Last December I travelled to Honolulu, Hawaii on vacation and had the opportunity to tour Pearl Harbor for the second time. My first visit was a family vacation when I was in my teens and I think it was part of the requisite itinerary planned by my parents. However, this time was different. This time, I went by choice and the visit really resonated with me.
It was an emotional tour both from the side of patriotism and that of humanity. Perhaps this second trip was different because I now have some semblance of fear (albeit civilian) of enemy attacks on our soil after 9/11. Maybe it was different just because I’m older now and have a more expanded world view and experiences as an adult.
I’m not a historian nor a military strategist so rather than focus on all that comes with the former, I’ll focus on the latter. As I walked through the exhibits learning about the events of the day, the existing world landscape and turmoil, what really stood out to me was the technology and tools of the day and their impact.
For example, RADAR (Radio Detection and Ranging) equipment had just been acquired by the military and put into use. In fact, this was the first U.S. military use of RADAR during wartime. This was its wartime debut. However, many at the time didn’t trust it, and dismissed it as newfangled, unreliable and primitive and chose to relied on old methods. So when a junior soldier reported that there was unusual activity on the new RADAR system it was quickly dismissed as a non issue. Unfortunately, we now know that unusual activity was the 1st round the first of bombers 136 miles away moving closer by the second.
That time period also marked another big shift in technology and tools with the advent of the aircraft carrier. The incumbent naval vessel at the time, the battleship, had served seafaring nations for years. Aviation was only considered as an auxiliary tool and had not been embraced as a force in and of itself for naval fleets world-wide. Fleet commanders relied on the tried and true battleships and counted on obsolete approaches to naval warfare.
Pearl Harbor proved that times had changed. The Japanese were able to defeat the US’s stationary battleships in the middle of the Pacific by relying on their aircraft carriers to get them in striking distance without detection. A slower moving battle ship would have been detected and addressed as an enemy threat long before it got in firing distance and surely there would have been a different outcome, a different competitive landscape altogether.
So what did I get out of my 2nd trip to Pearl Harbor other than an ever growing feeling of patriotism and appreciation for the sacrifices the men and women of the armed services have made for our country? I’m left with this nugget of wisdom . . . Technology is a game changer. You can either choose to ignore it or choose to embrace it and keep playing the game.
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