[ARC5] Talking to Airplanes From the Ground

[MARK DORNEY]

Making available stuff work has always been part of what our military has done. There was a tank mount for the SCR-300, so why couldn’t that be done in a C-47 or an L-4 ?  I mentioned the use of the BC-659 in the L-4 in Europe. The BC-659 operated on frequencies used by US Army Field Artillery, and the L-4, having a mission of spotting and target acquisition in Europe, would naturally have that radio installed there. The mission was different in the CBI, so a different solution was found. 

In air drop operations, using voice communication certainly makes perfect sense. Setting up overhead aircraft for an overhead supply drop requires quick communication, and CW just won’t cut it. And the SCR-284 requires a three man team to carry everything, so, yeah, it is a pain in the rear to set up and move, and while it is water resistant, it is not waterproof ( the radio that was supposed to replace it, the SCR-294/BC-1306 was waterproof, and was just as much a pain in the butt to move, and still required a hand cranked generator to be operated when transmitting). The limiting factor with the radios was technology. When originally adopted into service, the SCR-284 and SCR-294 were state of the art. 

Mark D. 
WW2RDO

“In matters of style, float with the current. In matters of Principle, stand like a rock. “.   -   Thomas Jefferson 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Aug 1, 2021, at 4:33 PM, Robert Eleazer <releazer at earthlink.net> wrote:
> 
> 
> Well, that's the point. The US military lacked suitable portable radios capable of communicating with aircraft.  The BC-654 was a lot to haul around and set up. I would guess that something about the size of three BC-611's put together could have done the job pretty well on HF, but I have wondered if the lack of such a set reflected more the available technology or the doctrine.  The RAF in the CBI thought it was perfectly fine for the ground troops to relay their CAS requests back to some HQ and have them brief the pilots on what targets to hit.  That sounds crazy from our pespective today, and the RAF apparently had already come up with a FAC concept in the Western desert, but the situation in Burma was that only the USAAF P-51A's could talk to the ground troops.
> 
> Wayne
> WB5WSV.    
> 
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