Telecommunications Research Establishment

52°06′00″N 2°18′58″W / 52.100°N 2.316°W / 52.100; -2.316

The Telecommunications Research Establishment (TRE) was the main United Kingdom research and development organisation for radio navigation, radar, infra-red detection for heat seeking missiles, and related work for the Royal Air Force (RAF) during World War II and the years that followed. It was regarded as "the most brilliant and successful of the English wartime research establishments" under "Rowe, who saw more of the English scientific choices between 1935 and 1945 than any single man."

The name was changed to Radar Research Establishment in 1953, and again to the Royal Radar Establishment in 1957. This article covers the precursor organizations and the Telecommunications Research Establishment up to the time of the name change. The later work at the site is described in the separate article about RRE.

TRE is best known for work on defensive and offensive radar. TRE also made substantial contributions to radio-navigation and to jamming enemy radio-navigation. Radar dominates the history.

The organization was originally at Bawdsey, later moving to Dundee and then Worth Matravers ('Swanage'), where it was renamed TRE. It subsequently moved to Malvern and then amalgamated with other establishments to become the Royal Radar Establishment.

The development of radar in the United Kingdom was started by Sir Henry Tizard's Committee for the Scientific Survey of Air Defence in 1935. Experimental work was begun under the direction of Robert Watson-Watt at Orfordness near Ipswich. Looking for a suitable permanent location, one of the team members recalled an empty manor house a short distance south of Orfordness and the location became Bawdsey Research Station (BRS) in 1936. At that time the team became known as the Air Ministry Experimental Station (AMES).

Bawdsey was only a short E-boat dash across the North Sea from the Netherlands, a fact that was not lost on the Air Ministry. Watson-Watt planned to move the teams to a safer location in the event of war, and approached the rector of his alma mater, University College at Dundee. It is not clear whose fault it was, but when the war opened in 1939 the AMES teams rushed to Dundee they found the rector was only dimly aware of the earlier conversation and nothing had been prepared. By this time the students had returned for the autumn term and consequently there was little room for the researchers.

In addition to lacking room at the University, the teams working on aircraft interception (AI) radar were sent to RAF Scone, a small, formerly civilian airfield near Perth that was entirely unsuited to the scale of their work. Complaints by one of the AI team members worked their way up to higher levels of the Ministry, which led to a search for a more suitable location. Late in the year, the AI team was moved to RAF St Athan in Wales, but ultimately found the location to be only marginally better than Perth.