[Milsurplus] Japan's Pearl Harbor Blunders?

[Ray Fantini]

According to the “Green Books” and other sources I have seen that SCR-270 was indeed at both locations. Remember reading about this years ago and spent much time trying to find a SCR-270 to go see it for myself, always wanted to see if it looked like the one in “Tora Tora Tora” knew it did not look anything like the stupid PPI display they showed in that last Pearl Harbor movie.
RF

From: Joe Connor [mailto:joeconnor53 at yahoo.com]
Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 12:14 PM
To: Ray Fantini; Military Surplus Mail List (milsurplus at mailman.qth.net)
Subject: Re: [Milsurplus] Japan's Pearl Harbor Blunders?

Ray, your points are well taken, as are John's. Once we had decisive battles like Coral Sea and Midway, where the capital ships never even saw each other, even the older admirals realized the day of the battleship had ended. Their main role would be using their big guns to support landings.

If I remember correctly, there was a modern radar unit on Oahu (SCR-270?) and it did pick up the incoming Japanese planes. However, it was mistakenly believed that it was a flight of B-17s flying in from the west coast. I'm not sure if that was a function of poor equipment, poor use of the equipment, poor command use of the information the radar unit produced, or a peacetime mentality that could not conceive of the Japanese having the audacity to attack Pearl Harbor.

If I remember correctly, there was at least one radar unit near Clark Field in the Philippines. In the days immediately before the war, the Japanese flew over Luzon at night. Our radar picked them up and fighters (I guess they were called pursuits back then) scrambled to intercept them. Our pursuits never found the intruders. The radar didn't detect the attacks that obliterated Clark Field and the Cavite Naval Base in the first few days of the war. Again, I'm not sure if the fault lies with the equipment, the operators, the command or a peacetime mentality.

                                      Joe Connor