Storm Over Leyte

by John Prados

  Admiral Lockwood ordered the subs into a line to search out the Japanese. Commander John P. “Beetle” Roach led three boats, Haddock, Tuna, and Halibut. It was Commander Ignatius J. (“Pete”) Galantin’s Halibut that made first contact. Galantin had had a ringside seat as warplanes assailed Ozawa’s battleships and the cruiser Oyodo. At 5:42 p.m., the Halibut saw what it thought were the pagoda masts of a battleship coming his way and decided it was the Ise. Galantin maneuvered for an hour to set up a shot, and eventually emptied six torpedo tubes at the target, with the crew hearing five explosions. The Ise actually saw two torpedoes in the water at one point, and several more another time, but none hit her. Clay Blair, redoubtable chronicler of the U.S. submarine war, believes the victim was really destroyer Akitsuki, but, as related here, the Akitsuki had been sunk by aircraft much earlier in the day.

  Before midnight (local time) at Pearl Harbor, Admiral Nimitz had received word, not only of the attack on the Ise, but of Halibut plus Roach’s Haddock trailing Japanese battleships, and of a boat from the other wolfpack, Jallao, sinking a Japanese light cruiser. That would be the damaged Tama, struggling on her own to reach home. Lieutenant Commander Joseph Icenhower, on his very first patrol as a sub skipper, rode on the surface when his Jallao picked up the contact on radar. Captain Yamamoto Iwata’s Tama struggled at reduced speed, but she was nearly fourteen miles away. Icenhower gave chase, as did Commander Bernard A. “Chick” Clarey in the Pintado. The Jallao got there first and loosed seven torpedoes, and the Tama disappeared beneath the waves. Clarey was close enough to confirm the cruiser had sunk. The news must have set Nimitz at ease about agreeing that subs could operate here.

  There were another half dozen boats in the Luzon Strait, and a gauntlet of a dozen between the Ozawa fleet and home. A muddled contact report from the Halibut put the Trigger in a poor position to catch Admiral Matsuda’s battleships the next morning. Commander Vernon L. “Rebel” Lowrance in the Sea Dog got another shot at Matsuda on October 28, after the Japanese battleships refueled from the Takane Maru, but the hermaphrodites providentially zagged away from the torpedoes in the water. They were steaming too fast for Rebel to chase. His report, picked up by Butch Robbins in Sterlet, led to one more attempt northeast of Okinawa, but it was again frustrated by Matsuda’s speed. Remnants of the Ozawa fleet were near home now. They reached Empire waters safely. Matsuda entered Kure on October 29.

  Finally the play came full circle to Ozawa’s replenishment group. Takane Maru had boiler troubles, restricting her to a very low speed, so she was ordered to Kure for repairs. Code breakers at FRUPAC, benefiting from reading the Japanese transport (“Maru”) code for so long, kept up a stream of updates on the oilers. They reported the demise of Jinei Maru, the boiler problems of her consort, movements of a couple of her escorts on October 26, and Combined Fleet orders to the oiler the next day. Takane Maru’s boiler problems cut her speed to well within the cruising capabilities of the U.S. submarines. Commander Frederick J. Harlfinger in the Trigger picked up Takane Maru and attacked her on October 30. The oiler saw one of Trigger’s torpedoes break the surface, so she turned away, whereupon escorts counterattacked and forced the Trigger to dive deep.

  But Harlfinger’s contact report enabled the Salmon to renew the attack. Two torpedoes struck the Takane Maru. Again, the escorts counterattacked, damaging Lieutenant Commander Harley K. Nauman’s boat, forcing her to surface and fight with guns. At one point Nauman and a Japanese coast defense ship passed each other no more than fifty yards apart, firing everything down to machine guns. While all this distracted the escorts, Butch Robbins crept up again. At one in the morning, his Sterlet put four torpedoes into the hapless Takane Maru and sent her to Davy Jones.

  • • •

  THE IMPERIAL NAVY had its own submarines, and they too had their role to play in the Sho plan. The Japanese undersea service had been in flux for months, since its Sixth Fleet headquarters had been caught on Saipan, wiping out the sub fleet commander and his entire staff. Vice Admiral Miwa Shigeyoshi subsequently moved over from the bureau handling sub construction to reconstitute the fleet headquarters.

  Miwa had been flotilla leader for some of the I-boats surrounding Pearl Harbor when the war began but had not had a billet at sea since he fell ill in 1942. A great deal had changed since then. At his shipbuilding post, Admiral Miwa had actually witnessed some of that, because virtual attrition had especially affected the Imperial Navy’s submarine force. Allied dominance in the air and, increasingly, on the surface had forced the Sixth Fleet to repurpose submarines as undersea transports, not weapons. Miwa’s shipbuilders actually converted some boats and designed a new class of subs without torpedo tubes so they could carry more supplies to bypassed island garrisons. In their desperate search for new weapons, the Japanese were also creating a manned torpedo they called the kaiten, and more subs were taken out of service to be prepared as mother ships for them.

  There were service problems too. During the July 1944 command conference, Admiral Miwa found out that most of the boats (nine of fourteen) lost during the Marianas campaign had been pulled out of the Indian Ocean, where crews knew nothing of the latest American antisubmarine warfare tactics. Many of the others were crewed by sailors fresh from submarine school. The high loss rate sharpened the need for new crews, exacerbating the newbie problem. Admiral Miwa’s fleet contained fifty-five submarines, but fifteen of them were engaged in training. That was virtual attrition too.

  Basic directives for the Sixth Fleet for Sho had been issued on August 20, 1944. Combined Fleet Operations Order No. 87 set target priorities and designated half a dozen preplanned deployment zones, giving Admiral Miwa wide discretion to dictate final deployments. Increasing the confusion regarding Sho objectives, the submarine priorities were to sink aircraft carriers, battleships, and troop convoys—the opposite of other directives. However, Order No. 87 also emphasized flexibility and provided that the subs had to be ready to attack in strength in conjunction with penetration operations, and that Allied moves might require the submarine fleet to act in strength in unanticipated directions.

  That very thing happened when Halsey’s Third Fleet started the Taiwan air battle. Combined Fleet instructed Admiral Miwa to deploy off Taiwan immediately. Suddenly the effects of virtual attrition became very apparent. The strength of the Sixth Fleet did not even amount to the forty submarines on Miwa’s active list. Seven boats were working up after construction or refits. Four subs were converting to kaiten carriers. An equal number were in the Indian Ocean. Another seven boats were in service as transports. Four submarines were overdue from their war patrols or transport missions. Commander Kudo Kaneo’s I-12 had been sent on a harassment mission to the waters between the U.S. West Coast and Hawaii. The Sixth Fleet’s list of fifty-five submarines suddenly shrank to barely more than a dozen, fourteen to be exact. Of those, three boats, which had been operating off Morotai or Ulithi, were still on their way back and could be used only after upkeep in harbor.

  Admiral Miwa organized his force into several groups. The I-26 and I-45 left on October 12, and the I-54 and I-56 on the fifteenth. They headed for Taiwanese waters, essentially the Luzon Strait. Miwa wanted them to deploy in a search line from east to west and work their way south along the Philippine littoral. Eight more submarines left port by October 21. By then, the Sho surface and air operations were in full swing. Lieutenant Masuzawa Seiji’s RO-109 sailed from Kure on October 23. Masuzawa had joined the ship just over a week earlier. That same day Lieutenant Uesugi Kazuo assumed command of the RO-112, which he took to sea on October 23. Thus, on top of their other disadvantages, the Japanese had some crews and captains who hardly knew each other.

  In the I-26, Lieutenant Commander Nishiuchi Shoichi was an experienced skipper who had sailed the Indian Ocean, in addition to Australian and Solomons waters. Sixth Fleet ordered him to a position southeast of Leyte on October 20, later moving him to east of the gulf. Allied Ultra on October
24 reported positions of three Japanese submarines established by direction finding, including one east of Leyte. The next day, still east of Leyte, Nishiuchi reported seeing four U.S. carriers. These were the small escort carriers of Task Unit 77.4.1, familiarly called a “taffy.” A sub, presumably I-26, made a torpedo attack against the escort carrier Petrof Bay. The jeep carrier evaded the torpedoes with luck—one passed along each side of her hull. One of Taffy 1’s escorts destroyed the attacking submarine. The I-26 was never heard from again.

  The mystery of what happened to the I-26 set the tone for the Japanese submarine experience at Leyte. Lieutenant Commander Nakayama Denshichi of the I-54 disappeared after a message on October 23. On the twenty-eighth, actually, a Japanese submarine tried to get inside the screen of Task Group 38.4. She was discovered only 600 yards away by the destroyer Helm. That warship and the Gridley cooperated to destroy the sub, identified after the war as the I-54. Morinaga Masahiko, among the top sub aces in the Imperial Navy, skippered the I-56 and became one of the only ones who succeeded in bringing his boat back. Commander Morinaga fired at an Allied convoy on October 24 and at the escort carrier Santee the next day. Destroyer counterattacks forced him into an extraordinarily deep dive, and when the sub surfaced again, an unexploded hedgehog depth charge was discovered caught on her deck.

  Despite their misfortunes, Japanese submarines had a bit of an impact—but paid a considerable price for it. During the pursuit of the Ozawa fleet in the Luzon Strait, one of the American subs trailing the Japanese surface ships turned away and lost her position after sighting an enemy periscope. Off Samar Island, where the American jeep carriers would fight to the death with the Kurita fleet, sailors reported that a submarine appeared right inside their formation during the evening after the big battle. The destroyer escort Eversole fell victim to an I-boat, while the light cruiser Reno and an LST would be damaged.

  Sixth Fleet had one more arrow in its quiver: a direct attack with the kaiten suicide torpedoes. The kaiten was a Long Lance torpedo modified to be driven by a human pilot—and indeed the early trainees were all student aircraft pilots who were unmarried and volunteered for the suicide torpedoes. A class of 200 pilots began training in August 1944. Admiral Miwa held a formal ceremony to honor the Kikusui unit, as the mission force was called, led by Sublieutenant Nishina Sekio, a coinventor of the suicide torpedo. Captain Ageta Kiyoi of Submarine Division 15 led the mission. The pilots were presented ceremonial swords, a dinner was given in their honor, and religious services were held for them on November 8. Admiral Toyoda attended the dinner and send-off. After that the mission began, with submarines I-36 and I-47 going to the U.S. anchorage at Ulithi, and the I-37 to nearby Palau. Each boat carried four kaiten.

  No attack took place at Kossol Roads (Palau). Allied code breakers identified the I-37 and passed warnings down the chain of command, resulting in her destruction on November 19. The Ulithi attack took place the next morning. Commander Orita Zenji in the I-47 launched four kaiten, which succeeded in entering the atoll. Captain Ageta had sailed in Lieutenant Commander Teramoto Iwao’s I-36, and that boat had trouble with her kaiten. Two would not separate from the sub, while a third was found to have extensive leaks. A total of five human torpedoes made the actual attack. One, believed to have been piloted by Lieutenant Nishina, blew up the tanker Mississinewa. Allied cruisers and destroyers, with fire and depth charges and by ramming, seem to have destroyed all of the other kaiten.

  Not by aircraft or by submarine did the Imperial Navy defeat MacArthur’s return. Admiral Ozawa had done his part to pull Bill Halsey offsides, and the unfortunate admirals Nishimura and Shima had kept Bill Kinkaid busy until the crack of dawn. All that considerable sacrifice had had the purpose of setting up the power play, the attack of the Kurita fleet.

  With the dawn, that Japanese armada sped down the east coast of Samar, shifting formation as it bore down to attack Leyte Gulf. All of the Sho operation had come down to one cosmic roll of the dice.

  CHAPTER 10

  “CLOSE AND ATTACK ENEMY CARRIERS!”

  Kurita Takeo graduated from the naval academy one class behind Ozawa Jisaburo. Smart, Kurita ranked twenty-eighth in his class—though he did not place as well as Mikawa Gunichi, who was third. Nevertheless, Kurita got his wish; his first service training would be the basic course at the Yokosuka Torpedo School, and his early seagoing tours were with cruisers and big ships.

  It was a long way for a boy from Mito. Born a little after the cherries blossomed in the spring of 1889, Takeo had been inculcated with a philosophy of jen, an amalgam of civility, charity, and kindness—a contrast with his name, which means “warrior.” Kurita would be the kind warrior, though the lightning thrusts of his sword led enemies to think of him more like Hotspur.

  Like Nishimura Shoji, Kurita spent most of his career at sea. His longest shoreside posts would be at the Torpedo School, where Takeo served as an instructor several times, including as chief instructor from 1935 to 1937. He also spent a few months doing the short course at the Naval War College. Marked for leadership, he was still a lowly lieutenant when he took command of destroyer Shigure in 1920. After that, Kurita never again served on a staff, in the Navy Ministry, or anywhere else except directing a ship or unit (and instructing in torpedoes, or helping design them). He first led a destroyer division in 1930, commanded the light cruiser Abukuma in 1935, and skippered battleship Kongo in 1937. Kurita achieved promotion to rear admiral in 1938. His destroyer flotillas fought in the China Incident and kept the seas clear during Japan’s 1939 troubles with Russia.

  His sailors loved Kurita. Approachable and considerate within a naval service known for hard discipline, Kurita always seemed distinctive. Petty Officer Koitabashi Kosaku, an Atago survivor pressed into service as a lookout aboard the Yamato, recalled that “I never heard a negative word about Admiral Kurita . . . He was a great man.” Destroyerman Commander Terauchi Masamichi, who skippered the Ukikaze, also thought Kurita a bit of a cosmopolitan. His wardroom served Western-style food at lunch, Japanese fare at dinnertime.

  In the lead-up to Leyte Gulf, Kurita knew the flak defenses of his warships had been strengthened, and the vessels themselves had been well trained—by him. The admiral’s remarks to his senior commanders at Brunei indicated a certain fatalism, but also a modicum of hope.

  Hope? Why should a Japanese admiral expect a miracle this late in the war, with the Allied intelligence advantage, their technological prowess, and their great preponderance of power? It can only be that Kurita expected to make a miracle happen. Of course, the Combined Fleet would help him—the sacrifices of other fleet elements were all aimed at getting Kurita’s gunnery ships into contact with the enemy—but ultimately everything stopped at the fleet commander’s door. From this the most reasonable inference is that Kurita had a plan to get at the enemy. All of which takes us back to the Battle of the Sibuyan Sea. Chief of staff Koyanagi Tomiji pointed out that until Yamamoto at Pearl Harbor, a “gambling philosophy” had never before existed in the Imperial Navy. Gambling then had been justified in terms of disrupting long-established U.S. war plans. Now, three years later, gambling, for Kurita, had the purpose of Japan neutralizing Allied advantages by means of doing the unexpected. The bid to take losses became part of the gamble, one officially sanctioned by Combined Fleet. As for tactics, not only Ozawa Jisaburo studied the Germans at Jutland. Kurita had also been interested in the German use of battle turnaways at Jutland and had discussed the subject with his chief of staff.

  That said, it had been a shock at the Sibuyan Sea to witness the destruction of the “unsinkable” battleship Musashi. The damage to heavy cruiser Myoko, also distressing, fit more within Kurita’s expectations. By this stage the leader of the Kurita fleet can fairly be regarded as rattled if not gun-shy. The fleet had lost one of its five battleships and had damage to others, 40 percent of heavy cruisers were damaged or lost too, and almost 30 percent of Kurita’s destroyers had had to be
detached to cover crippled warships or carry survivors to safety. In particular the loss of flagship Atago hurt. Kurita and Koyanagi in postwar interrogations, and Shima in an interview, all drew attention to the fact that the Second Fleet lost roughly half its expert radiomen in the Atago sinking, while the physical fact that Admiral Kurita had to change ships, twice, to end up on the Yamato had to have had an effect. Plus, for all her splendid attributes, the Yamato had not been prepared as a fleet flagship and so lacked the necessary communications equipment.

  Though the preliminaries had rattled Admiral Kurita, he nevertheless persevered in his determination to perform a miracle, even with the difficulties he was faced with. And the fleet commander sailed with a resentful subordinate in a flagship not fully suited to her sudden role. Plus, at the moment Kurita made his battle turnaway in the Sibuyan Sea, he had failed to inform Nishimura. That mistake could not be rectified. Kurita’s general schedule message sent in the evening did not induce Nishimura to slow his own progress. This would afford Kinkaid additional time to respond. No one knew how this would play out.

  Japan’s entire battle hopes now lay on the shoulders of just one man. Beneath his stolid countenance, Kurita exhibited many qualities of the best leaders. His reputation in the Imperial Navy was for coolheadedness. But Vice Admiral Kurita offered more than that. Sharp, aggressive, and thoroughly professional, Kurita kept up with technical trends and calculated probabilities to a nicety. So his understanding of the possibilities was coupled with determination to carry out the mission. In command of the Second Fleet, Japan’s most powerful force at this stage of the war, Vice Admiral Kurita had trained his crews to a fine edge, prepared his warships for battle, and studied the Sho plans long and hard. He had made some mistakes and the Allies had advantages, but if the mission could be carried out, Kurita Takeo was one of the best men to do it.