Halsey's Decision: Organizational Failure at Leyte Gulf

Brooks, David L.

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At 0646 Fanshaw Bay makes an “unidentified surface contact” on her radar and her radio watch reports “Japs gabbing” on the fighter-interception net. And then at 0647 the A/S patrol radios: “I can see pagoda masts, and I see the biggest red meatball flag I ever saw on the biggest battleship I ever saw.” <p>

Ziggy Sprague knows his ships are in trouble. His 20-knot carriers and his paltry 5-inch guns firing a 54-pound shell with a range of about nine nautical miles, which could not penetrate bat