[ARC5] Japanese technology

[Kenneth G. Gordon]

On 24 Mar 2012 at 14:07, gordon white wrote:

>      While they were behind in radar,

And, IMHO, in squad and aircraft communications...

I understand that, at least early in the war, Japanese pilots would routinely 
remove their radios because they were so worthless, and that would enable 
them to carry a bit more ammo.

> their night-fighting at sea
> techniques were ahead of ours in 1941-42 (Maybe the Germans were
> giving them superior Zeiss night binoculars?)

Yes, but when we finally added radar-fire-direction capabilities to our ship-
board fire control computers, our forces took a quantum leap in night-fighting 
capability and effectiveness. An incident mentioned here concerning the 
Battleship "Washington" supports this opinion.

> and their long-lance
> torpedoes were way ahead of ours for quite a while.

OH, YES! Our torpedoes were a real and very serious scandal from early to 
practically mid-WWII. They were pretty much worthless, and were the cause 
of many deaths and failures. I cannot understand how that situation was let 
go on for so long. It really and seriously stunk to high heaven.

The Japanese Long Lance torpedo was a real masterpiece of design and 
implementation, and was very effective.

> Our superior
> technologies took a while to get into service as did our superior
> production. As Yamamato said. "I'll run wild for six months" then
> watch out. From December 7, 1941 to June, 1942 (Midway) he did.

I always liked his "...behind every blade of grass..." statement. :-)

Ken W7EKB