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Show .enemy fleeing westward and were joined by shore-based aircraft of the Southwest Pacific area. Damage Dam-age done the enemy retreat through the San Bernard-dino Bernard-dino Strait and the Subiyan sea, included two cruisers sunk, one battleship possibly sunk, three battleships and three cruisers further fur-ther damaged. 'S r'1ca Planes and dive-. X m the Third Act at- n c lnrmy8hlpa lnthe Sibuyan 1 os tLS;?SV infllCtinS severe a b, UloJn rSt encmy d l,C h'P and a carrier severely an th, ' t,lr th0r ttleships a cl three cruisers were bombed both hml f,d- In the Sulu sea oil r ,1PS Were bombed and ad,,,1? Straf0d with rekets and machine guns. Carrier Units Surprise Japs ..." By dawn, Oct. 14, after full speed through the night, the carrier car-rier units caught the enemy so completely by surprise that they wet no effective air opposition. F- .The large carrier and two small carriers were sunk by our aircraft, another went down, after being bombed from gunfire, as did a cruiser. Planes sank a destroyer and another cruiser, damaged was sunk by a submarine. In addition, a battleship was torpedoed and bombed, another was bombed, three cruisers gunned gun-ned and bombed and four destroyers destroy-ers strafed, bombed and gunned. None of our ships was damaged but before the enemy ships could be pursued and completely destroyed de-stroyed the engagement was broken brok-en off and our ships proceeded to the assistance of the Seventh Fleet (Carrier group, which was under heavy attack from the large enemy ene-my fleet which came through the Sibuyan Sea. Heavy Battle Off Samar ... During the morning of Oct. 14 the enemy group had proceeded through the San Bernardino Strait despite damage inflicted by our planes on Oct. 13, and had attacked at-tacked units of the Seventh fleet off Samar Island, which is northeast north-east of Leyte Island. In the ensuing en-suing battle most of the enemy ships were badly damaged by aircraft air-craft of the two American fleets. After losing a cruiser and destroyer de-stroyer the enemy ran northwest from the scene of action and dur- ing the early hours of darkness passed westward through the Strait. About 2 a. m., however, a straggling cruiser was sunk by gunfire. The other enemy group, which had come through the Sulu sea, had attempted to come through Surigao Strait, where it met the Seventh fleet in a night battle, on Oct. 23-24. All units of this fleet were sunk or decisively defeated, says the Navy, as reported by the Commander in Chief of the Southwest South-west Pacific area. On Oct. 24 carrier aircraft pursued pur-sued the crippled and damaged searchers discovered two strong enemy naval forces moving eastward, east-ward, one through the Sibuya Sea, consisting of five battleships, eight cruisers and thirteen destroyers. The other, moving eastward through the Sulu Sea, included two battleships, four cruisers and seven or eight destroyers. Discover Third Enemy -rrrrr, i 1 1 1 1 1 ' ' FORWARD IEH By H. S. Sims, Jr. i - i x tci. . . . On the afternoon of Oct. 2S, a land-based Navy plane discovered an enemy carrier force, about 200 miles off northern Luzon, heading south. This third enemy group consisted of a large carrier, three light carriers, two battleships, five cruisers and six destroyers. Thus we have the picture of the situation that confronted the American Navy which had been deployed to protect the operations underway on Leyte. Earlier enemy shore-based planes had attacked our carriers, eastward of the Philippines, Phil-ippines, hitting the Princeton which was subsequently sunk by our own forces. To meet the threat of the Jap carrier force several carrier task groups of the Third fleet, under Admiral Halsey started northward at high speed. At the same time, i 3UME OF NAVAL REPORTS REVEALS CRUSHING DEFEAT j OF EXEMY EFFORT I TO REACH LEYTE Wiile the full extent of Japa-:;s Japa-:;s losses in the Second Battle :' 'It Philippine Sea may not be ecu until after the war the de-23s de-23s of the engagement are clearly clear-ly revealed by a recent naval com-Effiique. com-Effiique. to Oct. 21 and 22 (west longitude longi-tude dates) submarine scouts re-pjrfed re-pjrfed movement of major Japa-Kse Japa-Kse fleet units northward from !le Sinapore area. Our subs sank teo cruisers and damaged a third, ttmediately ships of the Third i'eet were moved into position to fie eastward of the Philippines. The next day, Oct. 23, carrier |
