Leyte Gulf is the greatest naval battle you’ve never heard of

When you think of great naval engagements, the Battle of Leyte Gulf does not immediately spring to mind, despite it being the largest naval battle in modern history. Leyte Gulf, which celebrates its 80th anniversary today, took place in the Philippines in 1944. Even my well-educated American friends, the CEO of a major publishing company included, fail the vox pop test of knowledge of this epic battle.

The sea battles that we remember tend to be engagements that define the outcome of struggles between empires and civilisations. At the Battle of Salamis, Athenian triremes thwarted Persia’s conquest of Greece. Similarly at the Battle of Lepanto, Pope Pius V’s Holy League navy defeated the Ottomans who threatened Europe. Britain’s greatest sea battles of course – Trafalgar, Jutland and the Battle of the Atlantic – were instrumental in the defeat of the hegemonic ambitions of Napoleon, Kaiser Wilhelm II and Hitler. But the Battle of Leyte Gulf does not belong in this canon of civilisation defining engagements.