Where did the biggest naval battle of the Second World War take place between the USA and Japan, from 24th to 26th October 1944?
"for most of these surface actions was almost non-existent."" Battle of Ormoc Bay The Battle of Ormoc Bay was a series of air-sea battles between Imperial Japan and the United States in the Camotes Sea in the Philippines from 11 November-21 December 1944, part of the Battle of Leyte in the Pacific campaign of World War II. The battles resulted from Japanese operations to reinforce and resupply their forces on Leyte and U.S. attempts to interdict them. After gaining naval control over the Western Pacific in mid-1944, the Allies attacked the Philippines in October, landing troops at Leyte Gulf on"
"the loss of the Philippines would result in the loss of shipping lanes to their oil supplies in South East Asia, the Japanese committed the remnants of the Imperial Japanese Navy in what would become the greatest naval battle in history, the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Between 23 and 26 October 1944, there were four separate engagements: the Battle of the Sibuyan Sea, the Battle of Surigao Strait, the Battle of Cape Engaño and the Battle off Samar, as well as other actions. In four days of fighting the Japanese lost 26 of their finest ships: three battleships, one large"
"the ""largest naval battle in history."" MacArthur's forces secured control of Leyte in December and had largely re-taken control of the Philippines by March 1945. The U.S. began launching strategic bombing raids on Japan from the Mariana Islands in November 1944, but Japan still controlled several islands surrounding the Japanese archipelago. In February 1945, the U.S. launched an invasion of the well-defended island of Iwo Jima, taking control of that island the following month. On April 1, the U.S. landed on Okinawa Island, the largest of the Ryukyu Islands. Japanese forces on Okinawa held out until June 1945; U.S. forces"
"Leyte Gulf order of battle The Battle of Leyte Gulf, generally considered to be the largest naval combat in history, was fought 24-25 October 1944 in the waters of the Philippine Islands by elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy's Combined Fleet and the United States Navy's Pacific Fleet. Of the five separate engagements that made up the battle as a whole, the forces involved in the three principal ones are listed here. <br> Since the Japanese assumed the tactical initiative in all three actions, their forces are listed first in each section. <br> ""Losses in these three actions""<br> IJN: 1"
"Americans lost one light carrier and two escort carriers, a destroyer and two destroyer escorts. The Battle of Leyte Gulf was arguably the largest naval battle in history and was the largest naval battle of World War II. On 20 October 1944 the US Sixth Army, supported by naval and air bombardment, landed on the favorable eastern shore of Leyte, north of Mindanao. The US Sixth Army continued its advance from the east, as the Japanese rushed reinforcements to the Ormoc Bay area on the western side of the island. While the Sixth Army was reinforced successfully, the US Fifth"
"and was the biggest naval battle of World War II. The campaign to re-take the Philippines was the bloodiest campaign of the Pacific War. Intelligence information gathered by the guerrillas averted a disaster—they revealed the plans of Japanese General Yamashita to trap MacArthur's army, and they led the liberating soldiers to the Japanese fortifications. MacArthur's Allied forces landed on the island of Leyte on 20 October 1944, accompanied by Osmeña, who had succeeded to the commonwealth presidency upon the death of Quezon on 1 August 1944. Landings then followed on the island of Mindoro and around Lingayen Gulf on the"
"Japanese fleet sortied to attack the invasion fleet, resulting in the four-day Battle of Leyte Gulf, one of the largest naval battles in history. The first kamikaze missions were flown during the battle, sinking and damaging several other U.S. ships; these attacks were the most effective anti-ship weapon of the war. The Battle of Okinawa became the last major battle between U.S. and Japanese ground units. Okinawa was to become a staging area for the eventual invasion of Japan since it was just south of the Japanese mainland. Marines and soldiers landed unopposed on 1 April 1945, to begin an"
"had control of Guam, Saipan and Tinian islands that provided air bases within range of B-29 bombers targeted at Japan's home islands. It was entirely an air battle, in which Americans had all the technological advantages. It was the largest naval battle in history to date, surpassed only by the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October 1944. The American 5th Fleet covering the landing comprised 15 big carriers and 956 planes, plus 28 battleships and cruisers, and 69 destroyers. Tokyo sent Vice Admiral Jisaburo Ozawa with nine-tenths of Japan's fighting fleet—it was about half the size of the American force,"
"and Japan, for the most part, could not do so adequately. US forces returned to the Philippines in a major invasion at Leyte beginning on 20 October 1944, with General MacArthur soon declaring ""I have returned"". The Imperial Japanese Navy attacked the invasion fleet on 23-26 October in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the largest naval battle of the war, but were repulsed with heavy losses. By early February 1945 much of the Manila area and part of Bataan had been secured. Corregidor was the biggest obstacle to reopening Manila Bay to shipping. A risky operation to recapture the island"
"different ports: the USS Okinawa to La Pallice and La Rochelle, France, and to Plymouth, England. Operation Steel Pike Operation Steel Pike was the largest peacetime amphibious landing exercise in history, conducted by the United States Navy and Marine Corps and taking place on the coast of Spain in October to November 1964. The operation involved 84 naval ships and 28,000 Marines of the 2nd Marine Division, and was commanded by Vice Admiral John S. McCain, Jr. and Lieutenant general James P. Berkeley. In the opening hour of the landing, two helicopters collided in mid-air, resulting in the deaths of"
"Battle of the Philippine Sea The Battle of the Philippine Sea (June 19–20, 1944) was a major naval battle of World War II that eliminated the Imperial Japanese Navy's ability to conduct large-scale carrier actions. It took place during the United States' amphibious invasion of the Mariana Islands during the Pacific War. The battle was the last of five major ""carrier-versus-carrier"" engagements between American and Japanese naval forces, and pitted elements of the United States Navy's Fifth Fleet against ships and aircraft of the Imperial Japanese Navy's Mobile Fleet and nearby island garrisons. This was the largest carrier-to-carrier battle in"
"and the surviving Japanese infrastructure of the Aslito and Marpi Point airfields. Battle of Saipan The Battle of Saipan was a battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II, fought on the island of Saipan in the Mariana Islands from 15 June to 9 July 1944. The Allied invasion fleet embarking the expeditionary forces left Pearl Harbor on 5 June 1944, the day before Operation Overlord in Europe was launched. The U.S. 2nd Marine Division, 4th Marine Division, and the Army's 27th Infantry Division, commanded by Lieutenant General Holland Smith, defeated the 43rd Infantry Division of the Imperial Japanese"
"Pacific, with the Battle of the Philippine Sea, where Japan suffered major losses and definitively lost the ability to rely on aircraft carriers. In later October, a combined attack of American and Australian forces took on the Imperial Japanese Navy during the Battle of Leyte Gulf in what was to be the largest naval battle of World War II and possibly the largest naval battle of all time. The Allied victory achieved its stated goal of further severing oil supplied to the Japanese army, which was already struggling to fuel the remainder of its naval power. The battle of Leyte"
"in Leyte. No less than fifty warships were sunk by the raiding American bomber planes. After the attack, not a single Japanese ship was seen afloat. The following month, on October 24–25, the famous Battle of Surigao Strait, the final line battle in naval history, was fiercely fought by allied forces against the Japanese fleet. By April 12, 1945, the whole province of Surigao was liberated from Japanese occupation. One American family who had lived in and near Surigao before the war returned after the Japanese left the area in 1945. Virginia Holmes, a child in 1945, many years later"
"On October 20, 1944, United States troops invaded the island of Leyte as part of a strategy aimed at isolating Japan from the countries it had occupied in South East Asia, and in particular depriving its forces and industry of vital oil supplies. The Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) mobilized nearly all of its remaining major naval vessels in an attempt to defeat the Allied invasion. In the ensuing Battle of Leyte Gulf the Japanese intended to use ships commanded by Vice-Admiral Jisaburō Ozawa, ""Northern Force"", to lure the main American covering forces away from Leyte, thus allowing the main IJN"
"Battle of Okinawa The (), codenamed Operation Iceberg, was a major battle of the Pacific War fought on the island of Okinawa by United States Marine and Army forces against the Imperial Japanese Army. The initial invasion of Okinawa on April 1, 1945, was the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific Theater of World War II. The 82-day battle lasted from April 1 until June 22, 1945. After a long campaign of island hopping, the Allies were planning to use Kadena Air Base on the large island of Okinawa as a base for Operation Downfall, the planned invasion of the"
"was fought between the United States and the Japanese Empire, in February and March 1945 during the Pacific Campaign of World War II. Ground fighting on the island took place over approximately 35 days; lasting from the landings of February 19 to a final Japanese charge the morning of March 26, 1945. The U.S. invasion, known as Operation Detachment, was charged with the mission of capturing the island's airfields. The Japanese positions on the island were heavily fortified, with vast bunkers, hidden artillery, and 18 kilometers (11 mi) of tunnels. On February 19, Sergeant Cole led his machine gun section"
"pilots who crashed their planes into enemy ships. Life in Japan became increasingly difficult for civilians due to stringent rationing of food, electrical outages, and a brutal crackdown on dissent. In 1944 the US Army captured the island of Saipan, which allowed the United States to begin widespread bombing raids on the Japanese mainland. These destroyed over half of the total area of Japan's major cities. The Battle of Okinawa, fought between April and June 1945, was the largest naval operation of the war and left 77,166 Japanese soldiers and more than 140,000 Okinawans dead, suggesting that the planned invasion"
"Battle of Mindoro The Battle of Mindoro (Filipino: ""Labanan sa Mindoro"") was a battle in World War II between forces of the United States and Japan, in Mindoro Island in the central Philippines, from 13–16 December 1944, during the Philippines Campaign. Troops of the United States Army, supported by the United States Navy and U.S. Army Air Forces (USAAF), made an amphibious landing on Mindoro and defeated Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) forces there. There was no significant opposition from the Imperial Japanese Navy, nor from the Japanese Army and Navy Air Forces, except for ""kamikaze"" (suicide) attacks on American ships."
"the largest naval engagement in history. On 24 October, ""Haruna"" was lightly damaged by fragments from near misses by American carrier aircraft in the Battle of the Sibuyan Sea. On 25 October, during the Battle off Samar, ""Haruna""—as part of Admiral Kurita's Centre Force—engaged escort carriers and destroyers of the U.S. 7th Fleet's ""Taffy 3"". Her shells straddled (but did not hit) two American escort carriers, before she dodged torpedoes launched by American destroyers. After a fierce defensive action by the American ships, Admiral Kurita elected to withdraw, ending the battle. Following the Japanese Navy's defeat at Leyte Gulf, ""Haruna"""
"Battle of Peleliu The Battle of Peleliu, codenamed Operation Stalemate II by the United States military, was fought between the U.S. and Japan during the Mariana and Palau Campaign of World War II, from September to November 1944, on the island of Peleliu. U.S. Marines of the 1st Marine Division, and later soldiers of the U.S. Army's 81st Infantry Division, fought to capture an airstrip on the small coral island. This battle was part of a larger offensive campaign known as Operation Forager, which ran from June to November 1944, in the Pacific Theater. Major General William Rupertus, Commander of"
"Battle of Guam (1944) The Second Battle of Guam (21 July – 10 August 1944) was the American recapture of the Japanese-held island of Guam, a U.S. territory in the Mariana Islands captured by the Japanese from the U.S. in the 1941 First Battle of Guam during the Pacific campaign of World War II. Guam, at 212 square miles (543 square kilometers), is the largest island of the Marianas, with a length of 32 miles (52 km) and a width ranging from 12 miles (19.31 km) to four miles (6.44 km) at different points of the island. It had been"
"chose to fight on to the end, leaving only 1,000 of the original 21,000 defenders alive. The Marines suffered as well, suffering 25,000 casualties. The battle became iconic in America as the epitome of heroism in desperate hand-to-hand combat. Okinawa became the last major battle of the Pacific Theater and the Second World War. The island was to become a staging area for the eventual invasion of Japan since it was just 350 miles (550 km) south of the Japanese mainland. Marines and soldiers landed unopposed on 1 April 1945, to begin an 82-day campaign which became the largest land-sea-air"
"Battle of Saipan The Battle of Saipan was a battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II, fought on the island of Saipan in the Mariana Islands from 15 June to 9 July 1944. The Allied invasion fleet embarking the expeditionary forces left Pearl Harbor on 5 June 1944, the day before Operation Overlord in Europe was launched. The U.S. 2nd Marine Division, 4th Marine Division, and the Army's 27th Infantry Division, commanded by Lieutenant General Holland Smith, defeated the 43rd Infantry Division of the Imperial Japanese Army, commanded by Lieutenant General Yoshitsugu Saito. The loss of Saipan, with"
"Battle of Iwo Jima The Battle of Iwo Jima (19 February – 26 March 1945) was a major battle in which the United States Marine Corps landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) during World War II. The American invasion, designated Operation Detachment, had the goal of capturing the entire island, including the three Japanese-controlled airfields (including the South Field and the Central Field), to provide a staging area for attacks on the Japanese main islands. This five-week battle comprised some of the fiercest and bloodiest fighting of the Pacific War"
"west and south and ensure that his carriers could provide better protection for the invasion convoy. Gotō and Kajioka were unable to position and coordinate their ships in time to attempt a night attack on the Allied warships. Both sides expected to find each other early the next day, and spent the night preparing their strike aircraft for the anticipated battle as their exhausted aircrews attempted to get a few hours' sleep. In 1972, U.S. Vice Admiral H. S. Duckworth, after reading Japanese records of the battle, commented, ""Without a doubt, May 7, 1942, vicinity of Coral Sea, was the"
"Battle of Kula Gulf The naval Battle of Kula Gulf (Japanese: クラ湾夜戦) took place in the early hours of 6 July 1943 during World War II and was between United States and Japanese ships off the coast of Kolombangara in the Solomon Islands. On 5 July, United States Navy Task Group 36.1 (TG 36.1)—commanded by Rear Admiral Walden L. Ainsworth and consisting of the light cruisers , , and , plus four destroyers, had received word of another ""Tokyo Express"" mission down ""the Slot"" in the Solomon Islands, and the task group proceeded northwest past New Georgia Island. The Allies"
"Action of 23 April 1945 The Action of 23 April 1945 was a submarine engagement of World War II that occurred in the Java Sea between Nazi Germany and the United States. It resulted in the last sinking of a German U-boat in Asian waters during the Pacific War and was one of only a few actions of the theater involving German forces. , under the command of Lieutenant Commander Herman Edward Miller, made radar contact with at about 01:00 off the southern coast of Borneo while patrolling the area. Underwater, the Americans fired a spread of torpedoes and one"
"suffered in the Marianas and started training for its toughest battle of World War II - Iwo Jima. In late January 1945, the 24th Marines embarked and sailed for the Japanese stronghold, landing on 19 February, with other 4th Marine Division units. From the very beginning of the operation the 24th Marines remained locked in battle, often in hand-to-hand combat. The last enemy pocket of resistance was finally crushed on 16 March. The regiment was relieved two days later and immediately boarded naval vessels and returned to Hawaii. The regiment suffered 652 killed and 1053 wounded. On 21 February 1945,"
"Philippines will continue to be called the Philippine Sea. A historic war between the naval fleets of the United States and Japan took place in the vicinity of the Philippine Sea. This was called The Battle of the Philippine Sea, and occurred near the Mariana Islands from June 19–20 of 1944. It was also the largest carrier-to-carrier battle in history which featured the United States Fifth Fleet and the 1st Mobile Fleet of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Aside from the navy, aerial activity was also present in the Battle of the Philippine Sea, as hundreds of aircraft from both countries"
"Battle of Guam (1941) The First Battle of Guam was an engagement during the Pacific War in World War II, and took place from 8 December to 10 December 1941 on Guam in the Mariana Islands between Japan and the United States. The American garrison was defeated by Japanese forces on 10 December, which resulted in an occupation until the Second Battle of Guam in 1944. Guam is the southernmost part of the Mariana Islands in the Pacific Ocean. It is the largest of the islands, with an area of 225 square miles. Guam's interior is rugged, with heavy tropical"
"Mindoro airfields were also used by long-range bombers, especially USAAF B-24 Liberators, to attack Japanese shipping from Formosa to Luzon. These bombers also operated over the South China Sea, and combined with the Navy to blockade shipping between Japan and south-east Asia. Battle of Mindoro The Battle of Mindoro (Filipino: ""Labanan sa Mindoro"") was a battle in World War II between forces of the United States and Japan, in Mindoro Island in the central Philippines, from 13–16 December 1944, during the Philippines Campaign. Troops of the United States Army, supported by the United States Navy and U.S. Army Air Forces"
"battle line, badly damaged. The Japanese flagship, the heavy cruiser ""Nachi"", collided with another ship in the melee and found her own speed reduced to 18 knots (33 km/hr). This second echelon of Japanese ships, correctly surmising that the first had fallen upon some hard times, then fled, hotly pursued by American planes which administered the ""coup de grace"" to sink the already crippled ""Abukuma"" and the destroyer ""Shiranuhi"" on 26 October 1944. MTBron 12's actions and the Battle of Surigao Strait itself were part of the larger Battle of Leyte Gulf of 23 October to 26 October 1944, a"