Editing Douglas MacArthur (section)

===Philippines Campaign (1944–45)===
{{further|Philippines Campaign (1944–45)}}

====Leyte====
In July 1944, President Roosevelt summoned MacArthur to meet with him in Hawaii "to determine the phase of action against Japan". Nimitz made the case for attacking Formosa. MacArthur stressed America's moral obligation to liberate the Philippines and won Roosevelt's support. In September, Admiral [[William Halsey Jr.]]'s carriers made a series of air strikes on the Philippines. Opposition was feeble; Halsey concluded, incorrectly, that [[Leyte]] was "wide open" and possibly undefended, and recommended that projected operations be skipped in favor of an assault on Leyte.{{sfn|Drea|1992|pp=152–159}}

[[File:Douglas MacArthur lands Leyte1.jpg|thumb|left|"I have returned" – General MacArthur returns to the Philippines with Philippine President Sergio Osmeña to his right with the pith helmet and sunglasses, Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Carlos P. Romulo at his rear, and Lieutenant General Richard K. Sutherland on his left. Photo taken by [[Gaetano Faillace]].  This iconic image is re-created in larger-than-life statues at [[MacArthur Landing Memorial National Park]].|alt=A group of men wading ashore. With General MacArthur is Philippine President Sergio Osmeña and other U.S. and Philippine Generals.]]

On 20 October 1944, troops of Krueger's Sixth Army [[Battle of Leyte|landed on Leyte]], while MacArthur watched from the light cruiser {{USS|Nashville|CL-43|6}}. That afternoon he arrived on the beach. The advance had not progressed far; snipers were still active and the area was under sporadic mortar fire. When his whaleboat grounded in knee-deep water, MacArthur requested a landing craft, but the beachmaster was too busy to grant his request. MacArthur was compelled to wade ashore.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=552–556}} In his prepared speech, he said:{{blockquote|People of the Philippines: I have returned. By the grace of Almighty God our forces stand again on Philippine soil—soil consecrated in the blood of our two peoples. We have come dedicated and committed to the task of destroying every vestige of enemy control over your daily lives, and of restoring upon a foundation of indestructible strength, the liberties of your people.{{sfn|MacArthur|1964|p=216}}}}

Since Leyte was out of range of Kenney's land-based aircraft, MacArthur was dependent on carrier aircraft.{{sfn|MacArthur|1964|p=228}} Japanese air activity soon increased, with raids on [[Tacloban]], where MacArthur decided to establish his headquarters, and on the fleet offshore. MacArthur enjoyed staying on ''Nashville''{{'}}s bridge during air raids, although several bombs landed close by, and two nearby cruisers were hit.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=561–562}} Over the next few days, the Japanese counterattacked in the [[Battle of Leyte Gulf]], resulting in a near-disaster that MacArthur attributed to the command being divided between himself and Nimitz.{{sfn|MacArthur|1964|pp=222–231}} Nor did the campaign ashore proceed smoothly. Heavy monsoonal rains disrupted the airbase construction program. Carrier aircraft proved to be no substitute for land-based aircraft, and the lack of air cover permitted the Japanese to pour troops into Leyte. Adverse weather and tough Japanese resistance slowed the American advance, resulting in a protracted campaign.{{sfn|MacArthur|1964|pp=231–234}}{{sfn|James|1975|pp=568–569}}

[[File:USA C-260 Invasion of Leyte, October 1944.jpg|thumb|right|General Douglas MacArthur (center), accompanied by Lieutenant Generals George C. Kenney and Richard K. Sutherland and Major General Verne D. Mudge (Commanding General, First Cavalry Division), inspecting the beachhead on Leyte Island, 20 October 1944 with a crowd of onlookers|alt=A large crowd of soldiers and jeeps on a beach. There are palm trees in the distance and landing craft offshore. A small group in the center conspicuously wear khaki uniforms and peaked caps instead of jungle green uniforms and helmets.]]

By the end of December, Krueger's headquarters estimated that 5,000 Japanese remained on Leyte, and on 26 December MacArthur issued a communiqué announcing that "the campaign can now be regarded as closed except for minor mopping up". Yet Eichelberger's [[Eighth United States Army|Eighth Army]] killed another 27,000 Japanese on Leyte before the campaign ended in May 1945.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=602–603}} On 18 December 1944, MacArthur was promoted to the new [[five-star rank]] of [[General of the Army (United States)|General of the Army]], placing him in the company of Marshall and followed by Eisenhower and [[Henry H. Arnold|Henry "Hap" Arnold]], the only four men to achieve the rank in World War II. Including [[Omar Bradley]] who was promoted during the Korean War so as not to be outranked by MacArthur, they were the only five men to achieve the rank of General of the Army since the 5 August 1888 death of [[Philip Sheridan]]. MacArthur was senior to all but Marshall.<ref name="history.army.mil 5star" /> The rank was created by an [[Act of Congress]] when Public Law [[s:Public Law 78-482|78-482]]<!-- a hyphen (-) is proper here, not an endash  --> was passed on 14 December 1944,<ref name="PL78-482">{{USPL|78|482}} This law allowed only 75% of pay and allowances to the grade for those on the retired list.</ref> as a temporary rank, subject to reversion to permanent rank six months after the end of the war. The temporary rank was then declared permanent 23 March 1946 by Public Law 333 of the [[79th Congress]], which also awarded full pay and allowances in the grade to those on the retired list.<ref name="PL79-333">{{USPL|79|333}}</ref>

====Luzon====
MacArthur's next move was the [[Battle of Mindoro|invasion of Mindoro]], where there were good potential airfield sites. Willoughby estimated, correctly as it turned out, that the island had only about 1,000 Japanese defenders. The problem this time was getting there. Kinkaid balked at sending escort carriers into the restricted waters of the [[Sulu Sea]], and Kenney could not guarantee land based air cover. The operation was clearly hazardous, and MacArthur's staff talked him out of accompanying the invasion on ''Nashville''. As the invasion force entered the Sulu Sea, a ''[[kamikaze]]'' struck ''Nashville'', killing 133 people and wounding 190 more.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=604–609}} Australian and American engineers had three airstrips in operation within two weeks, but the resupply convoys were repeatedly attacked by ''kamikazes''.{{sfn|Smith|1963|pp=48–49}} During this time, MacArthur quarreled with Sutherland, notorious for his abrasiveness, over the latter's mistress, Captain Elaine Clark. MacArthur had instructed Sutherland not to bring Clark to Leyte, due to a personal undertaking to Curtin that Australian women on the GHQ staff would not be taken to the Philippines, but Sutherland had brought her along anyway.{{sfn|Murray|Millet|2001|p=495}}

[[File:MacArthur, Kenney and Sutherland.jpg|thumb|left|American military officers off [[Leyte|Leyte Island]] in the Philippines, October 1944: Lieutenant General George Kenney, Lieutenant General Richard K. Sutherland, President [[Sergio Osmeña]], General Douglas MacArthur|alt=Eight men in khaki uniforms, seated.]]
The way was now clear for the [[Battle of Luzon|invasion of Luzon]]. This time, based on different interpretations of the same intelligence data, Willoughby estimated the strength of General [[Tomoyuki Yamashita]]'s forces on Luzon at 137,000, while Sixth Army estimated it at 234,000. MacArthur's response was "Bunk!".{{sfn|Drea|1992|p=186}} He felt that even Willoughby's estimate was too high. "Audacity, calculated risk, and a clear strategic aim were MacArthur's attributes",{{sfn|Drea|1992|p=187}} and he disregarded the estimates. In fact, they were too low; Yamashita had more than 287,000 troops on Luzon.{{sfn|Drea|1992|pp=180–187}} This time, MacArthur traveled aboard the light cruiser {{USS|Boise|CL-47|6}}, watching as the ship was nearly hit by a bomb and torpedoes fired by [[midget submarine]]s.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=619–620}} His communiqué read: "The decisive battle for the liberation of the Philippines and the control of the Southwest Pacific is at hand. General MacArthur is in personal command at the front and landed with his assault troops."{{sfn|James|1975|p=622}}

MacArthur's primary concern was the capture of the port of Manila and the airbase at Clark Field, which were required to support future operations. He urged his commanders on.{{sfn|James|1975|p=629}} On 25 January 1945, he moved his advanced headquarters forward to [[Hacienda Luisita]], closer to the front than Krueger's.{{sfn|James|1975|p=623}} He ordered the 1st Cavalry Division to conduct a rapid advance on Manila. It reached the northern outskirts of Manila on 3 February,{{sfn|James|1975|pp=632–633}} but, unknown to the Americans, Rear Admiral [[Sanji Iwabuchi]] had decided to defend Manila to the death. The [[Battle of Manila (1945)|Battle of Manila]] raged for the next three weeks.{{sfn|Drea|1992|pp=195–200}} To spare the civilian population, MacArthur prohibited the use of air strikes,{{sfn|Rogers|1991|p=261}} but thousands of civilians died in the crossfire or Japanese massacres.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=642–644}} He also refused to restrict the traffic of civilians who clogged the roads in and out of Manila, placing humanitarian concerns above military ones except in emergencies.{{sfn|James|1975|p=654}} For his part in the capture of Manila, MacArthur was awarded his third Distinguished Service Cross.{{sfn|MacArthur|1964|p=244}}

After taking Manila, MacArthur installed one of his Filipino friends, [[Manuel Roxas]]—who also happened to be one of the few people who knew about the huge sum of money Quezon had given MacArthur in 1942—into a position of power that ensured Roxas was to become the next Filipino president.{{sfn|Weinberg|2004|p=863}} Roxas had been a leading Japanese collaborator serving in the puppet government of José Laurel, but MacArthur claimed that Roxas had secretly been an American agent all the long.{{sfn|Weinberg|2004|p=863}} About MacArthur's claim that Roxas was really part of the resistance, Weinberg wrote that "evidence to this effect has yet to surface", and that by favoring the Japanese collaborator Roxas, MacArthur ensured there was no serious effort to address the issue of Filipino collaboration with the Japanese after the war.{{sfn|Weinberg|2004|pp=863–864}} There was evidence that Roxas used his position of working in the Japanese puppet government to secretly gather intelligence to pass onto guerillas, MacArthur, and his intelligence staff during the occupation period.{{sfn|Keats|1963|pp=208–209}}{{sfn|Lapham|Norling|1996|pp=57–58}}

One of the major reasons for MacArthur to return to the Philippines was to liberate [[List of Japanese-run internment camps during World War II#Camps in the Philippines|prisoner-of-war camps and civilian internee camps]] as well as to relieve the Filipino civilians suffering at the hands of the very brutal Japanese occupiers. MacArthur authorized daring rescue raids at numerous prison camps like [[Raid at Cabanatuan|Cabanatuan]],<ref>{{cite web |author=<!-- no author listed --> |date=n.d. |title=Cabanatuan Camps |publisher=American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Museum |url=http://philippine-defenders.lib.wv.us/html/cabanatuan.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304192623/http://philippine-defenders.lib.wv.us/html/cabanatuan.html |archive-date=4 March 2016 |access-date=23 April 2021}}</ref> [[Raid on Los Baños|Los Baños]],<ref>{{cite web |last=Elphick |first=James |date=28 January 2019 |title=The day we saved 2,147 POWs from Los Baños Prison |website=WeAreTheMighty.com |url=https://www.wearethemighty.com/articles/the-day-we-saved-2147-pows-from-los-banos-prison/ |access-date=23 April 2021 |archive-date=23 April 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210423085459/https://www.wearethemighty.com/articles/the-day-we-saved-2147-pows-from-los-banos-prison/ }}</ref> and [[Santo Tomas Internment Camp#Arrival of the American Army|Santo Tomas]]. At Santo Tomas Japanese guards held 200 prisoners hostage, but the U.S. soldiers were able to negotiate safe passage for the Japanese to escape peacefully in exchange for the release of the prisoners.<ref>{{cite video |date=1 March 1945 |first=Ed |last=Herlihy |author-link=Ed Herlihy |title=Santo Tomas Prisoners Liberated |series=[[Universal Newsreel]] |publisher=Universal Studios |url=https://archive.org/details/1945-03-01_Santo_Tomas_Prisoners_Liberated |access-date=3 September 2021}}</ref>

After the Battle of Manila, MacArthur turned his attention to Yamashita, who had retreated into the mountains of central and northern Luzon.{{sfn|Murray|Millet|2001|pp=500–501}} Yamashita chose to fight a defensive campaign, being pushed back slowly by Krueger, and was still holding out at the time the war ended, much to MacArthur's intense annoyance as he had wished to liberate the entire Philippines before the war ended.{{sfn|Murray|Millet|2001|p=502}} On 2 September 1945, Yamashita (who had a hard time believing that the Emperor had ordered Japan to sign an armistice) came down from the mountains to surrender with some 50,500 of his men.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.history.army.mil/brochures/luzon/72-28.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071221031951/http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/luzon/72-28.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=21 December 2007 |title=Luzon 1944–1945 |publisher=U.S. Army Center of Military History |access-date=21 October 2024}}</ref>

====Southern Philippines====
[[File:Douglas MacArthur signs formal surrender.jpg|thumb|right|MacArthur signs the [[Japanese Instrument of Surrender]] aboard the USS ''Missouri''. American General [[Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright IV|Jonathan Wainwright]] and British General [[Arthur Percival]] stand behind him.|alt=MacArthur is seated a small desk, writing. Two men in uniform stand behind him. A large crowd of men in uniform look on.]]
Although MacArthur had no specific directive to do so, and the fighting on Luzon was far from over, he committed his forces to liberate the remainder of the Philippines.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=737–741}} In the GHQ communiqué on 5 July, he announced that the Philippines had been liberated and all operations ended, although Yamashita still held out in northern Luzon.{{sfn|James|1975|p=749}} Starting in May 1945, MacArthur used his Australian troops in the [[Borneo campaign (1945)|invasion of Borneo]]. He accompanied the [[Battle of North Borneo|assault on Labuan]] and visited the troops ashore. While returning to GHQ in Manila, he visited [[Davao City|Davao]], where he told Eichelberger that no more than 4,000 Japanese remained alive on Mindanao. A few months later, six times that number surrendered.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=757–761}} In July 1945, he was awarded his fourth Distinguished Service Medal.{{sfn|MacArthur|1964|p=260}}

As part of preparations for [[Operation Downfall]], the invasion of Japan, MacArthur became commander in chief U.S. Army Forces Pacific (AFPAC) in April 1945, assuming command of all Army and Army Air Force units in the Pacific except the [[Twentieth Air Force]]. At the same time, Nimitz became commander of all naval forces. Command in the Pacific therefore remained divided.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=725–726, 765–771}} During his planning of the invasion of Japan, MacArthur stressed to the decision-makers in Washington that it was essential to have the Soviet Union enter the war as he argued it was crucial to have the Red Army tie down the Kwantung army in Manchuria.{{sfn|Weinberg|2004|p=872}} Contrary to the claim that this meant that MacArthur urged Roosevelt to agree to every Soviet demand at the [[Yalta Conference]], he was in fact not told about any of the territorial concessions to the Soviet Union in Asia as agreed upon in the secret deal that Roosevelt made with [[Joseph Stalin]], and MacArthur said that he would not have supported the Soviet invasion of Manchuria had he known about the secret deal that involved [[Lüshun Port|Port Arthur]], other parts of Manchuria, and northern Korea being given by the western Allies to the Soviet Union.<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://time.com/archive/6610174/historical-notes-macarthur-yalta/ |title=Historical Notes: MacArthur & Yalta |magazine=Time |date=31 October 1955 |access-date=21 October 2024}}</ref> Unlike Nimitz, who was told about the [[atomic bomb]] in February 1945, MacArthur was not told about its existence until a few days before [[Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki|Hiroshima was bombed]].<ref>{{cite periodical |url=https://www.americanheritage.com/biggest-decision-why-we-had-drop-atomic-bomb |title=The Biggest Decision: Why We Had to Drop the Atomic Bomb |last=Maddox  |first=Robert James |periodical=American Heritage |date=1995 |volume=46 |issue=3 |access-date=21 October 2024}}</ref> The invasion was pre-empted by the [[surrender of Japan]] in August 1945. On 2 September MacArthur accepted the [[Japanese Instrument of Surrender|formal Japanese surrender]] aboard the [[battleship]] {{USS|Missouri|BB-63|6}}, thus ending hostilities in World War II.{{sfn|James|1975|pp=786–792}} In recognition of his role as a maritime strategist, the U.S. Navy awarded him the [[Navy Distinguished Service Medal]].{{sfn|MacArthur|1964|p=265}}