The Perils of Technological Transformation
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 saw the introduction of game-changing naval strike technologies, among them the first Japanese introduction of aircraft voice radios, shallow-running torpedoes, armor-piercing bombs, advanced fuzes, and the use of dive bombers against fleet units in port. The attack was the first instance of a multi-carrier strike, with over 350 aircraft participating. Instead of amplifying success, these technologies contributed to a very poor performance: with sufficient firepower to sink all the accessible battleships and cruisers in the harbor, with overkill, they applied killing levels of ordnance to only three. The attack is an exemplar of what can go wrong when introducing new naval technologies and doctrine. This chapter by Alan D. Zimm examines the errors made by the Japanese, the impact of these errors on strike performance, and the ultimate source of the errors. Examined are bombsights, general-purpose and armor-piercing bombs, radios and command and control, and torpedoes and anti-torpedo defenses. Much of the Japanese performance shortfall can be attributed to improper assimilation of new technologies, along with poor testing, manufacturing, and installation of new technologies.