Permanent System radar stations
| Permanent System | |
| Military radar network | |
 Buildings at Fortuna Air Force Station (P-27) included the tower for the general surveillance Sperry AN/FPS-35 radar (top) and a different radar with radome (left). In front of the FPS-35 tower is a pedestal for a previous radar.
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| Countries | United States, Canada |
|---|---|
| Command | Air Defense |
| Radar Stations on December 31, 1957 |
75 primary 47 gap-filler 39 semi-mobile 19 Pinetree 1 Texas Tower 1 with Lashup radar |
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Networks 1980 December 23 |
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JSS:
SAGE:
Permanent:
1980 December 23
1958 June 26
1952 May
1950 April
The Permanent System ("P system") was a 1950s radar network ("P radar net") used for the CONUS "manual air defense system" and which had a USAF aircraft control and warning (AC&W) organization of personnel and military installations with radars to allow Air Defense Command ground-controlled interception of Cold War bombers attacking the United States.
As with the World War II CONUS radar network of "Army Radar Stations", Aircraft Warning Corps information centers, Ground Observer Corps filter centers, and Fighter Control Centers ("inactivated...in April 1944"), a post-war system was planned to assess bomber attacks and for dispatching interceptors. The Distant Early Warning Line was "first conceived—and rejected—in 1946", General Stratemeyer forwarded an air defense plan to General Spaatz in November 1946, and in the spring and summer of 1947, 3 Air Defense Command (ADC) Aircraft Control and Warning (AC&W) plans had gone unfunded: e.g., the April 8, 1947, "air defense plan (long term)". With only 5 "Air Warning Station" radars operating in 1948, the "Radar Fence Plan (code named Project SUPREMACY)" was planned for completion by 1953 with 411 radar stations and 18 control centers. The Radar Fence was rejected by ADC since "no provision was made in it for the Alaska to Greenland net with flanks guarded by aircraft and picket ships [required] for 3 to 6 hours of warning time". ADC's Interim Program and its First Augmentation were planned "until the Supremacy plan network could be approved and constructed", and an $85,500,000 March 1949 Congressional bill funded both the Interim Program "for 61 basic radars and 10 control centers to be deployed in 26 months, with an additional ten radars and one control station for Alaska" and the augmentation's additional 15 radars ("essentially Phase II of Supremacy"). The resulting Lashup Radar Network was completed in April 1950 and was operational in June 1950.
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