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MAJ Ken Landgren
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Ok that was a little confusing. The Philippines is an archipelago of thousands of islands. Leyte island is kind of in the middle of the archipelago and the amphibious landing would be the first land action to reclaim the Philippines. The Japanese sent her aircraft carriers to the East of the Philippines and then went North. Our aircraft carriers took the bate and chased the Japanese aircraft carriers.

The diversion worked and the Japanese intent was to use their massive battleships to disrupt the Leyte amphibious landings and were bearing down. Out of desperation one of our destroyer captains chose to attack the incoming Japanese fleet. Other destroyer captains followed suit. Destroyers were sunk and it was it was a brutal fight. Eventually American naval aviation chased the Japanese fleet away, thus protecting the amphibious landing at Leyte.
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GySgt Gary Cordeiro
GySgt Gary Cordeiro
4 y
Some are tactically brilliant (Desert Storm) and pure grit and courage (Leyte)
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MAJ Ken Landgren
MAJ Ken Landgren
4 y
GySgt Gary Cordeiro - I read a retired AF COL and military historian came up with the idea of sweeping from the left. It was tactically brilliant and simple to use to plan for a vast army to flank the enemy army from the West. The Marines fixed the Iraqis on the East coast of Kuwait. 1ST CAV conducted feints up and down the middle of the Southern line of the coalition army which fixed Iraqis divisions with orientations to the South.

The Iraqis had no idea what would hit them. Our M1 tanks were often in the lead. They had a range advantage, ability to fire on the move, and it's armor was generally impervious to T-72 rounds. The range advantage is significant as it gave our tanks the freedom to hit T-72s without being under threat of the enemy tanks. This is called stand off distance. Sometimes Iraqi armor units became cognizant of being attacked because their tanks were being hit and destroyed.

The Center of Gravity or the true strength for the Iraqi military was the Republican Guard. It was our intent to wipe them out early. Destroying their elite armor divisions was ominous and foreshadowed the coalition victory.

Do you like military history?
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GySgt Gary Cordeiro
GySgt Gary Cordeiro
4 y
MAJ Ken Landgren
I can be heavily absorbed depending on the subject matter, to the point that nothing else matters.
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MAJ Ken Landgren
MAJ Ken Landgren
4 y
GySgt Gary Cordeiro - I often ask why, what, or how did something happen. Case in point. What happened from D-Day to the Battle of the Bulge? There is no way that I can remember all the details, but I do understand the major muscle moves that were conducted on that martial continuum. I have some knowledge of the strategic, operational, and tactical perspectives. Some of those actions are applicable to today's military. I like military history because, well it is just fun learning about it.
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SGT David A. 'Cowboy' Groth
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Excellent share shipmate @PO1 William
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Cpl Gerald Tucker
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Yes sir!!!
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