Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!att!cbnews!military
From: vrdxhq!vrdxhq.verdix.com!bsmart@uunet.UU.NET (Bob Smart)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: BB design
Summary: Anti Kamikaze mods
Keywords: Iowa
Message-ID: <6595@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 16 May 89 03:57:12 GMT
References: <6272@cbnews.ATT.COM> <6322@cbnews.ATT.COM> <6488@cbnews.ATT.COM> <6546@cbnews.ATT.COM>
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From: vrdxhq!vrdxhq.verdix.com!bsmart@uunet.UU.NET (Bob Smart)

In article <6546@cbnews.ATT.COM>, eos!eugene@eos.arc.nasa.gov (Eugene Miya) writes:
> 
(Eugene refrences my article about the antikamikaze planning)
> 
> The lead time for design and construction was such that this wasn't
> entirely correct as kamikazes were relatively late in the war.
This program was not a construction program but a overhaul and improvement
program. It did have a lot of it's basis in the earlier anti-air prrograms
that came out of the Solomins campaign ( Remember we lost 2 carriers there)
but I believe was given a very high priority during and after the Leyte
invasion when there was pretty convincing evidence that the "sucide" attacks
were intentional and not a last ditch effort to hit a target by an injured
pilot/plane. The program concentrated on short term improvements and changes
in tactics ( I remember that the debate about whether the added firepower of
turning broadside to an attack was worth the increased area that could be
struck was a very big topic, But I cant remember the reult :-( ) This was
conducted at least partially by the Operations Research group that spent a
lot of 42-mid developing anti-sub tactics for the atlantic theater. Since
the anti-sub war was under control they applied the same methodology to the
anti-air problem. I believe the operational archives mentioned here recently
has a fair amount available. I remember running across some of it when I was
doing research up there about 8-9 years ago.

Bob Smart (bsmart@verdix.com)