Japanese Admirals Mocked Essex Carriers — Until 17 of Them Appeared at Leyte Gulf.

On October 23rd, nineteen forty-four, at fourteen hundred hours, Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita stood in the flag bridge of the battleship Yamato as his force entered the Sibuyan Sea. Twenty-three warships formed up behind him: four battleships, six heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, and eleven destroyers. It was the most powerful surface fleet Japan had assembled in over a year.

Kurita's mission was simple in concept, brutal in execution. Transit the central Philippines, break through San Bernardino Strait, turn south, and destroy the American invasion fleet anchored in Leyte Gulf. Everything depended on one critical assumption: American carrier forces would be drawn away by a decoy force sailing from the north.

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