4

The popular view of the Battle of Britain is that one of the critical factors that enabled the British to win it was Watson-Watt's invention of Radar. The History Learning Site, for example, summarises like this:

The radar invented by Robert Watson-Watt, was invaluable to the men who fought the Battle of Britain. The radar allowed Britain to track incoming German warplanes and gave Fighter Command, led by Sir Hugh Dowding, sufficient time to get airborne and attack them.

But in his widely admired book on the battle, Most Dangerous Enemy, Stephen Bungay writes:

The Germans knew all about radar and used it themselves to great effect. They had in fact invented it first.

Is the popular mythology wrong to assume that the British invented Radar first and that that invention was vital to the victory?

matt_black
  • 56,186
  • 16
  • 175
  • 373
  • [Before the Second World War, researchers in France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States, independently and in great secrecy, developed technologies that led to the modern version of radar. Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa followed prewar Great Britain, and Hungary had similar developments during the war.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar) – bummi Sep 18 '13 at 10:39
  • How is Germany's knowledge about radars related to their efficiency in defending Great Britain? – Aeronth Sep 18 '13 at 11:34
  • It's well known the Germans knew about radar about the same time the British did. But afaik they didn't put that knowledge into use in a practical device until after the British had done so. The fact that the Germans recognised and undertook to destroy the British radar installations for what they were is evidence enough of that. – jwenting Sep 18 '13 at 11:43
  • @Aeronth The popular story of the Battle of Britain is that one of the key factors behind the British victory was the fact that *they invented Radar first*. The question is about whether this version of the story is true. A broader question would be, if the myth is not true, *what really did contribute to victory*, but that open-ended question is a little broad for Skeptics.SE. – matt_black Sep 18 '13 at 12:38
  • 1
    @matt_black None of the claims in your question state that Britain's radars were efficient *because* they invented them before the Germans did. And I fail to see the causality in this. – Aeronth Sep 18 '13 at 12:40
  • @Aeronth My question isn't asking whether Radar mattered to the victory, just whether the simpler claim that the British had it first is true. The popular myth would be undermined if this is not true without the need to speculate about the other factors that really did contribute to victory (though a claim about that might make a good follow up question). – matt_black Sep 18 '13 at 12:45
  • Perhaps the British aircraft-detection radar was more important before German radar was, because, at the beginning, the war was being flown over Britain not over Germany. – ChrisW Sep 18 '13 at 13:15
  • 2
    @ChrisW Or because the British had a much better organised command and control system that the germans. So not because they *had* radar, but because they *knew what to do with it*, which would be a very different story than the myth. – matt_black Sep 18 '13 at 13:20
  • There is a related post on Physics.SE that might be of interest in this matter: [Is this claim from historician true for physicist point of view?](http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/32557/is-this-claim-from-historician-true-for-physicist-point-of-view) turns on what effect the the choice of *polarization* made for the early radar systems of the combatants might have made. – dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten Sep 18 '13 at 14:35
  • It is irrelevant to success in the Battle of Britain whether Britain invented radar *first*. Because other countries were not sharing it, if Britain had not invented radar for themselves, they would have been less successful in their defence. – DJClayworth Jul 16 '17 at 14:55
  • @DJClayworth True, but also irrelevant given the context. Bungay (the source for the claim) argues that it was the superior British *organisation* of their defence that mattered. The germans also had radar but didn't use it as intelligently. I'm still amazed that popular myth has Britain "bumbling through" heroically against well organised enemies when the opposite is more truthful. – matt_black Jul 16 '17 at 15:00
  • @matt_black - Unfortunately its difficult to compare the British and German command and control structures for interdiction because they we're never stressed at the same time. Each would have learnt lessons from their own performance and the behaviour of the enemy, modifying the C&C structure and procedures as the war progressed. Its the same with Radar, the country being attacked HAD to develop it faster than the one attacking. The attacker had to fixate their efforts on Anti-radar which was predominantly TNT based solutions. – Code Gorilla Jul 18 '17 at 12:01

2 Answers2

8

Is the popular mythology wrong to assume that the British invented Radar first

It's debatable.

Wikipedia on Robert Watson-Watt:

His early work was using radio to detect thunderstorms

In January 1935 ... he also mentioned in the same report a suggestion that was originally made to him by Wilkins that radio waves may be capable of detecting aircraft.

On 12 February 1935, Watson-Watt sent the secret memo of the proposed system to the Air Ministry, Detection and location of aircraft by radio methods. Although not as exciting as a death-ray, the concept clearly had potential but the Air Ministry, before giving funding, asked for a demonstration proving that radio waves could be reflected by an aircraft.[7] This was ready by 26 February and consisted of two receiving antennas located about ten km away from one of the BBC's shortwave broadcast stations at Daventry. The two antennas were phased such that signals travelling directly from the station cancelled themselves out, but signals arriving from other angles were admitted, thereby deflecting the trace on a CRT indicator (passive radar).[8] Such was the secrecy of this test that only three people witnessed it: Watson-Watt, his colleague Arnold Wilkins, and a single member of the committee, A.P. Rowe. The demonstration was a success; on several occasions a clear signal was seen from a Handley Page Heyford bomber being flown around the site. Most importantly, the prime minister, Stanley Baldwin, was kept quietly informed of radar's progress. On 2 April 1935, Watson-Watt received a patent on a radio device for detecting and locating an aircraft.

In mid-May 1935, Wilkins left the Radio Research Station with a small party, including Edward George Bowen, to start further research at Orford Ness, an isolated peninsula on the coast of the North Sea. By June they were detecting aircraft at 27 km, which was enough for scientists and engineers to stop all work on competing sound-based detection systems. By the end of the year the range was up to 100 km, at which point plans were made in December to set up five stations covering the approaches to London.

So, very rapid (only a few months) progress in implementing a system once there was a desire for and funding for it.

Radar Development in Germany for Aircraft Warning

GEMA built the first radar transmitter in the autumn of 1934 for detecting ships. The radar operated on 50 cm wave length and could find ships up to 10 km away. In the summer of 1935, a pulse radar was developed with which they could spot the ship the "Koenigsberg" 8 km away. This radar unit used the "Braunschen" tubes and had an accuracy of 50 m. A magnetron had been tried but the frequency was not stable, and as such, tubes were used. A wave length of 60 - 80 cm was used so the sender and receiver could be spaced close together. An airplane at a height of 500 m and a distance of 28 km could be seen. By 1935, they had built the first successful radar unit.

It also says,

Huelsmeyer had invented and demonstrated his radar in 1904. However, his invention was an idea too early for its time.

I don't see any claim that British radar wasn't vital, so I won't answer that.

And Watson-Watt did invent /a/ radar device, and got a patent on it. However, clearly what he invented was a particular implementation of a radar device (and not, the concept of radar, nor even the first practical implementation of it).

Community
  • 1
ChrisW
  • 26,552
  • 5
  • 108
  • 141
  • Hüelsmeyer's "telemobiloscope" seems to have been able to detect metal objects at a fairly short range: it used a spark-gap transmitter broadcasting in all directions, and a directional receiver to pick up the echoes. No attempt was made at ranging. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_H%C3%BClsmeyer – Paul Johnson Jul 17 '17 at 06:33
1

The earliest description of the concept of using reflection from a beam of radio waves seems to have been by Hugo Gernsback in the story "Ralph 124C 41+", first published in 1911. It includes a diagram showing a parabolic dish directing a "pulsating polarized ether wave" at a "space flyer" and discusses the use of the time delay of the reflected signal to determine distance.

Paul Johnson
  • 15,814
  • 7
  • 66
  • 81
  • 1
    This question seems to be about actual usable technology, not the theory behind it. Naturally, theory precedes action, and sometimes by many years. I don't think this answers the question. –  Jul 17 '17 at 00:33