Word: straits
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Blameworthy Bull. The bulk of the Japanese navy was divided into four groups. Two minor groups made up the southern force, which was supposed to steam through Surigao Strait between Leyte and Mindanao. The main striking group was the central force, under Vice Admiral Kurita. which was to steam through San Bernardino Strait north of Leyte between Samar and Luzon. Like two arms of a nutcracker, the two fleets were to converge on Leyte Gulf, wipe out. amphibious and supply craft there, and isolate MacArthur's forces on the island. A third (northern) force under Vice Admiral Ozawa...
...Japanese maneuver, the U.S. Third and Seventh Fleets. Admirals Halsey and Kinkaid commanding, left the five-day-old Leyte beachhead perilously unguarded. Rear Admiral Clifton "Ziggy" Sprague's light task force of baby flattops with a destroyer screen was cruelly trapped by a surprise attack from San Bernardino Strait. On the question of who was to blame hinges the Leyte Gulf controversy that has sputtered ever since. Nearly all of Historian Morison's evidence in this book supports the notion that "Bull"' Halsey was the most blameworthy; he fell for and chased the decoy force...
Guts & Gumption. There were three main actions in the Leyte Gulf battle, and each had its special tone, which Historian Morison perfectly captures. The battle of Surigao Strait might be called Operation By-the-Book. The first section of the Japanese southern force sailed into a night slaughter of destroyer torpedoes and heavy fire from cruisers and old battleships, with a single Jap destroyer surviving to join the second section, which simply turned tail...
...think Quemoy is the place to fight Communism," Vincent remarked. The present U.S. involvement in the Formosa strait is "a situation to which we should never have committed ourselves...
...week. "But the Republic of China holds its views, and, after all, it is its territory that is primarily involved." Tacking back to the rhumb-line course of policy in the teeth of the continuing foreign policy storm at home* and the uncertain cease-fire calm in the Formosa Strait, Dulles criticized the "exaggerated" importance the press had put on his comment fortnight before (TIME, Oct. 13) that the Chinese Nationalists were "foolish" to concentrate 100,000 fighting men on the offshore islands. As a military matter, the U.S. will advise some reduction of these forces, but U.S. diplomatic policy...