Talk:World War Two in the Pacific

Leyte

I added much more detail and used better sources, esp Halsey's memoir and Woodward's summary of interviews with Kurita.Richard Jensen 20:59, 18 June 2008 (CDT)

It is correct Halsey became enraged and changed his action due to a perceived insult from Nimitz, but Nimitz's actual message was a simple request for information. The series of errors by both the sending and receiving cryptographic errors caused the message given to Halsey to read quite differently than what Nimitz had written.

I cited Kahn as reasonably available, but you'll find the actual message, complete with handling errors, on numerous texts available through Google Books. It's a well-known example of how military communications procedures can fail; I watched my one-time boss, a former director of NSA, wince whenever I used it in a class for the Defense Information Systems Agency. Howard C. Berkowitz 22:06, 18 June 2008 (CDT)

I used the version in Halsey's memoir because it was the impact on Halsey that really mattered (Kahn gets its info fourth-hand). This is the kind of colorful and revealing detail that we can shift to the Halsey bio when it gets written. The point is that Halsey still did not realize he had been fooled by the Japanese decoys! That's what made him so angry: he says he was ordered away from his lifelong dream of a super victory when in fact he had been tricked.Richard Jensen 23:27, 18 June 2008 (CDT)

Well, I'm not writing purely for historical personalities and style alone, but also for military significance. The TF34 message problem is constantly emphasized in the study of military communications problems, and is as much a general lesson as an insight into Halsey's personality. That personality also led him to let dreams take over from strategic sense. Ozawa's force sinking -- which it did -- would have made no difference to the progress of the war, unless Kurita had broken through and devastated the invasion force. Halsey lost sight of what was actually important -- the invasion. From my perspective, it's far less significant that he didn't fulfill his dream than that he let the landing force be jeopardized -- that he didn't make sure San Bernadino Strait was guarded before chasing carriers, which he knew had no effective air wings. While I'm aware of the politics involved, this is one reason I find it tragic that the colorful Halsey got a fifth star, rather than the reliable Spruance.

I'm not sure what you mean by Kahn getting his material fourth-hand. I've personally seen official copies of the message traffic, although I can't remember if I saw it first at the National Cryptologic Museum or the Naval Operational Archives -- probably the latter, as I worked across the street from it in the Naval Command Systems Support Activity, where we had, for some odd reason, a great deal of interest in what could go wrong with naval communications. That, incidentally, was in 1970 or so, well before Kahn wrote about it, but I'd want a citation for the Operational Archives. Howard C. Berkowitz 00:07, 19 June 2008 (CDT)

well I agree--the main issue was Halsey's falling for the trick and pursuing a decoy. He fell for the trick in part (he says himself) because of that boyhood dream. The communications issue of importance was NOT Nimitz's message (that message was very clear, albeit insulting the way it came across). The main communications issue was the belief by everyone else (esp 7th fleet) that TF34 existed and was protecting the strait. That was a terrible misunderstanding, and the main reason is divided command. Note that Japanese communication problems were even worse: Kurita had a major victory but did not know the decoys had worked (the Japanese Army new but did not tell him). The #1 mistake was Kurita disobeyed clear orders to attack. This section was from Wikipedia and its full of useless detail, I will rerwrite it. We have out own CZ article that I think is better.Richard Jensen 08:42, 19 June 2008 (CDT)

Very nice rewrite of the U.S. command problems at Leyte; it sometimes seems the Pacific War was three-sided with the Allies, the Japanese, and Douglas MacArthur. :-)

Were you planning on any commentary about the Japanese fixation both on the "decisive battle" and their overcomplex plans that were unrealistic, tactically and technically, to expect to synchronize? I can certainly write something here if you like; C3I is one of my specialties. (If you haven't, take a look at my writeup, from a particular C3I paradigm, of Swarming (military)#Battle of Surigao Strait: Decisive swarming victory. Howard C. Berkowitz 12:12, 19 June 2008 (CDT)

thanks. re Japanese overcomplex plans that couldn't work. I was infiltrating it piecemeal into articles. It certainly appears at Midway, Philippine Sea and Leyte--but was that just a coincidence? Maybe it did not appear at Pearl Harbor, Singapore, Philippines, Guadalcanal, Iwo or Okinawa. My own strong preference it to avoid speculation in encyclopedia articles and save it for journal articles or books.Richard Jensen 13:46, 19 June 2008 (CDT)