BATTLE OF THE PACIFIC: End Run, Touchdown

For miserable weeks, while U.S. ground forces on Leyte were half submerged in a sea of mud, the Sixth Army's leathery 63-year-old commander, Lieut. General Walter Krueger, had been planning to break the Philippine stalemate. As part of his plan he had insisted that U.S. patrols must keep the initiative: mud or no mud, they must keep the enemy off balance. Said Krueger: "I asked my troops to do the impossible and they did it." The next phase of Krueger's plan required the 7th and 32nd Divisions to step up their pres...