Battle of the Philippines (1941–42)
| Battle of the Philippines | |||||||||
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| Part of the Pacific Theatre of World War II | |||||||||
 A burial detail of Filipino prisoners of war uses improvised litters to carry fallen comrades at Camp O'Donnell, Capas, Tarlac, 1942, following the Bataan Death March. |
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| Belligerents | |||||||||
 Empire of Japan
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| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
 Masaharu Homma
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  Douglas MacArthur Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright IV (POW) Manuel L. Quezon Paulino T. Santos Basilio J. Valdez Vicente Lim Alfredo M. Santos Mateo Capinpin
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| Strength | |||||||||
| 129,435 troops 90 tanks 541 aircraft |
151,000 troops 108 tanks 277 aircraft |
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| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
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22,500 9,000 killed 500 missing 13,200 wounded |
146,000 25,000 killed 21,000 wounded 100,000 captured |
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The Philippines Campaign (Filipino: Kampanya sa Pilipinas or Labanan sa Pilipinas) or the Battle of the Philippines, fought 8 December 1941 – 8 May 1942, was the invasion of the Philippines by Imperial Japan and the defense of the islands by United States and Filipino forces during the Second World War.
The Japanese launched the invasion by sea from Formosa over 200 miles to the north of the Philippines. The defending forces outnumbered the Japanese invaders by 3 to 2, however they were a mixed force of non-combat experienced regular, national guard, constabulary and newly created Commonwealth units. The Japanese used first-line troops at the outset of the campaign concentrating forces in the first month enabling a swift overrun of most of Luzon.
The Japanese high command, believing they had won the campaign, made a strategic decision to advance by a month their timetable of operations in Borneo and Indonesia, withdrawing their best division and the bulk of their airpower in early January 1942. This, coupled with the decision of the defenders to withdraw into a defensive holding position in the Bataan Peninsula, enabled the Americans and Filipinos to successfully hold out for four more months.
The conquest of the Philippines by Japan is often considered the worst military defeat in United States history. Twenty-three thousand American military personnel were killed or captured and Filipino soldiers killed or captured totaled around 100,000.
The Japanese planned to occupy the Philippines as part of their plan for a "Greater East Asia War" in which their Southern Expeditionary Army Group seized sources of raw materials in Malaya and the Netherlands East Indies while the Combined Fleet neutralized the United States Pacific Fleet.
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