Archie to SAM: A Short Operational History of Ground-Based Air ...

ANTIAIRCRAFT DEFENSE THROUGH WORLD WAR II
11 to 13 aircraft. In November 1918, the British used 480 antiaircraft
guns and 376 aircraft in the defense of Great Britain. 3
The bulk of air operations during World War I was not
strategic but was in support of ground forces. On the western
front, German antiaircraft gunners claimed 1,588 Allied aircraft
(19 percent of their total kills), while French gunners
claimed 500 German aircraft; Italian gunners claimed 129;
British Expeditionary Force gunners, 341; and US gunners,
58. The guns grew increasingly effective as hastily improvised
equipment gave way to specially designed equipment, while,
relatively speaking, aircraft showed only modest improvements
in performance. Among the technologies harnessed by
the defenders were sound-detection systems, searchlights, optical
range-finders, and mechanically timed fuzes. 4 As a consequence,
the number of German antiaircraft rounds for each
claim fell from 11,600 in 1915 to 5,000 in 1918; French rounds
per claim decreased from 11,000 (1916) to 7,000 (1918); Russian
from 11,000 (1916) to 3,000 (1917); and British from 8,000
(1917) to 4,550 (1918). American antiaircraft artillery (AAA)
downed 17 German aircraft in three months, averaging 605
rounds per kill. 5
In contrast to the advances made during World War I, air defenders
made little progress between the wars. The three-inch
gun of World War I dominated what little AAA there was, and
acoustical devices provided the best location equipment (fig. 2).
In 1928, the United States adopted as standard equipment the
three-inch M3 gun that had an effective ceiling of 21,000 feet,
just exceeding the aircraft ceiling of the day. Meanwhile, new
technology such as removable barrel liners, automatic breech
mechanisms, and continuous fuze setters, improved the antiaircraft
guns. However, the revolution in aviation technology of
the 1930s, permitting much greater aircraft speeds and altitudes,
rendered three-inch guns and acoustical-location gear
obsolete. 6 In brief, from the mid to late 1930s, aircraft (offense)
had the edge over the AAA (defense).
In the latter half of the 1930s, new equipment began to appear
in antiaircraft units around the world. The major powers
adopted slightly larger but much more powerful guns, deciding
on a caliber of about a 90-millimeter (mm) gun with a muzzle
3