- 7/6/2025
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00:00:00During the long bitter struggle of the Second World War one weapon was paramount to the final
00:00:26outcome of victory a weapon that was so secret it was almost never spoken of on land air and sea it was a weapon that spanned the globe it brought together the world's top scientific and military minds it brought women for the first time into the front line of battle it also helped deliver the most destructive force of World War two yet this was a weapon that was invisible to the enemy
00:00:56it was called radar every single battle that was fought by americans by british troops radar became a key component
00:01:09we saw it grow up and it became our tool to help defeat the enemy thank god for radar united states navy
00:01:17using extraordinary archive film and color reenactments battle stations uncovers the invisible world of radar wars
00:01:27at a secret meeting in berlin on february the 26 1935 adolf hitler officially created the german luftfalfa
00:01:42appointing hermann goering as its commander-in-chief they were creating an air force that intended to
00:01:47destroy everything that stood in its path
00:01:51little did hitler and the top nazi chiefs gathered for this momentous occasion know
00:01:56that on that very day a small van was making its way to a remote meadow near the english village of daventry
00:02:02inside was a 43 year old research scientist named robert watson watt and his assistant arnold watkins
00:02:13what they were going to try and prove was that it was possible to detect an aircraft before it saw you
00:02:21until that time the only way of obtaining advance warning against attacks by aircraft
00:02:25was either by spotters on the ground or from fighters hoping to locate them in the air
00:02:32as german bombers became faster such methods were not enough to prevent an attack
00:02:38something else had to be found
00:02:41since the early 1930s scientists in several countries had been experimenting with radio beams
00:02:48it was known that when these beams hit certain objects they were deflected
00:02:51yet was there a use that this knowledge could be put to
00:02:57well of all these places in the world that invented radar britain was the one that had the most pressing
00:03:02need to to fast forward its development as uh as a defensive weapon they knew that you had aircraft
00:03:08that were going to be capable of delivering bombs and this previously isolated island was an island no more
00:03:14in 1934 the british air ministry set up a committee under a prestigious oxford trained chemist called henry tizard
00:03:23his task was to investigate new technologies as an effective defense against air attacks
00:03:30they looked at things like infrared detection acoustic mirrors acoustic warning systems barrage balloons
00:03:38and even this idea of a death ray that somehow could find enemy pilots and zap them in the cockpit
00:03:47the air ministry offered a prize of 1000 pounds to anyone who could build a death ray that could kill
00:03:53a sheep at 100 yards although this appeared to be in the realm of science fiction at the time the british
00:03:59government was worried that the germans were working on such devices
00:04:02robert watson watt was uh asked to investigate this possibility when he examined the state of science
00:04:11and technology he realized quickly that a death ray was not feasible but he proposed this alternative idea
00:04:18and this was the idea of radio detection the tisad committee were enthusiastic but before they
00:04:25committed the necessary funds to develop this theory they needed a successful demonstration
00:04:31watson watt had known that when an aircraft flew over a radio transmitter mast it caused a fading of the
00:04:37radio signal after a series of trials and experiments he was ready to prove his theory
00:04:44he asked an raf hayford bomber to fly a course between two bbc radio towers
00:04:54inside the darkened van they intently watched the screen for some sign of the aircraft
00:05:00the plane moved from left to right so the signal changed in length
00:05:14as the aircraft flew at different heights again the signal changed
00:05:19the blip remained on the screen until the plane was eight miles away
00:05:23the experiment was totally successful
00:05:30it was a revelation watson watt apparently exclaimed britain is once again and pilot
00:05:37he foresaw even then the possibility that britain could erect what was essentially an electromagnetic
00:05:44burglar alarm all around its shores that could see out
00:05:49uh tens if not a hundred miles to to detect german bombers on their way
00:05:59robert watson watt's system went into overdrive when in 1936 the british government saw the havoc
00:06:05that hitler's luftwaffe had inflicted on cities and the civilian population during the spanish civil war
00:06:10it suddenly became clear that waves of enemy bombers could fly over their cities leveling them in a reign
00:06:20of bombs with absolutely nothing to warn of their approach
00:06:26soon 350 foot high radar towers began to sprout up around the coastline of britain
00:06:32this was the beginning of a construction program
00:06:35that would enable the raf to search the skies for any threatening sign the towers however were not
00:06:41always greeted with enthusiasm local landowners were worried that they might actually interfere with their hunting
00:06:50by late 1938 britain had constructed a series of these towers all along the coast of britain
00:06:56from portsmouth in the south to scotland in the north each tower's transmission range
00:07:01extended to over 100 miles together they formed an invisible shield that no aircraft could penetrate
00:07:08undetected this entire web of surveillance became known as the chain home system
00:07:18by mid 1939 reports from german spies in britain were reaching the luftwaffe that a number of tall masts
00:07:25had been erected along british coastal sites to the germans this indicated that they must be
00:07:30associated with some form of military radio or radar it was crucial to the luftwaffe to try and discover
00:07:37what the british actually had to this end the germans decided to use an obsolete method to find out the
00:07:45true state of british radar they commissioned the retired graf zeppelin airship
00:07:52during the summer months of 1939 this grand old lady of flight was flown up and down the british coastline
00:07:59this was to become the world's first electronic surveillance mission now one day it was the third of
00:08:05august 1939 the ch station observed a massive echo approaching from the east uh at about 60 knots far bigger
00:08:20echo than they'd ever seen before and their first reaction was that it was an invasion fleet
00:08:27with the barrage balloons to protect it from an air attack we tracked it on radar the whole way
00:08:35the zeppelin was crammed with electrical surveillance equipment but as the germans flew over the masts
00:08:41all they received was meaningless clutter and static mistakenly the german team was monitoring the wrong
00:08:48frequency or wave bands it would be one of the costliest mistakes of world war ii now we concluded that
00:08:57they had been accurately observing our radar system so they would have gone back loaded with that
00:09:04information we assumed that as soon as war broke out we could expect a massive attack on the radar system
00:09:12for the confused germans all that their equipment told them was that the british had no operational radar
00:09:20they thought the towers might have been some form of civilian aircraft landing system
00:09:24they thought the war was that the battle of britain was as good as one
00:09:33goering was entirely dismissive of what he called these radio installations
00:09:37you don't fight a war with radio installations you fight them with bombers
00:09:41by the outbreak of world war ii on september the 3rd 1939 the whole of the vulnerable east coast of britain
00:09:53was now under continuous radar watch robert watson what system had been improved to the point where
00:10:00it could detect an enemy aircraft by day or night in any weather it had taken only four years to reach
00:10:07this point since that first experiment in an english meadow yet the period of development was now over
00:10:15the first bombers were about to wreak havoc on britain radar was about to be put to the test
00:10:27with the outbreak of world war ii the world held its breath as hitler's army swept over europe
00:10:33only the narrow english channel now stood between britain and total defeat hitler's plan to invade
00:10:43england depended on his luftwaffe taking control of the skies hermann goering boasted that his luftwaffe
00:10:49would smash the raf's fighters within a month an integral part of britain's defense plan against such
00:10:56an attack was robert watson watts chain home system but with nearly every man in britain
00:11:03involved in essential war work a way of manning these radar stations had to be found the solution
00:11:09was simple they were to be staffed almost exclusively by wax the women's auxiliary air force these women
00:11:17some as young as 18 were amongst the first frontline women used in war i was interviewed by
00:11:24a wife officer i'd never seen a wife officer in a uniform before because they were not any uniform
00:11:31force because of course she'd bought her bought her own and i thought oh if i wear one like that it'd be
00:11:37all right we were all volunteers i must say creme de la creme of course we had um two canadian girls
00:11:47there were some very very nice girls there trained in the new use of radar and plotting room procedure
00:11:54these women would hold the balance of the forthcoming battle of britain in their hands
00:12:00speed in getting their information to fighter command headquarters was paramount
00:12:06a fighter plane needed 13 minutes to reach its operational height
00:12:11a german bomber could cross the english channel in only five minutes
00:12:16this meant that with the 20 minutes warning radar could give there was almost no room for error
00:12:21the fighter room commander needed exact information as to height number and position of where the
00:12:29bombers would be he would then decide which squadrons of fighters to scramble to meet the enemy the
00:12:36gathering of this vital information fell to the women in the radar and filter rooms
00:12:45when a radar station spotted a contact on their screens they telephoned this information to the
00:12:49filter room here around a large-scale map of the british coastline stood the waft filter plotters
00:12:57as each radar contact was phoned in they placed on the map colored discs to indicate the position of the contact
00:13:06one of the problems of the early radar stations the chain home stations
00:13:11is that they were not very accurate they had the shortcoming that you've got a plot on an incoming aircraft
00:13:17it's observed position was not its true position its observed height was not its true height so we had the process of calibration
00:13:29this was the job of the filter officers these recently recruited scientists with knowledge of radar
00:13:36would assess the counters on the table and decide whether the information from other stations related to the same aircraft
00:13:42if they did they would replace the counters with a rectangular marker an arrow was then added to show
00:13:48the direction of the contact with all these officers and plotters shuffling counters around the table
00:13:54it resembled a frenzied children's game and was known as mad ludo you were hit by noise and heat
00:14:03and bedlam so it was very noisy very very hectic on a viewing gantry above the table a waft was listening
00:14:16to fighter command headquarters it was her job to monitor the movement of friendly aircraft from radio messages
00:14:23if the plot on the table matched the track of friendly aircraft she would illuminate the plot with
00:14:28the letter f for friend from a light gun the other tracks would be marked with the letter h for hostile
00:14:37once the filter officer saw the letter h he would immediately inform the fighter command room giving
00:14:42them position height and direction of the german bombers britain was vastly outnumbered in terms of planes
00:14:49and it couldn't afford to keep flights aloft at all times just waiting for an attack to come
00:14:55it had to husband its resources in some way and this was the key this integration into a command
00:15:00and control system that got the right planes to the right spot
00:15:08as the summer of 1940 approached goering was poised to unleash the might of his luftwaffe against britain
00:15:15he had over 3 000 aircraft britain had just 600 fighters
00:15:19but as its eyes and ears the raf had watts and watts chain home radar system throughout the build-up to
00:15:28the battle of britain wolfgang martini the luftwaffe head of signals had become convinced that those masts
00:15:35dotted along britain's coast were much more than aircraft landing towers he finally persuaded goering to
00:15:41allow the luftwaffe to bomb them it was sunday august the eighth at one o'clock in the afternoon
00:15:4819 year old avis parsons was alone at her radar post when they started to send the 100 plus over
00:15:56that 100 plus aircraft had never been seen on a radar screen and it was just it's difficult to say
00:16:04it's just a blurred mass and we had to almost guess how many aircraft there were
00:16:19suddenly the telephone rang and it was a sergeant saying duck which meant take cover and all i said
00:16:26was um i cannot i've got too much information coming through and he just said i'll leave it to you
00:16:32the most uncanny noises these aircraft and they started diving and the stuka shrieks and it makes the
00:16:50most blood-curdling sound and then there's the shriek of the bomb of course as it drops
00:16:59uh carried on i don't know quite how long it was at all until um the line went dead
00:17:07for her gallantry and staying at her radar post throughout the bombing
00:17:11avis parsons was awarded one of britain's highest honors the military medal
00:17:15i received it from the king at bucking palace and he decorated 306
00:17:25people that morning only three women
00:17:29of all the radar stations bombed just one was temporarily put out of action
00:17:36goering was so convinced that britain did not have radar that he never ordered his bombers to
00:17:41attack the radar masts again it was to be his greatest blunder and would have enormous consequences
00:17:47for the battle for britain britain had her back to the wall as wave after wave of german bombers launched
00:17:55a barrage of terrifying attacks as each flight came across the english channel they were plotted by the
00:18:02wafts of the royal air force you would be getting more and more coming in and you'd know you'd look
00:18:10across to somebody else and they were getting a lot in and you'd wink you know or something you knew
00:18:15that was something big coming in you just got on with the job you just did the job it was there you did
00:18:21it there's no anxiety at all if you're going to be bombed well you were going to be bombed
00:18:29sometimes as they plotted the luftwaffe these women knew that the bombers were headed for their home towns
00:18:36you thought of houses and roads and people
00:18:40and if your house had been very badly damaged in bombing you knew what was coming to somebody
00:18:48all you could do was pray
00:18:57as the battle increased the hard-pressed germans were unable to understand where the raf got their
00:19:02apparently inexhaustible supply of fighters
00:19:08the reality was that the raf was fast running out of reserves
00:19:13had the luftwaffe continued to bomb the raf airfields for just a few more days
00:19:17the british might have lost the battle but radar made them appear so much stronger than they actually were
00:19:24by the end of september 1940 the battle for britain was over goering's mighty luftwaffe had failed to win
00:19:35mastery of the skies over britain he had lost over 1200 aircraft and the luftwaffe would never bomb
00:19:43britain by daylight again i think that one intelligence failure of the grand zeppelin mission
00:19:51cost gory the battle of britain that's my opinion and had we lost the battle of britain what would
00:19:58have been the consequences radar had helped to save britain but it was just one victory in the battle to
00:20:07defeat nazi germany if radar was to win the war then britain needed help that would come from the colossal
00:20:15technological expertise of america and would push radar to its very limits in the battle for the pacific
00:20:30by summer 1940 as britain was fighting for its very life prime minister winston
00:20:35churchill made a momentous decision he knew that for britain to win the war
00:20:40she needed america's engineering and manufacturing resources an important aspect of the war was that
00:20:47while we had the creative ability to develop the most advanced radars in the world we did not have
00:20:53the production capacity and we needed the americans productivity resources in august of that year
00:21:02churchill authorized henry tizar to form a team and unconditionally to share the secrets of radar with
00:21:07the united states the british heads of military branches were very reluctant to share some of
00:21:13these early secrets with the americans churchill had a different attitude it was we can't do this
00:21:21by ourselves we don't have time to worry about secrets amongst the papers and plans of this highly
00:21:28secret mission was something that would forever change the course of the war the cavity magnetron
00:21:35invented by two british scientists this device greatly magnified the radar signal and could track objects
00:21:41that early radar could never do this was a device that looked a lot like a clay pigeon used in skeet
00:21:48shooting could fit in the palm of a hand yet it could put out on a wavelength of 10 centimeters microwave
00:21:54energy powerful radio waves that were about a thousand times more powerful than any other transmitter known
00:22:01on that wavelength so this was a uh this wasn't just an evolution this was a revolution ironically this
00:22:10quantum leap in science was not sent to america under armed guard although shrouded in secrecy it made
00:22:16its momentous journey via london taxi cab passenger train and ocean liner but when the cavity magnetron finally
00:22:26arrived in america it stunned its top scientists this would open the doors to the u.s radar program
00:22:32and in doing so would also help modernize their own armaments when the british opened up this black box
00:22:40and especially showed the magnetron it blew the americans away they felt that overnight their their own
00:22:48fledgling microwave radar techniques had been advanced two years the official historian james finney baxter in
00:22:55describing the magnetron wrote that when the british brought one to america they brought the most
00:22:59valuable cargo ever carried to our shores research immediately started at mit the massachusetts institute
00:23:08of technology in a laboratory called the radiation laboratory or rad lab rad lab enlisted the best and
00:23:15brightest minds that america could offer there began a recruiting drive the likes of which we never saw again
00:23:23uh they brought in the best known physicists in america they'd routinely get a call that would say
00:23:29something like come join this effort that we have i was recruited by telephone at the end of 1940
00:23:40with an encouragement that suggested that maybe the draft board would look favorably upon me if i were
00:23:46working in a technical field such was the secrecy surrounding rad lab the american public were oblivious
00:23:54to what was being developed most were completely unaware that the clock was ticking its countdown to war
00:24:01but for the newly recruited scientists at mit the importance of their work was not lost on them
00:24:08this was an important project there wasn't any question about that at all
00:24:13we were going to get this solved and everybody was expected to pitch in and do it and we were anxious
00:24:19to get this job done and maybe even get to get back to our regular jobs before too long
00:24:31as 1941 wore on few top american officials now doubted that the u.s would soon be fighting hitler in europe
00:24:39but initially the sword of war was to strike from a different part of the world completely
00:24:48on the morning of december the 7th 1941 aircraft launched by a carrier task force of the japanese
00:24:54imperial navy struck the navy base at pearl harbor in hawaii in the 110 minutes of the attack american
00:25:03forces suffered over 2400 killed 300 planes lost and every battleship in the pacific fleet was either sunk or damaged
00:25:12a shocked america charged into war with japan the question on everyone's minds was how could the japanese
00:25:27have made such an attack undetected what very few people knew was that the japanese had been picked up on
00:25:35the american radar the u.s army had deployed five new mobile radar stations on the island of oahu
00:25:43these were long-range sets capable of detecting intruders as far away as 150 miles
00:25:50this radar was being operated by two army personnel they were actually there in training
00:25:56and they were due to shut down at 7 a.m and the junior officer persuaded his boss to keep it open a
00:26:04little longer and lo and behold there was the blip of what turned out to be the japanese air invasion
00:26:13they actually tracked the planes for a while they relayed the information to their command post
00:26:21and the lieutenant on duty failed to put the pieces together he had heard this vague rumor of some
00:26:27american bombers doing from the mainland around that time and he thought this must be what they were
00:26:35seeing he told them to forget about it they tracked the invasion into about 20 miles when
00:26:41the planes disappeared behind some hills the rest as they say is history
00:26:47but the radar fiasco at pearl harbor had a valuable silver lining since it did much to alert the u.s
00:26:54military to the importance of radar and to speed up its development and deployment the arrival of pearl
00:27:01harbor clearly presented a different atmosphere in which to work the principal change that i can detect
00:27:10in looking back is that the military were now definitely interested in what was going on
00:27:16in our experimental laboratory thrust into the crucible of a bitter pacific war and with nearly all of
00:27:25its surface fleet decimated the u.s high command had only one choice left open to them as to how to
00:27:31take the war against the japanese it had to be the submarine service but could the new radar sets with their
00:27:39most advanced capabilities to date be outfitted for submarines in time to avenge the attack on pearl harbor
00:27:48the attack on pearl harbor had severely damaged the u.s pacific fleet a shocked america repulsed by the
00:27:55unprovoked aggression of the japanese launched themselves into war hours after the attack on the
00:28:03the afternoon of december the 7th 1941 the chief of u.s naval operations issued an order to execute
00:28:10unrestricted air and submarine warfare against japan with this call to arms the submarine force went on
00:28:18the offensive hundreds of new recruits volunteered to join the silent service
00:28:24they were to be the pioneers of the new technology of submarine radar the training was very hard
00:28:33actually uh there was a 50 percent failure rate at submarine school it was very uh strict
00:28:41i knew nothing about radar when i first went on a submarine i didn't even know what the word was
00:28:47and for some time even the word was classified but i began to learn about it because i had to
00:28:59alongside these volunteers dozens of the silent killers were being built and rushed into service
00:29:05nothing was going to stand in their way
00:29:11in may 1942 a unit was formed that combined the scientists of mit
00:29:17and the armed forces its purpose was to streamline any bureaucratic obstacles that might hinder the
00:29:22development of radar now science could work hand in hand with the military they had all kinds of
00:29:29spec lists for anti-aircraft guns for ships for search and warning for airborne interception for
00:29:39bombing all kinds of different uh uses and they would come and tell about their needs
00:29:45and at the same time the rad lab would say we have this new thing that could do something you never
00:29:51thought of before maybe uh what do you think about that so you had this unique give and take shopping list
00:29:57but also this kind of like kid in a candy store thing like oh i want that you know
00:30:04i have to say the word red tape i don't think had ever been invented back then
00:30:08none of us had ever heard of the idea of having our work interrupted by people who were keeping track
00:30:18of things on pieces of paper to see how much they cost or whether they were in stock or anything of that
00:30:25sort now the u.s submarine service was ready to come into its own utilizing the new technologies
00:30:33as pioneered at mit radar was being developed that would prove more than equal to the japanese
00:30:40japan entered world war ii with its own radar systems that were maybe six months behind the
00:30:48american and british systems by the end of the war the best assessments from the intelligence debrief
00:30:55debriefers showed that they were about four years behind
00:30:59using the newly developed radar units u.s submarines could now pinpoint japanese vessels and aircraft
00:31:07from much farther away well beyond the upper limits of the inferior japanese electronic equipment
00:31:14the tide of the pacific war was about to be turned so much so that a japanese officer likened the battle
00:31:21between the americans with their new radar technology as being like a fight between the sighted and the blind
00:31:29the operators of these new eyes of the submarine were held in awe by their fellow crew members
00:31:35the first radar man we had we looked at him as god radar was a very important item for submarines
00:31:42during world war ii and i think it gave us the edge over the enemy because we could see what was going
00:31:48on and he couldn't see us while we were watching the ability to see and not be detected was honed to a fine
00:31:56out but it was not just down to the radar operators to stand watch it was a team effort
00:32:03when we were on the surface we'd have a watch section there were three watches there'd be a radar
00:32:08operator uh he'd have a relief there'd be the lookouts there'd be the radioman it was a whole
00:32:15whole watch section one third of the crew was actually running running the boat
00:32:19it's hot cramped so you're sitting on this black conning tower with a red light eerie kind of thing
00:32:30you might say it was dark but also your screen showed up better in the dark
00:32:39then the initial radar also was manually trained the antenna was so the operator
00:32:46the operator stood and he cranked the antenna manually and that was tiresome you had to peer
00:32:53into that scope constantly that caused eye fatigue and if the operator was training the antenna and just
00:33:03happened to look away for a second he could miss seeing a target
00:33:08with the new radar the submarines were continuously locking in and destroying the enemy when you get
00:33:18a contact of course the adrenaline kicks in
00:33:25everybody's coming down manning their stations forward power planes stream planes the helms when
00:33:32we go to the sonar gear and we're on our way down
00:33:40using their radar the submarines were able to operate in hunter killer groups and take control of the
00:33:46pacific
00:33:49another use that we had for the sj radar was to home on other submarines especially when our
00:33:57submarines were operating in a wolf pack uh and we sort of lost track of where they were we could
00:34:04seek them out quite well by homing on their own radar emission
00:34:15using these tactics the radar equipped submarines were able to hunt down japanese shipping slowly squeezing
00:34:21the life out of the empire's industrial and military might
00:34:33but it was not a one-sided fight whenever the us submarines torpedoed a ship the japanese escort ships
00:34:40would ruthlessly hunt them down
00:34:44once below the surface radar could not protect them from the ensuing depth charges
00:34:49well it feels like you're sitting in a drum and somebody's hitting it with a sledgehammer
00:34:55depending on how close if it's not too close you hear the detonator go off first
00:35:00it's two click click click bang and if it's close you don't hear the click click you just hear the bang
00:35:08the boat will rock a little bit depending how close the depth charges come
00:35:20everybody has their own level of fear uh some guys can take it a little more than the other
00:35:26the other person but uh everybody is afraid of them we had one one young fella get on his knees when
00:35:33we'd be in depth charge he was scared he was scared he thought that we were going to rip open and this was his day
00:35:39uh that he was going to die yeah by mid 1944 the japanese were still unbeaten but it was becoming
00:35:50evident they were beginning to lose the war at sea more and more radar systems were being rushed into the
00:35:57conflict but there was one system that would play a vital but little known role in delivering the bombs that
00:36:04would end the war by late 1944 the silent service had the finest radar that science could provide
00:36:16refining their methods of attack the american submarines became the single greatest enemy of
00:36:21any ship flying the japanese flag
00:36:31shortly after midnight on the 21st of november 1944 the uss sea lion was patrolling on the surface
00:36:38off the coast of taiwan when she picked up a radar contact radar picked up an object which we thought
00:36:45was land because it was at a great distance about 40 000 yards until the radar operator said if it's land
00:36:51it's moving so the captain was called to the bridge and he decided to go where the radar picked up the pips
00:36:59and as we get closer we could see that there was seven ships in the formation which was a task force
00:37:07two of the ships were very very large now we could not see the ship this was radar that was
00:37:12telling us what was there good they were going straight on no zigzagging
00:37:17stand by fire one
00:37:31we got three hits on the first target and we spun around and fired three torpedoes from the stern tubes
00:37:38at the second battleship in formation and we got one hit when we hit the ship sure there was a lot of
00:37:44jubilation
00:37:47with its radar the sea lion had sunk the 31 000 ton battleship congo it was the only battleship to be
00:37:54sunk by a solo submarine in the pacific her loss struck another severe blow to the japanese navy
00:38:01the devastation that the american submarine fleet wreaked on the japanese with these
00:38:07uh microwave radar systems uh i think eclipsed the devastation done by the u-boats in the atlantic
00:38:15it was immense and not much talked about in subsequent histories
00:38:23as the war elsewhere in the pacific escalated so too did the use of radar
00:38:29u.s naval service vessels were now fully equipped with every technological weapon that the scientists
00:38:34from mit had developed in a radical move instead of commanding the battle from the bridge ship's
00:38:40executive officers now fought the enemy from the combat information center
00:38:46here was a whole battery of communications navigation plotting and radar
00:38:52once in range of the all-seeing eye no japanese ship was safe
00:38:56from the seeking out and plotting to the radar-controlled guns the enemy was virtually doomed from the first blip on the screen
00:39:11fleet carriers bristled with radar they had early warning surface search fighter control
00:39:17and height control all with one purpose destroy the enemy
00:39:24it all came to a head in june 1944 in the battle for the marianas with the aid of american shipboard radar
00:39:31more japanese aircraft were destroyed than the german luftwaffe lost in the whole of the battle of britain
00:39:37one japanese admiral identified the single greatest u.s strength as its ability to control its fighters
00:39:53by radar the gateway to japan was beginning to open but before america could hurl its might at the japanese
00:40:01mainland the islands of the pacific had to be taken but what was to follow was to be one of the bloodiest
00:40:07campaigns in the entire war
00:40:14each island was proving harder and harder to take as the japanese defenders fought to the death rather
00:40:20than surrender in early 1945 after a 36-day assault on iwo jima the u.s counted over 19 000 injured and 6
00:40:306 800 dead the toll on american lives was becoming too much to allow
00:40:39in the u.s plan for the invasion of mainland japan the official estimate was that over half a million
00:40:44american lives would be lost this was too high a price to pay
00:40:49again radar would come to the aid of the americans once the americans pushed up to the marianas islands
00:40:57within about 1500 miles of japan or so they were close enough to launch airstrikes with radar guided
00:41:04bombers on on the japanese home islands american b-29s were now able to bomb the japanese mainland
00:41:14using the latest rad lab airborne search technology they laid a devastating trail of destruction
00:41:27by mid-june 1945 u.s bombers had reduced many of the principal japanese cities to rubble
00:41:34the skies belonged to america but still japan would not surrender
00:41:42the decision was made to use the ultimate weapon to end the war
00:41:49shortly before three o'clock on the morning of the 6th of august a b-29 took off from the island of
00:41:54tinian southeast of japan the aircraft was using a radar navigational system called eagle
00:42:00within the b-29's bomb bay lay a 10 and a half feet long atomic bomb called little boy
00:42:09as the plane neared its target the bomb was made ready around its girth were four radar fuses
00:42:15at 8 15 a.m the bomb was released over hiroshima each fuse constantly bounced signals off the ground
00:42:24and at 1900 feet the radar fuses ignited the most powerful weapon known to man
00:42:35three days later a second nuclear weapon again assisted by radar exploded over nagasaki world war ii was over
00:42:44the explosive fury of the atomic bombs that ended the war also heralded the end of radland at mit over
00:42:55150 radar models had been designed and developed american industry had played its part by building nearly
00:43:03one million radar sets hiroshima was a conclusion but the radar systems that were produced during the war
00:43:13period played a very key role in almost every single battle the atomic bomb only ended the war radar won it
00:43:24there was no other technology that was more important to more aspects of war and it was the
00:43:30unique integration into all aspects of warfare that made this the most powerful and pervasive weapon
00:43:37of world war ii from a leafy lane in england to helping deliver the most powerful weapon in the world
00:43:45radar had come a long way but in 10 short years it had changed the face of war forever
00:44:07so
00:44:14so
00:44:15so
00:44:51I took an engineering degree at the University of London and in 1934 joined the development
00:45:02laboratories of standard telephones and cables where I was working on development of new systems
00:45:09of telecommunications. I also happened to work on a device for the army sound locator system
00:45:16that was being built on Romney Marsh. At that time, 1935, it was our only method of detecting
00:45:24incoming aircraft. It could achieve a range on a good day of about five miles and I designed
00:45:30a piece of equipment for that system.
00:45:32Then in 1938, I was headhunted by the Air Minister Research Establishment. They wanted a communications
00:45:43engineer because of the problem of passing all the radar information into fighter command.
00:45:49It was quite a communications problem. Someone recommended me and I joined them on the, I think
00:45:56it was the 3rd of September 1938, in the middle of the Czechoslovakian crisis.
00:46:05I was summoned by telegram to report to Bordsey. This was on the 1st of September, I think.
00:46:17And I arrived there. I met Roe, who was then running the research station. I signed the
00:46:23Official Secrets Act. And with a colleague of pre-Bordsey days, who had worked with me
00:46:30of standard telephones, we set off late in the evening to go to fighter command to put
00:46:36the first radar filter room into fighter command. We arrived at fighter command the next morning
00:46:43early, met the chief signals officer, Wing Commander Rodney, were led in to meet the
00:46:49commander in chief. We told him what we wanted to do. And he allocated a very dusty cellar in
00:46:56the basement of Bentley Priory. And within three days we had built, say we had built, we had
00:47:03post office engineers and a gang of carpenters and other helpful people. We had created the
00:47:10first radar filter table onto which all the plots from the CH stations were placed before
00:47:19being transmitted upstairs to the operations room where the commander in chief presided.
00:47:28We at Bordsey, we were sitting there lunching together, we said, well, the Germans must know
00:47:35what we're doing. We're building these 360-foot steel towers for the transmitter, 240-foot wooden
00:47:43towers for the receiver. Standing out on the skyline, they could not help but see them. And
00:47:50they must therefore realize this is a radar system and they must be investigating it. They probably
00:47:58know a lot about it. We had a high degree of secrecy, but you could never be sure. Now one
00:48:06day, it was the 3rd of August 1939, the CH station just north of South End, called Knudden, observed
00:48:16a massive echo approaching from the east at about 60 knots. Far bigger echo than they'd ever
00:48:25seen before. And their first reaction was that it was an invasion fleet with barrage balloons
00:48:33to protect it from an air attack. But they soon realized that was not so. It came within
00:48:39about 30 miles of the coast when it turned north and flew the whole way up the east coast.
00:48:46We tracked it on radar the whole way. When it was approaching Scotland, fighter command
00:48:53set up to air from our AF dice, not to shoot it down because the war hadn't broken out,
00:48:59but to have a look at it. And they secured a photograph. It was the Graf Zeppelin LZ-130.
00:49:08It flew to Scotland, where it turned eastwards and back across the North Sea. The whole operation
00:49:16lasted most of the day. Now we concluded that they had been accurately observing our radar
00:49:24system, measuring the frequencies, plotting the position of the stations, and all other
00:49:29technical information. So they would have gone back loaded with that information. And therefore,
00:49:36what would their reaction be? We assumed that as soon as war broke out, and we knew war was
00:49:43coming, they would probably bomb the stations, particularly Bordzee. But we could expect a
00:49:51massive attack on the radar system. For that reason, Bordzee was evacuated as soon as the first
00:49:58of September, as soon as Germany invaded Poland. And we put in hand measures to deal with the
00:50:07possible bombing of stations, such as mobile reserves. That did not occur. There was no attack
00:50:13launched at the beginning of the war. June, July of 1940, no attack. No attack came until the 12th of
00:50:21August, 1940, when the Luftwaffe attacked, first of all, the CH station at Dover, then one just
00:50:32north of Canterbury called Dunkirk, then Pevensey, Rye. And they did significant damage to all of them.
00:50:39There were one or two casualties. Most of the, well, all the stations were off the air for that day.
00:50:46In the afternoon, they attacked Bentrow in the Isle of Wight, and did a great deal of damage.
00:50:55In fact, it was out of action for, I think, four weeks after that.
00:51:00Now, we, our conclusion at Six Degrew, where I was serving on the staff at that time, was that they'll
00:51:06come back tomorrow and finish the job. And if they don't come back tomorrow, they'll certainly come
00:51:11back the day after tomorrow and finish the job. But they didn't come back. And we could never
00:51:17understand that. They did one more attack on the 18th of August on the CH station at Poling, and that was
00:51:24the only other significant attack on the radar system. Had they persisted as efficiently as they did at
00:51:31Ventnor, and fighter command would have had no radar cover for weeks on end. There would have been a
00:51:43complete gap through which Göring could have poured his bomber forces and destroyed all our fighter airfields
00:51:51and laid the way open for the invasion fleet which Hitler was holding in reserve to launch once
00:51:58fighter command had been destroyed.
00:52:02Now, that remained a puzzle throughout the war. It was only after the war, some years after the war,
00:52:10when I happened to meet General Martini, who was the Chief Signals Officer for Luftwaffe throughout the war,
00:52:16a very able officer. And I said to him, General, why didn't you destroy our radar system at the outbreak of war?
00:52:25He said, you didn't have a radar system. I said, well, how was it we tracked the Ralf Zeppelin from Thames
00:52:32to Scotland? I've never seen a man so shaken in long time. He said, you tracked it? I said, and then I described it.
00:52:39He then told me that heard Dr. Bruening was on board with about 20 scientists with all the receiving equipment in the world.
00:52:48They came back and reported. They could detect no radar transmissions. They could detect noise which they thought was from the British grid system sparking over.
00:52:59Now, had they got that right, and we now know the reasons, I won't go into that now, but had they got that exercise right,
00:53:08had they detected that we had a radar system, Martini, who knew the threat that radar posed to the attacking forces,
00:53:18would almost certainly have been able to persuade Goering to really destroy the radar system. As it was,
00:53:25Goering was entirely dismissive of what he called these radio installations.
00:53:29You don't fight a war with radio installations, you fight them with bombers.
00:53:34He might have persuaded Goering to take a different line.
00:53:46One of the war's most carefully guarded secrets has been revealed.
00:53:50This is radar, an electronic eye penetrating darkness, cloud, and thickest fog to aim our guns and bombs,
00:53:59to bring our aircraft safely home, to warn against attack, against storms, against navigation hazards.
00:54:06With urgent war demands accelerating 20 years' research in electronics,
00:54:15radar's potential forced swift advance in Air Force operational techniques,
00:54:19multiplied our striking power, and held the enemy off until he could no longer strike back.
00:54:24This is how radar works.
00:54:28A transmitter sends out a constant stream of ultra-short-wave impulses,
00:54:33which probe the sky like giant searchlight beams, at a speed of 186,000 miles per second.
00:54:39This oscilloscope registers the impulses and indicates the position of the transmitter by this large peak.
00:54:51When the radar beam strikes a solid object, such as a plane,
00:54:54it echoes back and appears on the oscilloscope screen as a smaller peak.
00:54:58By measuring the elapsed time and by focusing the radar beam like a giant searchlight,
00:55:03the plane's direction and distance are easily calculated.
00:55:11To carry out a war strategy rooted in the laboratories and the factories,
00:55:15an amazing variety of highly specialized radars has been developed.
00:55:19This is the early warning system, first guard against enemy attack,
00:55:24the radar that cost the Luftwaffe the Battle of Britain.
00:55:30Blanketing the sky in every direction, the early warning system is designed to detect an approaching bogey,
00:55:36a hundred miles away, to determine its azimuth and speed,
00:55:40to alert searchlights, gun crews, and night fighters.
00:55:48As the bogey draws nearer, this radar system, designed to throw a more sharply focused beam, takes over.
00:55:55Its job, to secure altitude and range data.
00:56:00This information is immediately forwarded to the plotting center.
00:56:04Here, location, course, speed, and altitude of the approaching aircraft are computed long before it comes within striking distance of the target installation.
00:56:13Continuous tracking, from the moment a bogey is spotted, provides a steady flow of firing data to gun crews and searchlight batteries,
00:56:20remain in constant communication with radar headquarters.
00:56:32As the plane enters gun range, anti-aircraft crews switch on their electronically guided searchlights.
00:56:38Radar is so sensitive, so precise, that once a searchlight beam focuses on an aircraft, escape becomes almost impossible.
00:56:46With AA guns automatically aimed by fire control radar, visibility is no longer of prime importance,
00:56:53but searchlights are triangulated on target to double-check range calculations.
00:57:02Final reports funnel into the plotting center, and the action signal goes out to the guns, already waiting to shoot down the intruder.
00:57:09To make certain that allied guns would not mistakenly shoot our own planes from war-crowded skies,
00:57:30the Air Force is turned to another radar device, the IFF, named for its ability to identify friend or foal.
00:57:38This device automatically establishes identification by an exchange of signals between ground radar and the aircraft in flight.
00:57:45When an unidentified plane is detected, an interrogator responder sends out a questioning signal.
00:57:51A transmitting device carried aboard all friendly aircraft is automatically set off by this signal,
00:57:57and responds with an extremely powerful energy wave, which causes a deviation in the normal oscilloscope patterns.
00:58:03If the plane is unfriendly, the normal echo pattern remains unchanged.
00:58:10Quick to exploit its ability to identify the enemy at all times,
00:58:13the AAF evolved new radar-based combat techniques designed special aircraft for night fighting.
00:58:19This air defense method is called GCI, for ground control interception,
00:58:24and employs the same type of radar as that used to monitor D-Day air traffic over France.
00:58:31The dial records relative positions of friend and enemy,
00:58:34makes it a simple matter to vector our planes in for the kill.
00:58:49Unlimited in its application, radar has saved the lives of countless airmen.
00:58:57Throwing this emergency switch prior to ditching a battle-damaged bomber,
00:59:01causes a continued wide impulse to be transmitted,
00:59:04enabling ground stations to locate the falling plane by triangulation.
00:59:08The device is destroyed automatically, but before the bomber hits the water,
00:59:17an air-sea rescue plane is on its way to the ditching site.
00:59:28Maintenance of air transport schedules, vital in far-flung military operations, depends heavily on radar.
00:59:34Uninterrupted delivery of urgently needed material often forces disregard of weather hazards.
00:59:40When pilots low on fuel, find runways closed in by fog,
00:59:44or when quick-shifting weather blots out a tiny Pacific landfall,
00:59:47endangered planes are helped to safety by a ground control approach radar system known as GCA.
00:59:53No part of this system is carried aboard the plane,
00:59:56but the pilot receives direct verbal guidance from the ground-based radar man.
01:00:00These dials show the transport's position relative to the runway.
01:00:04The operator's first task is to direct the pilot into correct position for a landing approach.
01:00:09As the transport nears the runway, it is picked up and registered on the GCA's oscilloscope.
01:00:24The GCA antenna has only one range and one azimuth,
01:00:28and if the approaching plane is correctly vectored,
01:00:30it will appear as a luminous patch moving between parallel lines.
01:00:34The operator notifies the pilot when the plane is over the glide path,
01:00:53and the transport settles down, literally talked onto the runway for a safe and easy blind landing.
01:01:03Despite its military usefulness,
01:01:05radar's peacetime possibilities have yet to be fully explored.
01:01:09But at war's end, giant cargo planes operating halfway across the world point to an indisputable fact.
01:01:16In peace, as well as war, the development of radar is now inseparable from the development of aviation.
01:01:33As food niecom Governments Kollegen-Im jesteśmy göndering
01:01:36of the rienriaan autism exercise.
01:01:37A conduit to land during national development of radar s ovarian
01:01:38Certainly, in some needs and sides.
01:01:40At brown time's current.
01:01:41I guess it is important to understand some level of rappelle asaha walker.
01:01:43And so my jawabers?
01:01:44In disappearance of acompañes standing one can continue to store this day.
01:01:45I have no Clear.
01:01:46Without a front ever on youruni point to
01:01:55the magic that isarzmanides on the radar.
01:01:57Which has deserved vision of the painting.
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