The Invasion of Lingayen Gulf (Pangasinan: Inlusob ed Golfo na Lingayen; Ilocano: Iraraut iti Golfo ti Lingayen; Tagalog: Paglusob sa Golfo ng Lingayen; Spanish: Invasión del Golfo de Lingayén), 3–13 January 1945, was an Allied amphibious operation in the Philippines during World War II. In the early morning of 6 January 1945, a large Allied force commanded by Admiral Jesse B. Oldendorf began approaching the shores of Lingayen from Lingayen Gulf, on the island of Luzon. U.S. Navy and Royal Australian Navy warships began bombarding suspected Japanese positions along the coast of Lingayen from their position in Lingayen Gulf for three days. On "S-Day", 9 January, the U.S. 6th Army landed on a roughly 25 mi (40 km) beachhead at the base of the Gulf between the towns of Lingayen and San Fabian.
Background
During World War II, Lingayen Gulf proved a strategically important theater of war between American and Japanese forces. Shown in the center of the figure left, on 22 December 1941, the Japanese 14th Army—under Lieutenant General Masaharu Homma—landed on the northeastern shores of the gulf, at Agoo, Caba, Santiago and Bauang, where they engaged in a number of relatively minor skirmishes with the defenders, a poorly equipped contingent of predominantly American and Filipino troops. Facing limited opposition, the larger Japanese forces managed to successfully invade and occupy the gulf.
On the day after the defeat, General Douglas MacArthur issued the order to retreat from Luzon and withdraw to Bataan. Following their defeat at the Battle of Bataan, U.S. and Filipino prisoners of war were forced into the Bataan Death March, with their destination Capas, Tarlac, not far from the capital city of Manila.
After attempting to establish an independent Allied government supported by American troops under the command of General McArthur on Corregidor, Japanese troops forced the surrender of the remaining American and Filipino forces there at the Battle of Corregidor on 6 May 1942. On 11 March 1942, Lieutenant John D. Bulkeley had picked up MacArthur, his family, and his immediate staff, who had been ordered to flee the Philippines. For the next three years, the gulf remained under Japanese occupation prior to the Lingayen Gulf landings.
Operations,
Bombardment
From 3–9 January 1945, the ships of Admiral Oldendorf's invasion force took a lengthy circuitous route through the previously captured islands of Leyte Gulf in the Southeast of the Philippines, shown in blue as the Eastern Visayas in the map at left, and West, South of the Southern Visayas through the Suriago Strait and the Bohol Sea. Then heading north and following the Western coastlines of the Western Philippine Islands of Negros, Panay, and Mindoro (In green), shown at left in the map, the forward staged ships of Admiral Oldendorf's naval invasion force headed for the mouth of Lingayen Gulf on the Island of Luzon, shown to the immediate left of Bagaio. From the mouth of the Gulf, two vertical channels would be swept of mines by the minesweepers, one for landing areas terminating at the base of the Gulf, west on the beach of Lingayen, and one for landing areas terminating east at the town of San Fabian. The narrow base of the roughly rectangular Lingayen Gulf provided a relatively small landing area, only 25–30 miles wide, but its assault forces needed to take only a 100-mile overland route South to reach Luzon's capital city of Manila, shown clearly at left.
Commencing around noon on 6 January 1945, a heavy naval and air bombardment of suspected Japanese defenses on Lingayen began from their position inside the Gulf, the base of which is shown in the figure above. Estimates of resistance from the coastline and inland shores on the landing areas on the mouth of the Gulf proved inaccurate, as much of the bombardment proved unnecessary.
Minesweeping efforts
Demolitions near the planned landing sites on the base of the Gulf by Underwater Demolition Teams were undertaken, but they found no beach obstacles, and only one mine and encountered sparse opposing forces. Lieutenant Commander W. R. Loud, who commanded the minesweeper force, claimed to have found around ten additional mines in his sweeping efforts by end of day 7 January, though intelligence estimates by Philippine resistance may have overestimated the number present. Smith writes that surprisingly, during the 7th, exploratory sweeps during the morning "turned up only two floating mines and none of the moored type." Both sources seemed to indicate a total of less than 10–12 mines, not a particularly large number for a close approach to a landing area, considering the large numbers soon to be found off the beaches of Iwo Jima. As approach channels were swept, buoys were placed to delineate the areas where ships could approach or land safe from the threat of active contact mines.
The sweepers performed with efficiency and courage considering they were the constant target of air attacks, several causing damage, or the sinking of their ships. They performed their tasks effectively during 6–8 January, during frequent attack, and in difficult weather, including high waves on the Eastern base of the gulf near Lingayen during 7 January, which may have affected those craft closer to the eastern side of the Gulf. Aircraft and naval artillery bombardment of the landing areas also occurred, with kamikazes attacking on the 7th, though enemy kamikazes, bombers and torpedo planes had reigned terror on the naval forces on their long route to the Gulf from the 2nd and would continue through the 13th. Smith writes that Allied planes from Allied escort carriers flew "from 250 to 300 sorties during the period from 6 through 8 January", bombing and strafing targets along the beaches. Many downed enemy planes and kamikazes, but many escaped their grasp. Ian W. Toll writes that on 7 January, "in response to urgent requests from Admiral Kinkade and General MacArthur, Halsey threw his "big blue blanket" over Luzon." Airmen from the carriers, after returning to their ships, touted "claims of at least seventy-five Japanese planes destroyed on the ground." On the 8th, it was observed that in the town of Lingayen, as a response to the pre-landing bombardment, Filipinos had begun to form a parade, complete with United States and Philippine flags; fire was shifted away from that area.
Land battle
As shown at left, at 09:30 on 9 January 1945, about 68,000 GIs under General Walter Krueger of the U.S. 6th Army—following a devastating naval bombardment—landed at the coast of Lingayen Gulf meeting no opposition. A total of 203,608 soldiers were eventually landed over the next few days, establishing a 20 mi (32 km) beachhead, stretching from Sual, and San Fabian at the far East of the map at the base of the Bolianu Peninsula, west to the central Gulf town of Dagupan (XIV Corps), and then to the far Western town of Lingayen. The location of XIV corps is shown by the blue line at the center of the figure at left. The Lingayen Assault Force landing areas are shown at left by blue rectangles near the town of Lingayen, and the assault forces are shown as the blue lines further inland. The San Fabian Assault force (I Corps) have landing areas shown as rectangles and a blue line indicating assault forces on right of figure by the town of San Fabian. The total number of troops under the command of MacArthur was reported to have even exceeded the number that Dwight D. Eisenhower controlled in Europe.
While aboard ship, Task Force 78, the San Fabian Attack Force, a full three days behind Admiral Oldendorf's Naval convoys, was commanded by Vice Admiral Daniel E. Barbey, and Task Force 79, the Lingayen Attack Force, an equal distance behind Oldendorf, was commanded by Vice Admiral Theodore Wilkinson. Once disembarking from their ships, the two ground-based assault Task Forces would put more U.S. troops ashore on the first day at Lingayen than those arriving on the bloody beaches of Normandy on Day one of D-Day. Within a few days, the assault forces had quickly captured the coastal towns and secured the 20-mile-long (32 km) beachhead, as well as penetrating up to five miles (8.0 km) inland.
Heavy losses on land and sea
Despite their success in driving out the Japanese forces stationed there, the Americans and their mostly Australian allies suffered relatively heavy losses; particularly to their convoys, due to kamikaze attacks. While not the highest in U.S. casualties, the subsequent Battle for Luzon was the highest net casualty battle U.S. forces fought in World War II, with 192,000 to 217,000 Japanese combatants dead, though some sources quote losses as high as 380,000 for the entire conflict including non-combat casualties (mostly from starvation and disease). The battle saw 8,000 American combatants killed, or as many as 10,000 in the entire conflict. Total non-combat American casualty estimates have ranged as high as 93,400 among the Sixth Army when illness from disease and non-combat injuries are accounted for. However, to these staggering losses, there must also be added the over 150,000 Filipinos killed, many during the Battle of Manila, but with an overwhelming number of Filipino civilians murdered by Japanese forces, as a result of the Manila massacre of February 1945.
Overview of ships damaged 3–13 January 1945
During the invasion by sea, which is the primary subject of this article, from 13 December 1944 – 13 January 1945, including the time Allied ships entered the Philippines through Leyte Gulf to Lingayen, as well as action taken two weeks before off the Northern Philippine Islands of Mindoro and Marinduque, a total of 24 Allied ships were sunk and another 67 were damaged by kamikazes, though this number includes naval activities off the West coast of Luzon, outside of Lingayen Gulf, off the Philippine Visaya Islands and the Island of Mindoro, which were necessary as preliminaries to secure the Island of Luzon for the invasion force. Ships damaged by kamikazes between 3–11 January on the way to Lingayen included the battleships USS Mississippi, New Mexico and California (the latter was also accidentally hit by friendly fire), the heavy cruiser HMAS Australia, the light cruiser USS Columbia, and the destroyer minesweepers USS Long and USS Hovey. Following the landings, Lingayen Gulf was turned into a vast supply depot for the rest of the war to support the Battle of Luzon.
General Douglas MacArthur was embarked on the light cruiser USS Boise. On 5 January a Japanese midget submarine shot two torpedoes at Boise but the cruiser took evasive actions to avoid getting hit. On 7 January a Japanese airplane dropped a bomb and barely missed hitting Boise. Throughout the operation, Boise shot anti-aircraft artillery at the Japanese kamikazes and witnessed numerous ships close to it getting hit.
USS Ommaney Bay sunk
On 3 January 1945, the USS Ommaney Bay, a large escort carrier, was severely damaged by a Yokosuka P1Y kamikaze carrying two bombs. At 17:12, the Yokosuka P1Y penetrated a Destroyer screen undetected and made for Ommaney, approaching directly towards the ship's bow. Captain Young of the Ommaney later reported that the kamikaze's approach was concealed by the blinding glare of the sun. The captain, aware of the kamikaze threat, had assigned multiple lookouts throughout the carrier's deck. But a lack of radar signals, a common and vexing problem during the battle, had led the task group to believe that the Japanese planes had withdrawn, and the kamikaze attack took the lookouts by complete surprise. New Mexico was only able to respond with inaccurate anti-aircraft fire, whilst Ommaney Bay was unable to react at all.
The plane sliced across the superstructure with its wing, collapsing it onto the flight deck, and then veered into her flight deck on the forward starboard side, releasing the two bombs, with one penetrating the flight deck and setting off a series of explosions among the fully gassed planes on the hangar deck. Pressure to her water main was lost when the second bomb passed through the hangar deck, making it more difficult to fight fires. Fires and explosions, including the intense heat and dark smoke of an oil fire, continued until the decision was made to scuttle her with a torpedo later in the day. Considered sunk by Naval statistics, her kamikaze strike, though coming early in the battle, represented the greatest loss of life to a single ship with 93 killed and 65 wounded. 19 Grumman FM-2 Wildcat fighters and 10 Grumman TBM Avenger torpedo bombers went down with Ommaney Bay. None of her planes were able to take off before the attack.