The Battle of Samar - Odds? What are those?

A strong morning breeze bristles the hair of the flight deck crew aboard the low-altitude USS. The small escort carrier expects a quiet day with small anti-submarine patrols and the occasional air strike in support of the long-running amphibious assault to the west. Far to the north, the Third Fleet is attacking a Japanese carrier strike group and has taken all the cruisers, destroyers,

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ships, and carriers that Admiral Halsey can muster with them if the flight deck crew expected to see anything at all. fleet apart from one of their own small escort group, then presumably they would be the returning units of the Third Fleet once they had destroyed another Japanese fleet, then a report came over the radio from one of Sint Lowe's pilots who was reporting that He had seen ships and they weren't American yet.

They were close, the incredulous Admiral Sprog demanded confirmation and, getting closer, the pilot replied by radio that he was not wrong either, that the meatball flag was flying from the enormous

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ship Yamato, its more than 70,000 tons sailing at high speed directly towards them and her No. only the U.S. Commanders received the news in a moment of stunned silence, then all hell broke loose in the distance and aircraft fire was seen as anti-submarine patrol planes carried out optimistic and reckless and brave assaults for aircraft in total armed with depth charges attacked over a dozen enemy fleet units and then the seas around Taffy 3's escort carriers began to erupt in huge jets of water as huge battleship quality shells began to land around them.

The Battle of Samar had truly begun. The Battle of Samar was one of four. The various battles fought in the Philippine area in late October 1943 are grouped together because they were all fought as part of a single Japanese operation Shogo, one that occurred in response to the US hostilities invasion of the Philippines and anticipated a three-pronged offensive with a decoy force in the north to draw away most of the defending American forces and then two attacking forces, one in the center and one in the south, to capture the American landing craft and the rest of the invasion fleet in a pincer movement and destroy them Due to the large scale of the operation and the distance between various forces, there was no overall commander for the Japanese efforts on the American side, the command was almost equally disorganized, direct naval support The landings were provided by Admiral Kincaid's Seventh Fleet, which reported to General MacArthur as Commanding General, but the Third Fleet containing most of the modern American ships and all aircraft carriers concentrated primarily in Task Group 38 was under the command of Admiral Halsey and reported to Admiral Nimitz this division in command. would prove almost fatal, Japan's southern force consisted of the older and slower battleships Fuso and Yamashiro, and let's just say that particular part of the expedition didn't end very well for the Imperial Japanese Navy, but even before that things They hadn't exactly started well.

For the attacking Japanese, the central force, by far the most powerful of all the Japanese fleets involved, was a truly impressive sight, as five battleships, including Yamato and Musashi, sailed from port, accompanied by the normally impressive but in this circumstance overshadowed Nagato along with the converted. The battlecruisers Congo and Haruna, no less than 10 heavy cruisers, two light cruisers and 15 destroyers would accompany them, but unfortunately for this impressive collection of Gato-class surface warships and submarines, data from the USS and USS dace noted The generally terrible nature of Japanese anti-submarine warfare against the South, even at this point in the war, the two submarines managed to sink the cruisers Otago and Maya and crippled the Tucao, which was forced to retreat taking a pair of destroyers with her as escort, losing almost 1/3. of heavy cruisers, including Admiral Caritas' flagship Otago, was not a particularly auspicious start to the operation, especially as the Admiral himself had to be lifted from the water by a destroyer.

Data also managed to report the sighting before becoming stranded trying to chase it. two cows, although the third fleet carrier groups were actually quite out of position at this point, the carriers that were in a position to take off did so, the resulting attack severely damaged the cruiser Myoko, which was also forced to withdraw and the plane also hit the three largest Japanese battleships, the American attack plane would concentrate on Musashi sending bombs and torpedoes at it like it was going out of style, after seventeen bombs and nineteen torpedoes, at least some of which were probably unnecessary , the powerful battleship slipped beneath the waves and the rest of the central force turned to get out of aircraft range for the rest of the day.

Halsey assumed this meant they were pulling out altogether. That assumption would almost cost the Americans their invasion force, but in the event that Halsey was prepared to detach four battleships, including Washington and Alabama along with supporting escorts to cover the San Bernardino Strait, but due to unclear communications, everyone who talked about this assumed that he had actually formed the force and therefore no one did anything like perhaps move the six old battleships of the 7th Fleet north or armed aircraft from the escort carrier groups with their limited supply of armor-piercing bombs and torpedoes instead convinced that they sent a force was defeated when he received reports that the northern force and its aircraft carriers had been located.

Halsey quickly took off without her entire fleet having separated the Surface Warfare ships like everyone else thought she had done and so she headed north all the modern battleships and aircraft carriers in the area, even the Pickett destroyers had disappeared. . Reconnaissance planes, in fact, now detected that the central force was turning toward the Americans. landings, but Halsey or her staff seemed to have done their best to ignore or reject each of those reports, possibly because they were determined for a final victory over

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remained of Japan's carrier force. During the night the southern force would attempt to transit Sir Gale directly and since The 7th Fleet had not moved, they ran into it and would quickly be sunk, although in the narrow, confined waters the 7th battleships were probably some

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superfluous, Since the destroyers and cruisers did considerable damage with their own guns and torpedoes, it was still a good light show and a satisfying amount of revenge for the old battleships that had survived or been salvaged from Pearl Harbor in anticipation of the potential to attack the survivors as the escort carrier formations of Taffy's One, Two, and Three had been following the battle as best they could fire. radio intercepts the core formation of the three was ordered to load some of their aircraft for anti-maritime attacks, the southern force and the northern force, Taffy being three, were to maintain their usual mix of anti-submarine and support loads in land, in a useful way for students.

From the story, the commander of Taffy 3 and the commanding general of the three Taffy groups were separate individuals, but they were both named Rear Admiral Sprog, which makes things very difficult to follow when you are trying to gather various sources and comments, but As a result, the Third Fleet departed after the northern Japanese force, a decoy group with barely enough aircraft to appear a threat. The central force would proceed completely unopposed through San Bernardino direct to the air, search patrols one at night and another. At dawn they failed to detect them and so they sailed south as dawn broke to encounter the bewildered force of Taffy Three.

All that stood between the largest battleship human artifice had ever constructed and its numerous escort ships were a handful of slow escort carriers and an even smaller group of destroyers and destroyers. The Yamato escorts alone displaced a little more than each ship in Taffy three combined and that was before the other three surviving battleships, six heavy and two light cruisers and about a dozen destroyers became involved, the fighting a lot. closest ended in a one-sided massacre and so the outcome seemed somewhat inevitable with reports of Japanese forces closing in on them, confirming that Rear Admiral Sprog orders his ships to head east towards a series of schools of rain in hopes of hiding, which will hopefully delay the closure of the Japanese range and also get them away from the area.

Much more vulnerable landing craft, wildcat fighters, and Avenger torpedo boats begin to take off loaded with whatever they were equipped with at the time. Rockets, depth charges and machine gun ammunition, the general case being not to have much faith in their wielder's ability to actually. They survive the morning. Aircraft are directly ordered to land on land runways to rearm once their initial operations are completed. Admiral Sprog Yamato opens fire, followed shortly after by the other ships of the fleet. Shell splashes are of many colors, with no fire control radar in the fleet, except for a very basic unit on Yamato itself, the other large ships use shells with dye packets to let them know which splashes were theirs, for Therefore, a rainbow of pink, red, purple, blue, green and yellow fonts fall around the conflicting task.

The force marked by the Yamato's huge white splashes are 18-inch projectiles. Admiral Carita has no call letters for escort carriers and therefore assumes that distant targets are fleet carriers proportionally to scale, their escorts must be battleships or cruisers, so Japanese forces continue to charge. armor-piercing shells, which will prove to be a very fortuitous mistake for their targets while it lasts, however, the general attack is ordered, which quickly causes much confusion as the fleet has just moved into a circular anti-aircraft formation. Each division is supposed to attack at its best speed, but either way it doesn't seem to change the

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much.

Yamato itself is slightly slower than usual after absorbing several thousand tons of water due to bomb hits suffered during the same attacks. that would sink Musashi, although the Japanese have engaged without hesitation, they are as surprised as the Americans to be fighting this battle, although the escort carrier groups have been under sporadic air attacks for over a week, these attacks appear to have been carried out by planes of the Japanese army which, of course, has not mentioned any of this to its counterparts, rivals, mortal enemies of the Imperial Japanese Navy, on the American side, the destroyer USS Johnston begins laying a smoke screen to cover the retreat and starts zigzagging to evade.

Incoming fire using both black smoke from her Bunnel x' and white smoke from her smoke generators to protect the escort carrier USS White Plains is the target of the Yamato and several other ships, at least if the rainbow of splash colors reported does anything to pass and within minutes something explodes under the hull near the keel, briefly cutting off electrical power and the starboard engine sources differ quite vehemently as to whether it was a rocket projectile. cruiser or one of the 18-inch shells from the yamato near failure, damage to the machinery results in a huge plume of black smoke for a time and The Japanese ships assume that the carrier has been sunk, allowing the white planes to escape any further fire in the immediate future while the Various Imperial Japanese Navy formations break out to attack the 5th Cruiser and the 10th Destruction Division pierces the 3rd Battleship Division, forcing Kongo. turning north to avoid a collision, this leaves her out of formation and alone for the rest of the battle, but Carita now decides that this high-speed pursuit of Stern will cause her destroyers to burn too much fuel and orders them to turn back. 10th destroyer division.

They receive the order just as they are moving into a perfect flanking position on the American forces for a torpedo attack with their devastating long spears, but instead of launching them, they obediently comply, giving up a chance to cause further damage. The second destruction division is ordered to fall behind the third.battleship division, but since this means finding the Congo, they surrender their position south of the main battle line while heading north to search for the errant battleship. The Johnston begins firing on the nearest Japanese ships, who respond by aiming accurate fire in front of them. an enemy whose largest turrets weigh more than the entire ship Johnston decides that running is boring and instead makes a complete 180 degree turn and charges directly towards the attacking forces, the ho L destroyer still follows the carriers and also begins to attack at maximum gun range upon taking a hit from Miyamoto's 6.1-inch secondary guns on the bridge for his trouble concentrating fire on the heavy cruiser Camano Johnston somehow still alive is rewarded by seeing explosions and flames in the midst of the Japanese cruiser's superstructure, the Destroyers' radar and the Mark 37 fire.

The control system is paying dividends. Sprog's first orders to the rest of the destroyer screen to follow his lead and soon he and the human will join their Fletcher-class compatriot in the attack, although they started a little behind the already charging Johnston. The American escort carriers arrived first in a series of rain schools and Japanese fire slows down significantly as their optical systems cannot see through the rain at this time, almost any other major Navy would have simply used its radar to continue detecting and shooting as the Duke of York had done with Scharnhorst. almost a year ago and as the battleships of the 7th Fleet had done to the Yamashiro just hours before, but since only one ship in the central force has artillery radar, the American ships gained a reprieve, meanwhile, Johnston managed to close in on five miles from his goal. and fires a full series of ten torpedoes minutes later to at least two, possibly three, rip off the bow of the ill-fated Camano Cruiser, the first blood incredibly therefore going to the Americans, the Caesarea also abandons the engagement as it approaches Camano to assist in this brazen action further helps Carita become convinced that the Johnston is actually a cruiser.

Since obviously no simple destroyer would dare risk this type of payload or achieve this type of damage in the confusion, a Johnston manages to make another turn and move away from her to open her range with her torpedoes aimed southward. Admiral Kincaid receives the first of many requests. Calling for help from the beleaguered Taffy Three, having led them to believe that at least four modern battleships of the Third Fleet should be in the area, Kincaid begins sending urgent messages to Admiral Halsey, as his own older ships cannot reach there. on time, no matter how hard they do.

If he cannot save Taffy 3, he still has to consider the ships of the landing force and orders a Perl Alden Dorf to extract to destroy the squadrons five cruisers and the battleships Tennessee California and Pennsylvania so that the operations in Syria do not conclude. gal directly and advance at best speed to the north, to hell with concerns about the level of fuel and ammunition, the American escort carriers turned south and passed to the right, they would have been the second destruction zone of the division , but as a result of orders from Caritas de a and their long spears are still north of the formation searching for Kongo, however, the Johnston's luck appears to have run out as she is hit almost simultaneously by 318-inch shells and 36-inch shells. .1 inches from Yamato, who has decided to crush the irritating ship, the smaller projectiles making a complete slaughter of the bridge and splinters.

Through anyone on deck, the larger shells pass through the port engine room, crippling the ship and cutting off power to the rear guns. Thanks to a combination of low fuel reserves and its light structure, which does not initiate the fuses of larger shells, the ship is crippled but not destroyed, although Yamato diligently records the sinking of the enemy cruiser, instead the ship heads to another rain school and repair crews begin work on the radar and electrical systems so it can once again engage the enemy with its 5-inch guns, meanwhile, how well? she fires half of her torpedoes and reverses course, but is also hit by a wide variety of shells that cause much more significant damage than she caused: Johnston leaves the second torpedo launcher as almost her only functioning system to the south.

Kincaid also orders each plane. currently in the air to divert Taffey three and four tapis one and two to launch any and all operational aircraft left on deck or in their hangars in that direction too after a couple of minutes happily firing their 5 guns inches and horribly abusing the natural cover system of the real world, Johnston Meets how I and a human coming in the opposite direction followed him at a distance by the escorted destroyer Samuel B Roberts and despite having only forty percent of the firepower and three quarters of the speed of the largest. Fletcher-class destroyers and without automatic fire control, the captain of the Roberts has chosen to follow the full-size destroyers with the words deciding that he has not had enough action for one day the captain Evans of the Johnston to order another turn of approximately 180 degrees. he engages to provide gunfire support to the newcomers, this time attacking the heavy cruiser. turns to ho L fires the remaining torpedoes at what turns out to be the Yamato, no hits are scored, but the giant battleship is forced to run north to evade the shot.

In an ironic twist, the relatively low speed of the American torpedoes compared to the long launches of the Japanese actually prolongs this evasion, as the approach speed is so low that it keeps the Japanese flagship out of combat for a considerable time. . Once done, Ho L runs through the rest of Taffy Three as shells begin to explode around him as the human attacks Kaguro with his main battery and accidentally launches seven torpedoes in the same general direction before heading to send some shells. and the last three torpedoes aboard Harouna, although the Japanese battleship manages to evade them all, meanwhile, the bay USS Kalinin, currently the rearmost ship, takes a direct hit from a battleship-grade shell that destroys part of the deck From the hangar, the Roberts is hit by a stray shell which jams the torpedo rack.

Until now it has held fire to avoid being seen, but after some quick work by the crew, the Roberts is able to once again launch its torpedoes and it chooses the heavy cruiser Chuck I as its target before accelerating at full speed into the smoke. and returning to the carriers minutes later, Choukai takes at least one hit and begins to retreat here. Minh tries to backtrack towards the carriers and ends up trading wide sides with Nagato for his trouble. The other destroyer escorts are also carrying out attacks by launching their torpedoes. and returning to the carriers with the dennis taking several shell hits in return as the escort carriers move away to the south, their only rear 5 inch guns now ready to open fire as the field closes in disappointment.

The other gunners are informed that it is also not a vain boast, the damaged Kalinin Bay is taking repeated hits from the 8-inch guns on Tone A and her Goro, but it forces one of the cruisers to temporarily turn back while it manages a couple of hits on one of the forward turrets of the cruiser leaving On the other side of the smoke, Roberts finds the heavy cruiser Chikka Ma methodically firing at the escort carriers, especially Gambia Bay, with the words Roberts compares her two 5-inch guns with the cruiser's 10 8-inch guns, as well as her secondary battery with a slower rate of fire and her divided attention ChiCom does not immediately lift the Roberts out of the water and soon finds herself under a pincer assault when a human joins in from the other side, the Roberts empties his entire supply of armor-piercing bullets. and switches to chi, runs out of chi and resorts to firing anti-aircraft shells, then runs out of anti-aircraft shells and is forced, as a last resort, to fire star shells which actually have the unexpected advantage of flying high The phosphorus shots a High temperature throughout the superstructure The beleaguered heavy cruiser is not in immediate danger of sinking, but is being severely mauled even though the CVE designation of similar aircraft carriers is widely interpreted throughout the fleet as vulnerable fuel and the discharge of rounds is dispensable.

The larger fleet carriers that the Japanese still believe to be the escort carriers mean that a large number of hits simply pass through them as the continuous hail of fire from the 5-inch guns of the following carrier begins to impact even more on some of them. the main Japanese cruisers, but at the same time the aircraft carrier USS Gambia Bay is suffering multiple hits from the Chicka MA which, after a few salvos, finally realizes the small size of its enemy, now the range is closed and switches to high explosives, the johnston emerges. her from a smoke screen to find the Haruna at close range, so of course she fires at the battleship's superstructure while she ducks into the smoke while Kongo tries to take it out using her main battery.

Three more heavy cruisers from further down the Japanese line begin to explode. away in the now disabled Gambia Bay during this period and beyond, in the rest of the battle planes of various types and equipment crisscross the skies in desperate harassment attacks with the pilots having to constantly play guess the carrier to decide where to land. as the escort carriers are hit, sunken columns disappear from shell splashes or a force to evade at angles to the wind that make it impossible to land on them through the flight decks of not only the beleaguered E3 Griffon but also the support taffy and taffy to the south deck crews. quickly begins to ignore all technical protocol and simply agrees to rearm, refuel and relaunch any incoming American aircraft with the American star painted on it, USS Manila Bay in the next group south of Taffy, three service aircraft from 11 different squadrons that are not attached to it. own flight group and at one point has representatives from no less than four other carrier air groups on his flight in December at the same time he successfully evaded the battleships Johnson responds to calls for help from the escort carriers and appears near Gambia Bay seeing the ship under attack by a heavy cruiser, he quickly fires at this ship as well because of course he does, however an eight-inch shell destroys what remains of Ho Elle's engines and the ship. is quickly overwhelmed by incoming fire, the order is given to abandon ship. minutes later, after exchanging fire with a one-ton class cruise ship and 15 minutes later, the ship capsizes and sinks.

L clearly does not share the same level of luck as Johnston Kalinin Bay is also in trouble exchanging fire with Japanese destroyers and taking hits. both them and cruisers at the same time, unlike the Gambia Bay, however, it does not seem that these ships have realized that they need to switch from armor-piercing to high explosives and, despite being plagued by shells, the ship remains afloat despite this rather uneven blow. and for another twenty or thirty minutes, a lookout signals to Captain Evans aboard the Johnston that a strong formation of seven Japanese destroyers is approaching the carrier from behind.

What do you think is happening? Of course, the Johnston turns to attack the entire flotilla and despite receiving several more attacks, Johnston's forces successfully drove away the first two ships, leading to the entire squadron diverting to avoid the only bellicose ship, the It will take almost three-quarters of an hour for Japanese destroyers to prevent a Johnston free kick. position and, as a result, all of her torpedoes will fail during the fun, the Johnston almost crashes here. Minh and Roberts, who are trying to make some sense of the confusing mass of shipping as they continue to attack ChiCom, are with the remaining munitions, however, the Japanese battleships. and the cruisers now turn to ChiCom for help and within 10 minutes the Roberts is out of action when the Japanese ships firing at her also belatedly switch to high explosives and within minutes of this switch several huge holes are made in her side and begins to sink the besieged heavy cruiser retreats but will then sink on her way home around this time something happens to the cruiser choukai reports conflict as to whether the hit was scored by a5-inch cannon from the USS White Plains or whether it was a bomb hit from one of the newly arrived planes or whether it is a combination of both, but in either case the relatively small explosion causes the pure oxygen fuel in one of the banks The Joker's torpedoes detonate causing a catastrophic explosion that forces the ship to heal offline almost immediately.

The ship will be found limping and sunk by a plane later that day with Gambia Bay and Ho L sinking and Roberts will not be for this world much longer. The Johnston is now attacked by four cruisers and several destroyers. The ship's crew plugs the holes as she goes. as fast as they can, but the ship is literally being gradually dismantled by repeated salvos. The fact that this particular set of Japanese ships still uses armor-piercing instead of high-level explosives is the only saving grace, meanwhile several tap e3 planes were slowly launched. Along with the arrival of a concentrated attack formation from Tapis 1 and 2 further south, they begin attacking several Japanese capital ships with many aircraft strafing their targets.

Once the more conventional anti-ship weapons are expended, this assault considerably disrupts the human formation. Japanese. She has also been under heavy attack for about 20 minutes and at one point the captain wished it caused by an almost continuous barrage of shell splashes, but the ship bravely exchanges fire with the tonay until she is ordered to return to blow smoke for the surviving escort aircraft carriers. Corita convinced that their opposition is significant and without realizing that the human is the only fleet destroyer still operational he orders the fleet to stop attacking and regroup to the north, so just when the Japanese have eliminated almost In the background, the burning wreck of Gambia Bay finally slides beneath the waves into the air.

Some planes are using their loads of small 100-pound bombs and will attempt to disrupt or detonate torpedoes launched by Japanese destroyers and cruisers as parting gifts. with some degree of success with three heavy cruisers already sunk or damaged and increasingly larger and fiercer air attacks convincing Corita that he must engage fleet units, he also learns of the destruction of the southern force during night and that at least important elements of the Third Fleet, especially their battleships, are not actually here, but they could well be on their way back and, even though none of their battleships have received any major damage during this engagement, He orders the fleet to fully withdraw in the brief moments of silence.

An American sailor near the admiral. Sprog is heard shouting after a 45-minute fight against very lopsided

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. Abort the Johnston. The order is given to abandon ship. The ship sinks twenty-five minutes later, at 10:00 ten minutes, taking with it 186 members of her crew, including the gallant. Captain Evans with her will receive a posthumous Medal of Honor for her actions in her last stand. The ship still managed to repel considerable fire that would otherwise likely have led to the loss of more American ships. The various scattered planes are now moving forward. back after launching several attacks against the ships Caritas retreats, some are forced to abandon due to lack of fuel, having launched with barely anything in the first place others find an aircraft carrier on any aircraft carrier to land on others still serve for some of the barely functional landing strips that the invaders The troops have established a final postscript to the battle that occurs when a late wave of Japanese aircraft appears and begins a 40-minute attack on all surviving escort carriers except Kit Can Bay. takes damage an incoming flight of Japanese planes makes their attack runs and then zero kamikazes on the flight deck of the USS send low blows to the hangar and set off a catastrophic series of fires and explosions that we will see the ship sink within the hour, two other kamikazes crash into Kalinin Bay, but fortunately they did not detonate anything too explosive during the battle in the north, the southern escort carrier group had also been subject to a concentrated air attack and kamikaze along with possible submarine activity that causes varying degrees of damage to the pilots of the sent casualty returning from an attack lands on the do lagg airstrip and the delivered carbines are quickly given a trench and told to help repel a Japanese infantry counterattack with that work done with the help of some stacked boxes and buckets full of gasoline, they rearm and repair their air and then return to land on other ships.

A pilot during all of this disappears with a patrol of troops and returns with a new wing from somewhere to replace the tattered collection. of scrap metal that one of their own had been turned into a replacement before leaving with the battle having ended during the final stages of the battle angry messages calling for reinforcements flew back and forth over the radio, but the first aid from the Third Fleet does not turn around until almost an hour after the Caritas forces have already begun their retreat, a few hours later much of the northern decoy force is finally cornered and sunk by the combined striking power of the large aircraft carriers of the third fleet, a tragic final act unfolds as they advance Communication and navigation errors mean that many survivors of sunken destroyers and escort carriers are not picked up until the 27th, two days later, resulting in many men dying from exposure, dehydration, and shark attacks after the enemy has generally retreated; however, the score sheet was almost as hopeless. unbalanced as one would have expected going into the battle only the casualty ratios are completely backwards the US Navy has lost against escort carriers and one of them had been a kamikaze attack instead of a surface attack two destroyers and one destroyer escort along with one destroyer, three destroyer escorts, and several other escort carriers damaged in return, this small force had managed to push back the entire central force, causing the Japanese to lose three heavy cruisers. completely and another effectively permanently out of combat. levels of damage to the surviving battleships the other cruisers and destroyers not including losses suffered by the central force from submarine and air attacks the main action the entirety of taffy 3 would receive a Presidential Unit Citation as well as numerous awards for acts of individual bravery Although The battle would not have been as it was if it had not been for the astonishing bravery of the escorting destroyers and the destroyer escorts, it was also a salutary lesson in the number of other factors: the lack of radar and advanced fire control on the Japanese side. had severely hampered them with a disproportionate number of hits hitting the main and secondary batteries of a Yamato, which was the only ship with any type of radar in the fleet, the fact that the American ships could maneuver and quickly recover a solution of Accurate firing also meant that they had more freedom of action, while Japanese ships tended toward straight-line or wide movements, making them much easier targets, especially for torpedoes.

Their lack of good intelligence also meant that they greatly overestimated the size of their enemies during overly long hails. The armor-piercing shells do comparatively little damage compared to the high explosive they should have used. Additionally, the long fuses of many Japanese armor-piercing shells are designed for diving hits against capital ships, meaning that many shells actually hit. contacted the American ships did not explode or only did so after the projectile passed through the ship and out the other side, resulting in relatively little damage the rapid disappearance of Roberts and Gambia Bay once their respective attackers switched to high -explosive gives an idea of ​​what the battle might have been like if this critical change had been made much earlier Finally, once again, the quality of the cruiser is particularly shown in the case of Admiral Carita, who seems to have made so many basic mistakes as a commander of the fleet that would almost have made more sense if he were secretly an American spy given that almost every order he gave after the initial one to open fire seems to have been calculated to minimize his own chances of success and maximize the relatively few American ones. and advantages, on the contrary, the commanding officers of Taffy 3's ships, although they seemed to have accepted that they were almost certainly going to die, were equally determined to cause as much damage as possible to the enemy and would maintain strict combat discipline until the final.

The ships were literally shot out from under them, which in combination with the above factors resulted in a completely unexpected tactical and strategic victory. That's all for this video. Thanks for seeing it. If you have any comments or suggestions for reviewing a boat, please let us know in the comments below. Don't forget to comment on the pinned post if you have questions about dry docking.