The US invasion of Leyte on October 20, 1944, prompted the Japanese to activate plan Shō-1, the defense of the Philippines. The Imperial Japanese Navy would seek a decisive battle in Leyte Gulf, while the Imperial Japanese Army would significantly reinforce its forces on Leyte to fight a decisive battle with the Sixth US Army on the island. American troops invaded the beaches south of Tacloban with limited resistance from the Japanese defenders, allowing MacArthur to make good his promise to return with an iconic photo of him wading ashore alongside Philippine President Sergio Osmeña and members of the SWPA staff. The US and Japanese navies then fought a decisive four-day battle for supremacy in the waters surrounding the Philippines, which the US Third and Seventh Fleets won after some anxious moments in the fighting off the coast of Samar. Japanese kamikazes made their appearance on the final day of the battle, and they would bedevil the US Pacific Fleet from that point onward until the end of the war. After the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the remaining elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy would never again contest the Pacific Ocean.