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One thing to remember about Kurita's force is that it turned around for several hours after withstanding numerous attacks from Halsey's carrier aircraft. Halsey thought that he didn't need to worry about Kurita and Nishimura any more because they were out of the battle. That is why he went after Ozawa when his scouts spotted the carrier force. He didn't realize that Kurita had turned back again and was closing in on the beaches and transports. That said, Halsey still should have stayed closer to the landing fleet and let the typically complex Japanese plan play itself out, then pound them in detail. He especially didn't need the battleships against a force that lacked similar firepower.

Maybe Halsey himself didn't know Kurita had turned around, but his staff definitely received reports suggesting he had, and they refused to wake Halsey up and inform him. Would he have acted on the information? I think that is one of the more interesting "what ifs" at Leyte Gulf.

Somewhere I read that Halsey didn't form TF 34 because it included his flagship New Jersey, and he would have either had to shift flagships, a time consuming process, or miss the destruction of the Japanese carriers.

Good point.

I was thinking about this the other night and it occurred to me that Ozawa's Northern decoy probably succeeded in drawing off Halsey BECAUSE he knew it was a decoy. Thinking he had defeated the Center Force (as you described) he then probably thought the decoy force was going to take off once Ozawa realized 3rd fleet had defeated the force that Ozawa's ships were supposed to be distracting it from. Wanting to send some more Japanese ships to the bottom Halsey took of after them in order to prevent their escape.

I wonder...had he thought the Northern force was a legitimate striking force and not knowing what the overall strategy was, would he have been a bit more conservative and waited for them to come to him? If so maybe 3rd fleet, with its fast battleships, would have been in position to face Kurita when he appeared instead?

Imagine what a battle that would have been! This time had Kurita turned back he may have had a whole lot of American steel in hot pursuit looking to finish him off...rather than a few destroyers and CVE's looking on in bewilderment, wondering how they were still alive.