s litigating for money now.”

Therefore: consult your dictionary and look up “professional”—as in “professional writer.”

And maybe get back to me.

So, back to My Favorite Books.

Everyone is especially fond of My First Book, if only for sentimental reasons.  Mine was The Dauntless Dive Bomber of World War II, published by Naval Institute Press in 1976, reprinted in 2006.  It grew out of my father’s restoration of the world’s only airworthy Douglas SBD at the time, early to mid 70s.  What an inspiration.  I was blessed to get about eight hours in the gunner’s seat, lending authenticity to the first operational history of the plane that won the Pacific War.

Dauntless Dive Bomber set the pattern for subsequent Naval Institute volumes including the Grumman F4F Wildcat and F6F Hellcat, plus the Vought F4U Corsair and F8U/F-8 Crusader.  Remarkably few authors recognized the gap in operational histories of tailhook aircraft.  All were well received, as readers liked the mixture of narrative emphasis with a leavening of technical development. 

Some books commend themselves because the subjects have been overlooked or warrant updating.  There had never been a single-volume history of Allied air operations over Japan until Whirlwind (Simon & Schuster, 2010).  The Wall Street Journal firewalled its review, sending the book to Amazon’s number 36 overall.  (Thank you, Dan Ford!)

Equally remarkably, apparently nobody had done more than photo coverage of the climax of World War II.  When the Shooting Stopped: August 1945 (Bloomsbury-Osprey, 2022) relied heavily on sources compiled in the previous four decades, as only two of the participants I cited were still living upon publication.

Clash of the Carriers (Caliber, 2005) probably was the first account of the Battle of the Philippine Sea in 21 years.  “The Marianas Turkey Shoot” of June 1944 remains a landmark in Pacific Theater operations, and I benefited from emerging scholarship plus contact with dozens of participants including a senior Japanese pilot.  

In 2012 when Simon & Schuster released Enterprise: America’s Fightingest Ship, there had been no in-depth account since Edward P. Stafford’s landmark 1962 The Big E.  I noted its influence on me at the beginning of this blog, and during my writing process, Commander Stafford agreed that the world needs a Big E book every 50 years.

Among nonfiction, Enterprise remains my sentimental favorite.  I had more emotional investment in the subject than with any other book because I knew so many of those men so well for so long.  Pacific War students will recognize the names of Dick Best, Swede Vejtasa, Robin Lindsey, Bill Martin, Jig Dog Ramage, and so many others.

Another odd gap in the literature: the 100th anniversary of the aircraft carrier.   Because British Royal Navy operations began in 1917, I anticipated a centennial volume, hoping that nobody else recognized the opportunity.  And apparently no one did: On Wave and Wing came from Regency History in 2017.

As any World War II historian will tell you, books published as recently as ten years ago could not be written today.  That’s because of attrition among the wartime generation.  My colleagues and I were fortunate to know dozens of veterans from the era—and don’t overlook the civilians—as invaluable sources.  Today, “War Two” historians increasingly  rely on oral histories and secondary sources.

Meanwhile, as the saying goes, Time marches on.  In 2014 Steve Coonts called, suggesting a book about Thanh Hoa Bridge, North Vietnam’s most notorious target.  Fortunately, I’d compiled a reference file in the 80s.  Five years later Da Capo released The Dragon’s Jaw, and none too soon.  Many contributors had waited 50 years to tell their stories, and we benefited from their eagerness.  Again, the story as we’ve told it probably could not be duplicated today.  

I have coauthored memoirs with some extraordinary aviators, starting with Major General Marion Carl, the gold standard of Marine Corps pilots.  Pushing the Envelope (1987) is a straight-forward account of Marion’s exceptional career in combat and flight test.  In the foreword I noted that he described milking cows and aerial combat in the same tone of voice.  

Marion was murdered by a teenaged career criminal in 1998.  The bastard was sentenced to death but the sentence was commuted by a judge who claimed the defendant had inadequate representation, reducing to life without parole.

Another memoir was an anthology with three retired navy captains.  World War II ace Richard “Zeke” Cormier; three-time astronaut Wally Schirra; and carrier skipper Phil Wood combined their overlapping careers in Wildcats to Tomcats.  It was published in 1995 after years of back-and-forthing though Wally wanted to call it A Tale of Three Hookers.

One of my three best friends was the late Commander John Nichols, USN.  He contributed to my F-8 Crusader book, and a few years later he proposed On Yankee Station: The Naval Air War in Vietnam (Naval Institute 1987).  Rather than a chronology, we took a thematic approach with John and others’ comments on carrier operations, strike warfare, the threats, and morale, among others.  Some Navy squadrons took it to Desert Storm as a reality check.

Subsequently we collaborated on a Mideast novel, Warriors (Bantam 1990).  It appeared just in time for Entertainment Tonight to criticize us for “war profiteering,” as if we anticipated Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait by a couple of years.

Anyway, we did profit significantly!

The SBD reappeared in Dauntless: A Novel of Midway and Guadalcanal Bantam 1992).  It’s my favorite full-length fiction, although some friends I respect as aviators and authors prefer the sequel, Hellcats: A Novel of the War in the Pacific.  Fighter pilots especially like the descriptions of aerial combat, down to such esoterica as proper leads at deflection angles.

Possibly the record for a marathon novel was Duel Over Douai, a Great War aero epic written by stages with two unindicted co-conspirators, Commanders R.R. “Boom” Powell and Jack Woodul.  We had fun inserting ourselves in the text, respectively a title Briton, a New Mexico mankiller, and a German Priceline.  It was something like 12 years en route, but the e-book result remains highly satisfying.

Among my other fiction is a trilogy proposed by military novelist Harold Coyle.  The theme is a private military contractor doing Deniable Work at home and abroad.  Pandora’s Legion, Prometheus’ Child, and Vulcan’s Fire were released in 2006-2007.  I enjoyed the varied cast of good guys-gals and some really-really bad guys, though some had mitigating circumstances.  But not everybody survived.

So there’s once-over not-so-easy.  Some of my favorites are out of print, and some publishers have failed.  But I remain grateful to all who contributed in whatever way: topic suggestions, memories, sources, proof-reading, editing, and marketing.

After all, the foregoing is part of “writing for money.”

RECALLING NEW GUINEA

 My colleague Lt. Col. Jay Stout, USMC (Ret) was a Hornet pilot in Desert Storm, and he’s become a significant historian with a dozen books spanning WW II up to the present.  His next volume, Savage Skies, Emerald Hell, details the New Guinea air campaign, scheduled for December release.

In comparing notes with Jay, I related some contacts I had over the decades.  Most are vignettes not relevant to broader coverage but I’m presenting them here so they’ll be preserved in cyberspace if nowhere else.

Charles Lindbergh: I knew some 475th Fighter Group pilots well, especially aces Joe Forster and Jack Purdy.  I met their group commander, Col. Charles MacDonald one time—very low key for the AAF’s third-ranked Pacific ace.  I didn't realize at the time that “Colonel Mac” had been at Pearl Harbor.  The pilots had tremendous respect for CAL but were none too enthused when he squeezed 10 hours out of a 38's fuel.  He's been credited with inventing the cruise-control technique he taught but IIRC he passed along info from Lockheed and Allison, which the AAF apparently neglected.  

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Ralph Wandrey was a pleasant Midwesterner, inevitably cheerful.  I included him in a short anthology for Flight Journal.  This Pacific Wrecks installment mentions the episode I referenced.

https://pacificwrecks.com/people/veterans/wandrey/index.html

Ralph was assigned as keeper of the 9th Fighter Squadron mascot, a Muscovy Duck called Huckleberry (there was a popular tune).  Transiting to a new base, Ralph flew with Major Jerry Johnson in their new P-47s with Huckleberry wrapped in a sheet on the floor.  Unexpectedly the Forty-Niners found some targets and engaged.  Ralph said when he pushed over, Huckleberry raised to eye level and—distressed under unaccustomed negative G—let loose one loud QUACK!

Ralph said, "I was useless for the next few minutes.”

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I got to know Col. Charles Sullivan when I was secretary of the American Fighter Aces Association.  (Postwar he changed to his grandfather's O'Sullivan.)  He featured in one of the classic escape and evasion stories from the Southwest Pacific Theater.  He jumped out of his 39th Squadron P-38 in '43 and was picked up by locals who treated him well.  Invited him to dine in the mens' long house, which he inferred was an honor.  Until he realized he was the main course.  Charlie shot his way clear with his .45, ran into the tall grass where he hid as the cannibals hunted for him and the widows wailed.  He said "By the time the sun rose, I had the fastest reload in the SW Pacific."  Later came across some Aussies.

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Another 39er was an ace whom I saw frequently in the 80s.  His son was well known in the warbird community and recently died with a golden rep.  I won’t reveal his father’s full name because he has living relatives, but one day the P-38 pilot confided that he had a recurring nightmare.  Three Japanese Army Ki-43s caught him at low level and all he could do was try to keep his speed up, turning into each attack as possible.  It seemed futile—he was resigned to dying.  But finally an Oscar pilot made a mistake and my friend climbed away. Considering how many aces and other vets I knew pretty well, semi surprising that more didn't report similar reactions.

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Colonel Neel Kearby pioneered the P-47 Thunderbolt in the Pacific.  One of my favorite aces and occasional pheasant hunting partner was Col. Mort Magoffin, CO of the 9th AF's 362nd FG.  He hung his Distinguished Service Cross beside his hole-in-one certificate.  He'd flown P-35s with Kearby at Selfridge Field and said nobody could beat him.  A tie was a win.  Leading the 348th Group, Kearby received a posthumous Medal of Honor.

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A 348th ace (I recall two candidates) recounted a Hollywood visit to New Guinea.  John Wayne was popular, and bonded with Kearby in the CO's tent one night until JW passed out.  He awoke face-down on a cot in the HQ area, becoming aware of daylight and a crowd.  The GIs had never seen a naked movie star before…

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Major Thomas McGuire was widely regarded as the best P-38 pilot this side of  Lockheed’s Tony Levier.  Fortunately, I interviewed Lt. Col. Joe Forster for my website.  A really good guy—low-key like so many whose tiger blood stirred when they strapped in.  He described the culture in the 475th Group, and departed the pattern in 2013.

https://btillman.com/interview-with-p-38-ace-joe-forster/

Everybody seemed to like Richard Bong, the down-home Wisconsin farm kid who remains our ace of aces.  But I wonder what he would've done in the postwar AAF.  A 24-year-old major with no leadership experience beyond flight commander.  A subject that remains unaddressed, apparently.  

Meandering:

I've oft noted that Fifth Air Force’s General George Kenney wasted (in the Vietnam sense) some fine leaders in pursuit of his goal: the top ace would be a SWP man.  The notion that Bong was "an instructor" in a combat zone was absurd: not much known but officially he was V FC's P-38 standardization officer while in fact he chose where to carve notches for the general.  I don't know about Lt. Col. Thomas Lynch (KIA with 20 victories) but apparently Kearby and McGuire were glad to comply even at the squadron and group level.  

A final note about New Guinea air ops.  In June 1942, Texas Congressman Lyndon B. Johnson had a direct commission as a lieutenant commander, touring the Pacific on a “fact finding mission.”   Actually the trip was a political stunt on behalf of FDR who intended to recall the “volunteers” in time for that fall’s election.

Johnson received a massively undeserved Silver Star for his airplane ride, but he wore the lapel pin the rest of his misbegotten life.

Here’s a detailed assessment of “The Mission” (title of Martin Caiden’s egregious 1964 book.)

https://medicinthegreentime.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/LBJ-SSM-CNN.pdf

Following publication of our Naval History expose’, my partner Henry Sakaida and I were approached by CNN, which produced a documentary in 2000.

If this month’s blog has a Message, it’s this:

No matter how small a veteran’s recollection may seem, write or record it for future reference.