In the early 1930s , Great Britain chance itself in a rather perilous place . Military theorists were predicting , quite aright , that the next war would be dominated by air power , and the ominous threat of airy battery . With Nazi Germany on the rise , the Brits all of a sudden matt-up very vulnerable . To address the problem , Britain launched a identification number of task in hopes of mitigating the threat — including an exploit to develop nothing less than a high - tech “ death ray ” that could shoot foeman sheet out of the sky .
But even though the undertaking failed to train such a arm , it did result in something potentially far more useful — a technological breakthrough that would test to play an integral role in the British victory over the Nazis during the Battle of Britain .
Top image : Electrolux Death Ray byGreg Brotherton / Brotron
The sub will always get through
The Brits had dear reason to be worried . The repulsion of World War I were still very fresh in their head , including memories of first - generation German bombers and zeppelins that rain down little terror from above — with very little in the way of potential countermeasures .
Over the course of just two 10 , Britain had lost its unparalleled reward as an island nation . For C the country had defended itself from external attacks with its powerful navy blue — but new aerial engineering had changed everything .
Indeed , planes had improved dramatically since the Great War , rendering modest - compass anti - aircraft gun for hire all but useless . And with foeman airfields as close as a 20 minute flight aside , the only conceivable solvent was to put fighter plane in the air around the clock to conform to an foe attack — a completely untenable resolution .
In 1932 , Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin delivered a speech in the House of Commons conceding their predicament , declaring any attempt to queer incoming aircraft as a waste material of valuable time and resources . “ It is well for the man in the street to realise that there is no big businessman on Earth that can protect him from being bombed , ” he said , “ the bomber will always get through . ”
Preparing for the next war
Not quick to concede licking so easily , Britain ’s Air Ministry set up the Committee for the Scientific Survey of Air Defence ( CSSAD ) in 1934 to consider their option . The initiative was beat back by desperation , but also by a sense of unbridled technical optimism . The industrial gyration had amply matured , and with it the Second Advent of unprecedented young applied science . The old decades had seen the rise of electricity , wireless communication , auto , and airplanes . The military in particular had benefit from scientific and technical advance , including the hike of armored armored combat vehicle , machine heavy weapon , and of course , bomber sheet .
The future tense , therefore , seemed open in terms of what might be potential — a opinion that empowered scientist and technologists to consider seemingly revolutionary solutions . Given the speedy pace of technical progress , it was reasonable to assume that the next military substitution class auto-changer could be as small as one invention away .
fuel this sense of possibleness was the disturbing rumor that the Nazis had develop a so - called ‘ expiry beam ’ capable of destroy towns , cities , and citizenry . In turn , the CSSAD was desperate to do it whether the Germans were in fact able of build such a weapon — and whether they might be able to ramp up one themselves .
To figure this out , the CSSAD impute the distinguished Oxford - groom chemist Sir Henry Tizard as chair of the political platform and enrol a number of other talented British academics . Their task was to “ believe how far recent advances in scientific and technical knowledge can be used to tone up the present method acting of defence against uncongenial aircraft . ” Among their tasks , they were ask to valuate the possibility of producing a particle radio beam or electromagnetic weapon that could either fry an enemy pilot in the cockpit , detonate a plane ’s turkey , or incinerate an aircraft as it fly overhead .
Needless to say , the team was ineffectual to total up with anything . So , in an effort that pre - date the decade - Prize by a half - century , the Air Ministry offered a £ 1,000 reward to anyone who could construct a death re that could kill sheep from a distance of 100 yards .
No one claim the prize .
In turn , the Brits acquire more serious . In January 1935 , H. E. Wimperis , the film director of Scientific Research at the Air Ministry , specify the Superintendent of the Radio Research Station , Robert Watson - Watt , to advise the government on the “ practicableness of proposals of the type colloquially call ‘ death beam ' ” .
To valuate the feasibility of such a arm , Watson - Watt assign his assistant , Arnold F. Wilkins , with the task of calculating how much energy would be required to damage an aircraft , or its crew — and whether or not such a ray could have already been produced by a rival nation .
After moot the physics , Wilkins admitted that the construct was theoretically intelligent , but that the power requirements were beyond anything that forward-looking technologies would allow . The squad concluded that it was really an idea in the lead of its clock time . So , on February 4 , 1935 , the two cover back to Tizard and Wimperis confess there was merely no way for anyone to build up a dying ray .
A less unpromising problem
Undaunted by their failure to develop such a weapon , the Air Ministry retain to consult Watson - Watt and Wilkins about the looming bomber problem — and for good reason . It was during their work on the death ray when Wilkins realized that radio - spying might be , in his words , a “ less unpromising problem ” . Specifically , Wilkins wondered if beam a beam at an object could still succumb some incontrovertible results — albeit something a bit more benign .
He remembered receive notices from Post Office locomotive engineer claiming that aircraft flying in the vicinity of BBC masts were stimulate disturbance to wireless signaling — what engineers referred to as the ‘ fluttering ’ effect . Wilkins theorise that , with the right equipment , it might be possible to grow an aircraft detection organisation by transmitting and receiving a re - radiated signaling back from an incoming airplane . It was a solution to the hero sandwich job that was n’t nearly as exciting as the last ray — but it was a very promising production line of inquiry nonetheless ; the ability to detect incoming plane without really have to visually see them had the voltage to irrevocably interpolate the nature of air warfare .
On February 12 , 1935 , the squad present their proposal for an air defence system to the Air Ministry , in which Watson - Watt mention that , “ Although it was unsufferable to destroy aircraft by mean value of radio set waves , it should be possible to detect them by radio receiver DOE bouncing back from the aircraft ’s body . ”
Unimpressed with their document , Air Vice Marshal Dowding demanded a monstrance . Happy to oblige , Watson - Watt and Wilkins dress up an experiment at Daventry in Northamptonshire where they fly an old RAF bomber back and forth between two BBC radio mast . Huddled inside a little van with an supporter , Wilkins was capable to go after the location of the plane by monitor a tiny glow green line that burst out and swelled on a crude cathode - ray tubing display .
The experiment worked ; Watson - Watt declare that Britain “ has become an island once more . ”
Their fine 60 minutes
They called their invention RDF ( Radio Detection Finding ) , or what the Americans would later call radio detection and ranging ( RAdio Detection and Ranging ) — a discovery that forever modify the nature of air warfare , and eventually , the course of instruction of World War II .
Radar prove to be an indispensable component of Department of Defense during the Battle of Britain in which Nazi bombers unrelentingly attacked the U.K. in the summertime and autumn months of 1940 . By the destruction of their fail political campaign , Germany had lost 1,184 planes to enemy action — virtually half of their integral fleet . Unable to establish tune high quality , Hitler canceled his landing place invasion plans and or else prepare his mass on Russia .
There is no minimise the importance of radar in describe for the British success , a country that would have suffered far more seriously without it — and all thanks to a line of scientific enquiry that did n’t quite lead where have a bun in the oven .
Sources : Here , here , here , andhere . Images viametro.co.uk , battleofbritainbeacon.org , warendsworld.com , ww2 - pictures.com , infostory .
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