Radar needed power but the Americans soon discovered that the existing Russian radars of the 1950s offered thorough coverage. They were able to identify their operating frequencies. It is puzzling that anyone "thought" otherwise. On the other hand, this would be secret, compartmentalized information. During World War II, radar operated at 9-10 centimeters. Could you explain "processing power"? The Germans had radar-AAA linked systems during the war.
Well no the American's had found early on that there were 'gaps' in the coverage where they could penetrate the overall coverage. They also found that the Russian's had a systematic schedule where they would shut down sections for various reasons. The main idea was that while the Russians might be able to "see" the U2 it was thought they could not so easily 'track' it over long distances due to power requirments and the aforementioned 'gaps' in overall coverage.
Let me go into a bit of detail over the gaps because this is kind of iimportant. While both the Soviets and US had by the late 50s a theoretical 'wall' of radar coverage the various radars and instillations were a mixed bunch and quite often didn't complement or even integrate with each other. For example the American DEW line had radars that could 'see' very far but they couldn't reliable track low-angle (altitude) targets and at maximum range the computers and electronics used to process and 'read' the signal returns, (the "processing power" I mentioned) could often be confused by clutter and false returns generated within the system itself. As an example of this in one case a flock of Canadian Geese flying past a Pine Tree line radar was flagged by the system as a squadron of supersonic contacts flying high over the Arctic Circle, and then a possible subsonic single large air target less than 100 miles away.
"Processing power" is very important in radar tracking and targeting because in each case you need to do more than illuminate, (get radar returns) off the target. In early AAA applications you only needed enough power to read the radar returns from a 'hard' locked target for altitude and speed so that the AAA system could compute a simple intercept for the shells or unguided rockets fired. Early tracking radar simply told you there was "something" in "that" direction, at aproximatly "this" altitude and distance. In most WWII systems you had to be a good operator with a lot of experiance to translate what the signal, (which was usually just a vertical 'line' on the screen) might really be. Was it a single large aircraft? Several smaller ones? Was the range reducing, (signal return getting stronger, ie the line getting higher) or opening? Is the target coming straight on or angling away from you? (Was the line moving right or left of the center-line)
By the late 40s this data was being fed into both mechancal and early electronic computers where the 'data' was refined and translated into more human friendly terms. This would then be passed on to a central point where the output would be plotted on a map and assets assigned to deal with the target. But this data would be passed on by human voice or telegraph and then more human would have to interpret and act upon the data to then alert other humans to actually do something.
By the early 50s advances in electronics have now reduced a lot of this into easier to understand data that can be displayed on cathode ray tube at the actual radar station. Instead of vertical lines you had a 'sweep' which would place a 'dot' where the radar return was showing in close to real time what direction and distance the target was at from the 360 degree rotating radar antena. Most systems used a seperate antenna specifically for finding the altitude of the target showing this at first as a line at 90 degrees from a calibrated "altitude" bar. Again all this data was combined and passed on to a central command center where the informatin would be collected and anylized. Now understand that the further from the radar the signal has to come back from the more chance there is of interfence (both natural and man-made), signal degredation and deflection. So even with an electronic computer helping clean up the data what you end up with is a point where the radar can actually "see" quite a bit further, (it's a radio beam after all) but the returned signal is unable to be effectivly interpreted usefully.
At this point there is another radar system coming into use based on the early AAA radar 'guided' weapons. As I said above the initial systems just used the radar return to provide angle and speed from a fixed point to compute the intercept of a flying object with a ground launched shell or rocket. This was a very simple steady-state radar beam that was quite easy to use but by now more sophisticated weapons systems are coming into use and as you get into actual guided weapons there needs to be two different modes that the radar operates in. The first is logically called "search" mode where the beam and system is simply look to spot the target and this still uses the 'steady' (or in modern terms low pulse frequency) mode. Again as processing power goes up so too does the effective 'range' of the radar even though in theory it has unlimited range due to being a light-speed radio pulse. Now once the "search" mode finds a target the operator can then move to a more active mode which we call "locked" mode where both the pulse rate frequency and power are increased to allow faster positional information updating and a better and more clear 'return' from the target. (And it's this switch from 'search' to 'lock' that allows that wonderful "got tone!" scene in the movies btw
)
Now if the system is tied into something like an AAA missile system of the earlier "beam-rider" missiles it is at this point the radar seeker of the missile is turned on and directed to aquire the specifica pulse frequency train of the locked radar signal. Once the missle 'aquires' the targeting beam it's launched and follows the radar returns to the target. If the missile has a semi-active or active seeker then it pretty much has its own radar system on-board and uses the locked beam to search and then aquire the target with its own radar system and once its confirmed it has the target it is launched to make its own intercept and the system radar goes looking for another target.
And from here processing power begins to reign supreme in determining what you can do with a radar return signal more than anything else. See while it might seem counterintuatie the truth is that "seeing" an over 1,000km diameter object at at over 340,000km distance is extremely easy. You can do it with powerful enough radar system and pointing the transmitter by litterally "eyeballing-it". Almost as easy to simply spot and track a U2 at 80,000ft, now when we start talking about tracking and targeting that same U2...
It's not that the attack radar can't "see" the U2 because it likely can but for the most part (at the time) it was felt that the processing power in the Russian systems lacked the ability accuratly guide a missile to successful intercept and further it wasn't clear that the missile could reach or manuever at that altitude. Here again Power's flight was likely pretty easy to track and lock onto due to his power failure in flight, further even if he'd known he'd been shot at he couldn't manuever much under the circumstances.
Now to bring it around with a more personal example, the E3 Sentry which was introduced in 1977 has a radar range of between 250 and 400 miles for airborne targets. Does that mean the radar waves stop and turn around at 400 miles? Of course not but due to its onboard processing power it could only resolve and accurate track targets at that range. And it's gotten better over time as upgrades to it's processing power now can resolve Beyond-The-Horizon as well as near and far ground and sea targets. The better processing power of the incoming return signals means that the radar can now be used to accuratly track sea and ground targets whereas previously those were 'lost in the clutter' of the incoming ground returns. Similarly the new upgrades can clean up radar returns from further out AND higher up.
And finally going back to the U2 situation did Eisenhower's advisers "lie" to him when he asked if the Russian's could track the U2? Not activly but likely they chose to interpret his question to what they considered more relevent in that he wanted to know could they shoot one down and that answer was no, not under normal circumstances. And bringing this back even more with the question would the X-16 been "better" than the U2 in this case the answer if very much yes it would have because with an operating engine and assuming the U2 or X-16 had a warning system which is likely then it could have manuevered and quite possibly generated a 'miss' from the missile whereas Power's U2 could not.
Randy
