He pulled off his coat and threw it down, and declared he'd fight the whole boodle of 'em

a crossfloree […] supported with pillarets

Admiral Kurita has no identification charts for escort carriers, and so, assumes that the distant targets are fleet carriers. Commensurately, by scale, their escorts must either be battleships or cruisers. The Japanese forces therefore continue to load armor-piercing rounds, what will turn out to be a very fortuitous mistake for their targets for as long as it lasts.

…such a tree can be built up incrementally by adding the shortest edge not yet explored, which also maintains treeness (acyclicity).