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The South African Electronic Warfare Association |
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Aardvark Roost |
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Message from the President |
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April 2009 More than a Century of EW
Hundred and five years ago during the Russian - Japanese war of 1904/05, radio communications was for the first time used by both combatants. It was also where the first war time use of Electronic Warfare occurred.
On the14th of April 1904, the Japanese cruisers Kasuga and Nisshim bombarded the Russian naval base at Port Arthur. An innovative Russian radio operator intercepted Japanese radio signals and realized that a Japanese “spotter” was transmitting corrections to the cruisers for improved accuracy. He then used his “spark transmitter” and attempted to jam the Japanese communications – which proved to be quite successful as the bombardment caused little damage and few casualties.
A humble beginning that subsequently mushroomed into becoming a vital winning factor in nearly every subsequent conflict!
Much has already been written about EW - although a lot still remains to be said as well. There is a tremendous wealth of knowledge to be learnt from previous conflicts and every one involved in EW is well advised to read as much about it as they can lay their eyes on. (Which is an excellent reason to join the Old Crows and receive your own personal Journal of Electronic Defense (JED) magazine!)
Many lessons learnt are about mistakes made by not having the right equipment and inadequate training. It therefore comes as no surprise that history is rife with examples how often we get it wrong anticipating and preparing for the conflicts of tomorrow. To put it in another way, wars seldom happen the way we thought they would!
The tragedy of such mistakes is that futile millions and effort are spent on equipment and training that turns out to be inadequate and unsuitable. This in turn usually also results in the much more painful unnecessary loss of young lives…..
There is however also success stories which can without exception be attributed to proactive and innovative peace time planning and preparation as well as imaginative and well executed operations in combat situations. It is however not surprising that these successes can nearly always be linked back to creative preparation beforehand.
It is with this in mind that the Aardvark Roost chose “What will the expected nature of the threat be beyond 2020 and what should we as the EW community do to meet the challenge” as the theme for 2009.
You are therefore encouraged to participate in the three conferences planned for 2009 where this theme will be discussed from many different perspectives. Regards
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Gerrie Radloff (President of the Aardvark Roost) |
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