I don't know why you question if it's working as intended?
You said Wataga attacked them an hour after your battle. One hour was the cooldown timer in strat 3, and it appears that it's the same in strat 4 (based on your own experience).
I personally like the cool down timer. For me in strat 3 (before the timer was implemented), I literally attacked someone right on the doorstep to a large City. I won the battle, and the second it was over I entered the city. The second it was over, someone waiting on top of me attacked. I physically showed my guy being in the city (could buy stuff, see myself and the other people inside the city, etc), however the guy attacked me and I was forced to fight the battle (and lose). I bitched up a storm to the admins about this, and that may be part of the reason this was implemented, to fix that issue and give the people a chance to retreat slightly before someone else can attack.
The point of waiting 24 hours is to give the defender a chance to get people to sign up for their roster, but that 24 hours also allows someone to march over and wait for the battle to be over, so I think that's why it's necessary to leave the 1 hour cooldown after battle.