* World War II -- technology electronics applications,








World War II: Electronics--Inter-war Era (1920s-30s)

World War II electronics
Figure 1.-- Radio exploded after World War I and a whole new indudtry came into existence. And the American industry during the inter-War grew beyond the size of electtonics industrues in all other countries combined. This is 8-year old American boy, Bobby Garcia. He was described as in a 1922 article as a 'youthful prodigy of the radio world'. We are not sure what that meant, probably that he could build a radio set and master morse code. He was one small part of a vast bnew ibdustry that was developing in America. World War II was the first war in which electronics played a major role. And thus the huge American electronics industry was thus of major military potential, although at the time the War broke out had virtually no military component.

With advances during World War I, radio exploded. It vecame a huge commercail success. And no where like in America. Americans in partivcular had the eranings to buy radios. As a result a huge electronics inducstry developed. The ame process occurred in Europe, but not where near the number of people could afford radios. This varied by country. Britain had the highest concenbtration of radio users. Middle ckass Germans could afford radios, but notg weorking class radios. This is why the NAZIs when they seixed poer am up with an in iexpensive People's Radio--Volksempfänger radio sets. Radio owenership was lower in Italy and Japan. Even fewer people in the Soviet Union could afford a radio. All of this is important because because it determined the size of the electronics industries in the beligerant countries that fought World War II, not only thevfactories, but the number of techbicians competent to wor on and develop electronic equipment. Another important matter was scentific research. The companies involved with commercial radio conducted research, but with a focus on commercial operations. Researchers in Europe (primarily Britain and Germany) pursued other areas which rathef accidentally carries them toward radar and other areas. As War approached, Britain and Germany had about the same technical level, the Germans if anything were slightly ahead. But it was the British that took it most seriously because it seemed to have real potential as an air warming system. And thus became oart of the Chain Home Network. The Germans did not need an early warning systen, at least at first, because they planned to do the attacking. The Grmans were the first to insatll radar directed gunnery systems on naval vessels. The first victim was HMS Hood. The United States did very little military reserch, but the British after the onset of the War, turned their high-tech secret research over to the Amerians--the Tizard Mission (1940). Notably, the German did not share their secreat reserach with the Japanese until late in the War. And the Americans with their huge electronics industry had the capacity to not only perfect the British prototypes, but to produce all the varied electronic equioment developed by the military in quantities that no other coiuntry or comination of countries could begin to match. This included the cavity magnitron, arguably the most important secret wepon of the War.






HBC--WW II







Navigate the CIH World War II Section:
[Return to Main World War II technology/tactics electronics page]
[Return to Main World War II technology/tactics page]
[Return to Main World War II page]
[Biographies] [Campaigns] [Children] [Countries] [Deciding factors] [Diplomacy] [Geo-political crisis] [Economics] [Home front] [Intelligence]
[POWs] [Resistance] [Race] [Refugees] [Technology] [Totalitarian powers]
[Bibliographies] [Contributions] [FAQs] [Images] [Links] [Registration] [Tools]
[Return to Main World War II page]
[Return to Main war essay page]





Created: 3:43 AM 9/22/2020
Last updated: 3:43 AM 9/22/2020