OR is a relatively new discipline. Whereas 70 years ago it would have been possible to study mathematics, physics or engineering (for example) at university it would not have been possible to study OR, indeed the term OR did not exist then. It was really only in the late 1930's that operational research began in a systematic fashion, and it started in the UK. As such I thought it would be interesting to give a short history of OR and to consider some of the problems faced (and overcome) by early OR workers. Whilst researching for this short history I discovered that history is not clear cut, different people have different views of the same event. In addition many of the participants in the events described below are now elderly/dead. As such what is given below is only my understanding of what actually happened.
Note: some of you may have moral qualms about discussing what are, at root, more effective ways to kill people. However I cannot change history and what is presented below is essentially what happened, whether one likes it or not.
1936
Early in 1936 the British Air Ministry established Bawdsey Research Station, on the east coast, near Felixstowe, Suffolk, as the centre where all pre-war radar experiments for both the Air Force and the Army would be carried out. Experimental radar equipment was brought up to a high state of reliability and ranges of over 100 miles on aircraft were obtained.
It was also in 1936 that Royal Air Force (RAF) Fighter Command, charged specifically with the air defense of Britain, was first created. It lacked however any effective fighter aircraft - no Hurricanes or Spitfires had come into service - and no radar data was yet fed into its very elementary warning and control system. It had become clear that radar would create a whole new series of problems in fighter direction and control so in late 1936 some experiments started at Biggin Hill in Kent into the effective use of such data. This early work, attempting to integrate radar data with ground based observer data for fighter interception, was the start of OR.
1937
The first of three major pre-war air-defence exercises was carried out in the summer of 1937. The experimental radar station at Bawdsey Research Station was brought into operation and the information derived from it was fed into the general air-defense warning and control system. From the early warning point of view this exercise was encouraging, but the tracking information obtained from radar, after filtering and transmission through the control and display network, was not very satisfactory.
1938
In July 1938 a second major air-defense exercise was carried out. Four additional radar stations had been installed along the coast and it was hoped that Britain now had an aircraft location and control system greatly improved both in coverage and effectiveness. Not so! The exercise revealed, rather, that a new and serious problem had arisen. This was the need to coordinate and correlate the additional, and often conflicting, information received from the additional radar stations. With the out-break of war apparently imminent, it was obvious that something new - drastic if necessary - had to be attempted. Some new approach was needed. Accordingly, on the termination of the exercise, the Superintendent of Bawdsey Research Station, A.P. Rowe, announced that although the exercise had again demonstrated the technical feasibility of the radar system for detecting aircraft, its operational achievements still fell far short of requirements. He therefore proposed that a crash program of research into the operational - as opposed to the technical - aspects of the system should begin immediately. The term "operational research" [RESEARCH into (military) OPERATIONS] was coined as a suitable description of this new branch of applied science. The first team was selected from amongst the scientists of the radar research group the same day.
1939
In the summer of 1939 Britain held what was to be its last pre-war air defense exercise. It involved some 33,000 men, 1,300 aircraft, 110 antiaircraft guns, 700 searchlights, and 100 barrage balloons. This exercise showed a great improvement in the operation of the air defence warning and control system. The contribution made by the OR teams was so apparent that the Air Officer Commander-in-Chief RAF Fighter Command (Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding) requested that, on the outbreak of war, they should be attached to his headquarters at Stanmore in north London. Initially, they were designated the "Stanmore Research Section". In 1941 they were re-designated the "Operational Research Section" when the term was formalised and officially accepted, and similar sections set up at other RAF commands.
1940
On May 15th 1940, with German forces advancing rapidly in France, Stanmore Research Section was asked to analyse a French request for ten additional fighter squadrons (12 aircraft a squadron - so 120 aircraft in all) when losses were running at some three squadrons every two days (i.e. 36 aircraft every 2 days). They prepared graphs for Winston Churchill (the British Prime Minister of the time), based upon a study of current daily losses and replacement rates, indicating how rapidly such a move would deplete fighter strength. No aircraft were sent and most of those currently in France were recalled.
1941 onward
In 1941 an Operational Research Section (ORS) was established in Coastal Command which was to carry out some of the most well-known OR work in World War II. The responsibility of Coastal Command was, to a large extent, the flying of long-range sorties by single aircraft with the object of sighting and attacking surfaced U-boats (German submarines). Amongst the problems that ORS considered were:
• organisation of flying maintenance and inspection
Here the problem was that in a squadron each aircraft, in a cycle of approximately 350 flying hours, required in terms of routine maintenance 7 minor inspections (lasting 2 to 5 days each) and a major inspection (lasting 14 days). How then was flying and maintenance to be organised to make best use of squadron resources? ORS decided that the current procedure, whereby an aircrew had their own aircraft, and that aircraft was serviced by a devoted ground crew, was inefficient (as it meant that when the aircraft was out of action the aircrew were also inactive). They proposed a central garage system whereby aircraft were sent for maintenance when required and each aircrew drew a (different) aircraft when required.
The advantage of this system is plainly that flying hours should be increased. The disadvantage of this system is that there is a loss in morale as the ties between the aircrew and "their" plane/ground crew and the ground crew and "their" aircrew/plane are broken. This is held by some to be the most strategic contribution to the course of the war made by OR (as the aircraft and pilots saved were consequently available for the successful air defense of Britain, the Battle of Britain).
The first use of OR techniques in India, was in the year] 1949 at Hyderabad, where at the Regional Research Institute, an independent operations research unit was set-up. To identify evaluate and solve the problems related to planning, purchases and proper maintenance of stores, an operations research unit was also setup at the Defence Science Laboratory use of OR tools and techniques was done during India's second five year Plan in demand forecasting and suggesting the most suitable scheme which would lead to the overall growth and the development of the economy. Even today, Planning Commission utilises some. of these techniques in framing policies and sector-wise performance evaluation.
In 1953, at the Indian Statistical Institute (Calcutta). A self-sufficient operations research unit was established for the purpose of national planning & survey. OR Society of India was folined in 1957 which publishes journal titled "Of search". Many big and prominent business & industrial houses are using extensively the tools of OR for the optimum utilisation of precious and scarce resources available to them. This phenomenon is not limited to the private sector only. Even good companies in the public sector ("NavRatnas") are reaping the benefits of fully functional sound OR units. Example of such corporate, both private & public are: SAIL, BHEL, NTPC, Indian Railways, Indian Airlines, Air-India, Hindustan Lever, TELCO & TISCO etc. Textile companies engaged in the process of manufacture of various types of fabrics use some of the tools of OR like lenear programming & PERT in their blending, dyeing and other manufacturing operations. Various other Indian companies are .employing OR techniques for solving problems pertaining to various spheres of activities, as diverse as advertising, sales promotion, inspection, quality control, staffing, personnel, investment & production planning, etc. These organisations are not only employing the operations research techniques and analysis on a short-term trouble-shooting basis but also for ong-range strategic planning.
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