The Allies had taken control of all strategically and economically important locations of Luzon by March 1945, although pockets of Japanese resistance held out in the mountains until the unconditional surrender of Japan.

[24] While not the highest in U.S. casualties, it is the highest net casualty battle U.S. forces fought in World War II, with 192,000 to 217,000 Japanese combatants dead (mostly from starvation and disease),[25] 8,000 American combatants killed, and over 150,000 Filipinos, overwhelmingly civilians who were murdered by Japanese forces, mainly during the Manila massacre of February 1945.

General Douglas MacArthur—who was in charge of the defense of the Philippines at the time—was ordered to Australia, and the remaining U.S. forces retreated to the Bataan Peninsula.

[27] This would place his troops close to several roads and railways on Luzon, which led to Manila—the main objective—through the plains in the center of the island.

These deception operations failed to convince General Yamashita, the leader of the Imperial Japanese Army in the Philippines, and he built significant defensive positions in the hills and mountains surrounding Lingayen Gulf in Northern Luzon.

[30] [27] Aircraft from the 3rd Fleet, including Mexico's 201st squadron, assisted the landings with close air support, strafing and bombing Japanese gun positions.

XIV Corps under General Oscar Griswold then advanced south toward Manila, despite Krueger's concerns that his eastern flank was unprotected and vulnerable if the Japanese forces attacked.

Krueger had more tanks held in reserve to the north because of the threat of an unknown number of Japanese tanks being withheld from combat until ambushing them en masse in the exposed open flat plains of Central Luzon so the 76 Shermans and Stuarts and accompanying M7 Priests were tasked with finding and destroying them with their superior guns and armor.

[citation needed] In the campaign to recapture the island of Luzon in the Philippines, American planes dropped more than one million gallons of napalm in support of ground forces.

Small groups of the remaining Japanese forces retreated to the mountainous areas in the north and southeast of the island, where they were besieged for months.

Pockets of Japanese soldiers held out in the mountains—most ceasing resistance with the unconditional surrender of Japan, but a scattered few holding out for many years afterwards.

After the Japanese surrender it was revealed that Yamashita's Shobu group in northern Luzon had enough food to sustain themselves for only one more month.

Yamashita had planned on committing suicide if the war had continued and almost all of his remaining men died of starvation and were no longer able to fight.