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Thread: War stories...

  1. #61
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    Quote Originally Posted by wacojoe View Post
    The Battle Of Leyte Gulf, 10/24/1944 was the last major sea battle in which aircraft carriers were not present —

    http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the...o-strait-20713
    Not to correct such a learned mind as yours, counselor, but aircraft carriers indeed did play a large role in the Leyte Gulf actions, not only by their presence, but their absence as well...Adm. William Halsey was forced to make a difficult decision as the JIN made a feinting move with an array of ships commanded by Vice Adm. Ozawa who took several nearly empty JIN aircraft carriers into the seas north of the Allied 3rd Fleet in an attempt to lure Halsey's main battle force to them while the real attack came from the JIN Southern and Central forces...

    Halsey took the bait, but intended for a contingency force to be available to defend the Army units already on Leyte Gulf beaches...Through miscommunication and garbled transmissions, the defending forces for Leyte Gulf were stripped to a handful of destroyers, destroyer escorts and small, slow escort carriers...This small defensive force (callsign Taffy 3) was then called on to battle against the formidable force of Adm. Kurita's battleships, heavy cruisers and destroyers...In tactical command of Taffy 3, Lt. Cmdr. Evans, also commanding the closest destroyer, USS Johnston, immediately attacked Kurita's fleet with his ship, and ordered all other small ships and any available aircraft from the escort carriers to attack as well...

    Adm. Kurita was so stunned by the unexpected assault, and confused that the small destroyers may have been larger heavy cruisers by their attack tactics, he ordered his fleet to withdraw to safety, but not without sinking the Johnston, and doing severe damage to the remainder of Taffy 3, which continued the assault...This was the last time the JIN presented any viable threat in the Pacific...Taffy three sank two JIN heavy cruisers in the melee which became known as "The Last Stand of the Tincan Navy"...

    The photo pictured in Joe's link is one of my favorites from the Pacific War...It shows the USS Pennsylvania leading the battleship Colorado, and cruisers, Louisville, Portland and Columbia into the Lingayen Gulf in January 1945......Ben
    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

  2. #62
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    Always better to have a more full perspective. I bow to greater knowledge and above all to the bravery of the men and women who fought those battles.

    From Wikipedia —

    ...On the morning of 23 October 1944, American submarines detected and attacked units of the Japanese fleet coming in from the South China Sea toward the precarious Leyte beachhead. The battleship-cruiser-destroyer Southern Force was decimated as it attempted to enter Leyte Gulf via Surigao Strait the night of 24/25 October. The more powerful battleship-cruiser-destroyer Center Force under Vice Admiral Takeo Kurita had been pounded by Admiral “Bull” Halsey's attack carrier planes and presumably turned back from San Bernardino Strait. Admiral Halsey then raced north with his attack carriers and heavy battleships to engage a decoy Japanese carrier–battleship task force off Cape Engano. This left Johnston and her small escort carrier task unit as lonely sentinels in north Leyte Gulf, east of Samar and off San Bernardino Strait.[1]

    As enemy ships fled the Battle of Surigao Strait at daybreak of 25 October, the powerful Japanese Center Force slipped through San Bernardino Strait and into the Philippine Sea heading toward Leyte Gulf. It steamed along the coast of Samar directly for Johnston's little task unit and the American invasion beachhead at Leyte, hoping to destroy amphibious shipping and American troops on shore.[1]

    One of the pilots flying patrol after dawn alert that morning reported the approach of Japanese Center Force. Steaming straight for "Taffy 3" were four battleships (including the Yamato), eight cruisers (two light and six heavy), and 11 destroyers. Lieutenant Robert C. Hagen, Johnston's gunnery officer, later reported, "We felt like little David without a slingshot." In less than a minute, Johnston was zigzagging between the six escort carriers and the Japanese fleet and putting out a smoke screen over a 2,500 yd (2,300 m) front to conceal the carriers from the enemy gunners: "Even as we began laying smoke, the Japanese started lobbing shells at us and Johnston had to zigzag between the splashes.... We were the first destroyer to make smoke, the first to start firing, the first to launch a torpedo attack...."[1]

    For the first 20 minutes, Johnston could not return fire as the enemy cruisers and battleships' heavy guns outranged Johnston's 5 in (130 mm) guns. Not waiting for orders, Commander Evans broke formation and went on the offensive by ordering Johnston to speed directly toward the enemy — first a line of seven destroyers, next one light and three heavy cruisers, then the four battleships. To the east appeared three other cruisers and several destroyers.[1]

    As soon as range closed to within ten miles, Johnston fired on the heavy cruiser Kumano — the nearest ship — and scored several damaging hits. During her five-minute sprint into torpedo range, Johnston fired over 200 rounds at the enemy, then under the direction of torpedo officer Lieutenant Jack K. Bechdel, made her torpedo attack. She got off all 10 torpedoes, and turned to retire behind a heavy smoke screen. When she came out of the smoke a minute later, the Kumano could be seen burning furiously from a torpedo hit. Her bow had been blown completely off, and she was forced to withdraw. Around this time, Johnston took three 14 in (360 mm) shell hits from Kongō, followed closely by three 6 in (150 mm) shells — either from a light cruiser or Yamato— which hit the bridge. The shells resulted in the loss of all power to the steering engine and all power to the three 5-inch guns in the aft of the ship, and rendered the gyrocompass useless. A low-lying squall came up, and Johnston "ducked into it" for a few minutes of rapid repairs and salvage work.[1] The bridge was abandoned and Commander Evans, who had lost two fingers on his left hand, went to the aft steering column to conn the ship.[citation needed]

    At 07:50, Admiral Sprague ordered destroyers to make a torpedo attack: "small boys attack". Johnston, unable to keep position with her damaged engine, and with her torpedoes already expended, nonetheless moved to provide fire support for the other destroyers. As she emerged from a smoke screen, she nearly collided with the destroyer Heermann. At 08:20, Johnston sighted a Kongō-class battleship — only 7,000 yd (6,400 m) away — emerging through the smoke. The destroyer opened fire, scoring multiple hits on the superstructure of the much larger ship. The return fire from the battleship missed clearly.[1]

    Johnston soon observed Gambier Bay under fire from an enemy cruiser, and engaged the cruiser in an effort to draw her fire away from the carrier. Johnston scored four hits on the heavy cruiser, then broke off as the Japanese destroyer squadron was seen closing rapidly on the American escort carriers. The Johnston engaged the lead ship until it quit, then the second until the remaining enemy units broke off to get out of effective gun range before launching torpedoes, all of which missed.[1]

    Then, Johnston's luck ran out; she came under heavy fire from multiple enemy ships, and right when it was most needed, the damaged remaining engine quit, leaving her dead in the water.[citation needed]

    Some time into the battle, a Japanese battleship, Kongō, fired two rounds from her main cannons. One round punched through the thin side armor of Johnston and cut a hole through the engine room. Her speed was cut in half. The enemy ships closed in for an easy kill, pouring fire into the crippled destroyer.[citation needed]

    Johnston took a hit that knocked out one forward gun and damaged another, and her bridge was rendered untenable by fires and explosions resulting from a hit in her 40 mm ready ammunition locker. Evans, who had shifted his command to Johnston's fantail, was yelling orders through an open hatch to men turning her rudder by hand. At one of her batteries, a crewman kept calling "More shells! More shells!" Still the destroyer battled to keep the Japanese destroyers and cruisers from reaching the five surviving American carriers. "We were now in a position where all the gallantry and guts in the world couldn't save us, but we figured that help for the carrier must be on the way, and every minute's delay might count.... By 9:30 we were going dead in the water; even the Japanese couldn't miss us. They made a sort of running semicircle around our ship, shooting at us like a bunch of Indians attacking a prairie schooner. Our lone engine and fire room was knocked out; we lost all power, and even the indomitable skipper knew we were finished. At 9:45 he gave the saddest order a captain can give: 'Abandon Ship.'... At 10:10 Johnston rolled over and began to sink. A Japanese destroyer came up to 1,000 yards and pumped a final shot into her to make sure she went down. A survivor saw the Japanese captain salute her as she went down, considering her an honorable enemy. That was the end of Johnston.[1]

    Crewmen from the destroyer escort Samuel B. Roberts spotted Evans at the fantail, asking "isn't that their captain", waving to them with what they did not realize was his only good hand.[citation needed]

    From Johnston's complement of 327 officers and men, only 141 were saved. Of the 186 men lost, about 50 were killed by enemy action, 45 died later on rafts from wounds, and 92 men—including Cmdr. Evans—got off before she sank, but were never seen again.[1]

    Aftermath
    Hoel and Samuel B. Roberts also sacrificed themselves to save the escort carriers and to protect the landings at Leyte. Two of four Japanese heavy cruisers were sunk by combined surface and air attacks, and Admiral Sprague was soon amazed by the sight of the retirement of Kurita's entire fleet. By this time, planes of "Taffy 2" and Taffy 1" and every available unit of the Fleet were headed to assist "Taffy 3". But Johnston and her little escort carrier task unit had stopped Admiral Kurita's powerful Center Force in the Battle off Samar, inflicting greater losses than they suffered.[1].
    ...............
    “You can vote your way into socialism, but you have to shoot your way out.” — Too fundamental to have an attribution


  3. #63
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    Remember the movie, The Great Escape? Of course you do. Here is the rest of the story, or almost - no mention is made here of the two who actually did successfully escape. For the ones who were recaptured the story was no good or for the ones who murdered 47 of them.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/mosl...-manhunts.html
    ...............
    “You can vote your way into socialism, but you have to shoot your way out.” — Too fundamental to have an attribution


  4. #64
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    I'm currently reading the last of the three monumental works about Churchill, The Last Lion. I can't watch war movies but am able to read the accounts.

    I can't help but wonder what the French think when they read their own history. The conduct of the French government and senior military left little to be proud of.

    This is the most detailed account from the political perspective I have ever read.
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity, an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” ---Sir Winston Churchill
    "Political extremism involves two prime ingredients: an excessively simple diagnosis of the world's ills, and a conviction that there are identifiable villains back of it all." ---John W. Gardner
    “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” ---C. S. Lewis

  5. #65
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    Joe, I knew the movie was loosely based on fact, and that 50 murders had occurred, but I've never seen detail like this...Thank you...The Daily Mail article mentioned the KriminalPolizei which reminded me of another book I think you'll like, considering your background..."A Serial Killer in Nazi Berlin" by Scott Selby involves a serial rapist/killer in Berlin who took advantage of the blackout in the subways, and...well, you read it...

    Dave, "The Last Lion" is one I read last year without realizing it was part of William Manchester's trilogy...Now I have to buy the other two and read them in sequence...I did the same thing recently with Rick Atkinson's "The Guns at Last Light," which turned out to be the final in his Liberation Trilogy...It was fantastically detailed with depth I've seen nowhere else...Now I have to buy the first two......Ben

    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

  6. #66
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    I read Volumes I and II and then took a break for about a year to clean up my queue which had grown alarmingly high.
    Vol III covers the period of 1940 to 1964 (for those not familiar with these Churchill biographies).
    I was a late comer to Kindle but now an avid convert. I have never found trying to manage a 1000 page book enjoyable. However, I have found the most valuable aspect of Kindle is the ability to find the meaning of a word with a stroke of my finger . Something I do often when reading an author as learned as William Manchester.
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity, an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” ---Sir Winston Churchill
    "Political extremism involves two prime ingredients: an excessively simple diagnosis of the world's ills, and a conviction that there are identifiable villains back of it all." ---John W. Gardner
    “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” ---C. S. Lewis

  7. #67
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Grubb View Post
    I have found the most valuable aspect of Kindle is the ability to find the meaning of a word with a stroke of my finger . Something I do often when reading an author as learned as William Manchester.
    That's definitely a drawback in my paper-and-pasteboard products...Since you mentioned the French and their cowering, yet arrogant history, I'm picking up valuable new insight from William Shirer's "Collapse of the Third Republic," and I've barely cracked the covers...If you haven't read it yet, prepare yourself for 1,000+ pages in Shirer's inimitable style......Ben
    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

  8. #68
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    I have not read it but will at some point. I have to confess a touch of an ill bias toward the French, one that I came to by good cause.
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity, an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” ---Sir Winston Churchill
    "Political extremism involves two prime ingredients: an excessively simple diagnosis of the world's ills, and a conviction that there are identifiable villains back of it all." ---John W. Gardner
    “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” ---C. S. Lewis

  9. #69
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dave Grubb View Post
    I have to confess a touch of an ill bias toward the French, one that I came to by good cause.
    I've never tried to hide mine, also I think for good cause...No offense to our friend LV......Ben
    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

  10. #70
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    I wish not to offend either, despite the fact that I have been offended, belittled and abused by more than I care to recall.
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity, an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” ---Sir Winston Churchill
    "Political extremism involves two prime ingredients: an excessively simple diagnosis of the world's ills, and a conviction that there are identifiable villains back of it all." ---John W. Gardner
    “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” ---C. S. Lewis

  11. #71
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    My French Huguenot ancestors were more than offended, belittled & abused by the French; they were murdered and expelled.
    ...............
    “You can vote your way into socialism, but you have to shoot your way out.” — Too fundamental to have an attribution


  12. #72
    Wannabe is offline Nov 5, 1946 - Nov 19, 2018
    A Friend Who Will be Missed.
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    Even way back when Mark Twain said something to the effect of There is no form of life on Earth any lower than the Human, except for the French.
    Bob

  13. #73
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    Quote Originally Posted by Wannabe View Post
    There is no form of life on Earth any lower than the Human, except for the French.
    Bob
    Hah!...Got that one filed...Thanks, Bob......Ben
    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

  14. #74
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    Robert Rogers and the origins of Special Forces in America —

    http://http://www.thedailybeast.com/...-250-years-ago
    ...............
    “You can vote your way into socialism, but you have to shoot your way out.” — Too fundamental to have an attribution


  15. #75
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    This site can’t be reached
    ...Ben
    The future is forged on the anvil of history...The interpreter of history wields the hammer... - Unknown author...

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