When This American Tank Sank a Japanese Warship — The Only Time in History
WHEN AN AMERICAN TANK SANK A JAPANESE WARSHIP — A NIGHT THAT REWROTE MILITARY HISTORY
On the night of December 11, 1944, along a shattered stretch of waterfront in Ormoc Bay, Philippines, something happened that had never occurred before in modern warfare — and has never happened since.
An American Army tank destroyer sank a Japanese naval vessel.
It was not a coordinated naval engagement. There were no destroyers exchanging broadsides, no aircraft screaming in from the sky. Instead, the decisive blow came from an M10 tank destroyer — a vehicle designed to kill enemy tanks on European battlefields — firing from shore at a Japanese transport attempting to land troops.
For the soldiers of the U.S. Army’s 77th Infantry Division, it was simply another night of combat. For military history, it became a singular event.
An Infantry Division Facing the Navy
By December 1944, the battle for Leyte was entering its most desperate phase. Japanese General Tomoyuki Yamashita was attempting to reinforce his collapsing defenses by sea, sending transport vessels and barges into Ormoc Bay under cover of darkness. If those troops reached shore, American forces would face weeks of additional fighting in the mountains.
Stopping naval reinforcements was supposed to be the U.S. Navy’s job. But on the western coast of Leyte, the responsibility fell unexpectedly to the 77th Infantry Division — an Army unit composed largely of middle-aged reservists, many in their early 30s.
They were accountants, taxi drivers, factory workers. Other divisions called them “the old bastards.”
On the night of December 11, Corporal James McKenzie was crouched behind a broken concrete wall overlooking Ormoc Bay when he spotted dark silhouettes moving across the water. At least five Japanese vessels were approaching, carrying an estimated 750 troops.
The Army had no coastal artillery there. What they did have were three M10 tank destroyers positioned along the waterfront for ground support.
No manual covered what happened next.
Turning Tank Guns on Ships
The M10 carried a 3-inch armor-piercing gun, effective against German tanks at ranges up to 1,000 yards. Whether it could sink a ship was unknown. No one had ever tried.
At midnight, American mortar teams fired illumination flares, turning the bay into a stark white stage. The lead Japanese vessel — Transport No. 159, an 800-ton landing ship — was already beached and unloading troops.
The M10 crew had seconds to act.
The first round struck just above the waterline. The armor-piercing shell punched clean through the thin hull plating, detonating inside the cargo hold. Water poured in immediately.
A second round hit below the waterline.
Transport No. 159 began to sink.
Within minutes, Japanese troops were scrambling into the water as American artillery and machine guns opened fire. The vessel flooded beyond recovery and slipped beneath the surface.
It would not be the last.
An 18-Minute Engagement
As additional flares lit the bay, more Japanese vessels pressed forward. Barges scattered, hoping to evade fire. Another transport pushed toward shore under intense bombardment.
They did not succeed.
American forces unleashed everything available: 40mm anti-aircraft guns firing horizontally, self-propelled howitzers blasting high-explosive shells, heavy machine guns raking the water — and the M10 tank destroyers firing armor-piercing rounds designed to kill Tigers and Panthers.
By the end of the 18-minute engagement, all five Japanese vessels had been destroyed.
Estimated Japanese casualties: 750.
American casualties: zero.
One M10 fired seven rounds. Another fired five. The third fired three.
Fifteen tank shells had wiped out an entire reinforcement force.
A Result No One Expected
The following morning, General Andrew D. Bruce, commander of the 77th Infantry Division, sent a brief report up the chain of command. Even senior officers struggled to believe it.
An infantry division had sunk enemy ships.
In January 1945, the U.S. Army conducted an official investigation. Divers examined the wrecks in Ormoc Bay. Transport No. 159 lay in 15 feet of water, its hull pierced by two perfectly circular holes — exactly three inches in diameter.
Recovered shell fragments were traced to armor-piercing rounds manufactured in 1944 at the Watervliet Arsenal in New York.
The conclusion was unequivocal: M10 tank destroyers had sunk Japanese naval vessels.
It was the only confirmed instance in World War II — in any theater — where armored fighting vehicles destroyed warships from shore.
Tactical Flexibility, Not Heroics
No medals were awarded for the action. The crews received no special recognition. To the Army, it was considered part of normal defensive operations.
General Bruce later wrote that the engagement demonstrated the defining characteristic of the 77th Infantry Division: flexibility.
“They cared less about what the manual said,” one officer later remarked, “and more about stopping the enemy.”
That mindset carried the division through Leyte and later Okinawa, where the fighting would be far bloodier.
A Footnote That Ended Reinforcements
The consequences, however, were immediate. Japanese commanders abandoned attempts to reinforce Ormoc by sea. Within days, Yamashita ceased all convoy operations into the bay.
Cut off from resupply, Japanese forces in the mountains were doomed.
Strategically, the night of December 11 helped seal the outcome of the Leyte campaign.
Historically, it created a footnote that still stands alone.
Remembering the Men
The last surviving crew member of the M10 that sank Transport No. 159 died in 2003. He had never spoken publicly about that night. Like many veterans of the 77th, he returned home quietly, resumed civilian life, and rarely spoke of the war.
They did not think of themselves as extraordinary.
But on one night in December 1944, they did something no soldiers had ever done before — or would ever do again.
They turned a tank into a ship killer, because the mission demanded it.
And history took note.
