(December 6, 2018 at 12:36 pm)Brian37 Wrote: Again, watching a documentary on WW2. I just found out that radar caught the Japanese fighters planes on radar at Pearl Harbor, BUT dismissed it as scheduled American bombers coming in....... Talk about FUCK ME! Imagine what a blow it would have been to the Japanese fleet if they had taken the radar seriously and not dismissed it and defeated the raid?
In dec 1941 the Americans have not worked out the entire process and procedure required to make good use of radar information. Automatic electronic identification of friend and foe was still in the future. On that morning a flight of American aircraft is expected to come to land in Oahu. So it is easy to understand why the radar man would not have been unduly alarmed by aircrafts coming in. Without thoroughly worked out procedures, the options before the American radar man would have been one of the two:
1. Always raise an alert whenever an incoming air craft is detected - consequence: a a lot of false alerts, tired and jaded airmen, and incidents of friendly fire casualties.
2. Wait until confirmation incoming aircraft is hostile - consequence: the confirmation is Japanese bombs and when that is received it is too late.
So given the skill level and degree of organization, it was impractical to expect the American radar to have made a difference.
Also American radar remained far superior to Japanese radar during the entire war, American procedures and processes for using radar information in combat would remain totally inadequate until early 1943. In late 1942, even though American ships had good radar and Japanese ships had none, in night battles the Americans made such poor use of radar, and had so many road blocks to passing radar information to decision makers, that in night naval battles, the Japanese using eye balls usually react first to the presence of Americans ships using radar. The Japanese would shoot first, hit first, set Americans ships on fire, and then American radar stops being an advantage as the American fleet is now brightly illuminated by fires on Americans ships so the Japanese can keep shooting at American ships as if it were day.
Americans lost 3 major night naval battles in the Solomons because Japanese using eyeballs processed what they saw better than Americans were able to process radar information actions.