Comments by "Sar Jim" (@sarjim4381) on "IJN Kongo - Guide 174" video.

The growth of the pagoda structures reflect the Japanese faith in their optical rangefinders. As their weight and size grew, they needed ever taller and stronger structures to support and make best use of them. This also reflected how little faith the IJN had in radar, since their doctrine was their rangefinders would be more than adequate day or night. It wasn't until late 1942 that the Japanese realized how much USN surface search and radar fire control was mauling their ships. That set off a furious pace of development for their own radars. UNfortunately, it did the same for the army, with many identical types being developed in tandem with no coordination between the two services. If some miracle would have occured and the talented men for all services worked together, the IJN may have had effective radars by late 1944, but even that would have been too late. There are very few cases in the history of warfare where the types of circular gunfights engaged in by the Japanese armed services so badly impacted their chance of survival, let alone victory.
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@bkjeong4302 True, although these pagoda masts were built to increase the height of radio antennas as well as optics. The low powered, regenerative circuit radios of the 20's required as much height as possible if they were going to get any kind of useable range, especially in the Pacific. The early USN radars were primarily mounted on carriers and battleships for the same reasons. It was the development of superhet multiple stage receivers and higher powered transmitters that made absolute antenna height less important during the late 30's onward.
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@AWMJoeyjoejoe I'll agree with that title!
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