The War Reaching the Stars
With supported processing, the recovery horizon is only 0.10 light-years, or 2.45% of the distance to Proxima Centauri. Even the ideal-coherence ceiling stops at 2.42 light-years.
The strongest evaluated historical fixture reaches a peak-EIRP upper bound of 773 MW, and the calculation gives the receiver every advantage. The failure is not caused by choosing a weak transmitter or a pessimistic instrument. Propagation outran detectability.
These are deliberately favorable limits. Both give the receiver ten years and keep the radar beam continuously on the observer. Real scan patterns reduce the horizons. Hover or tap the markers to inspect the assumptions.
At Proxima, the favorable ideal case with 1% beam dwell demands either a 30.7× improvement over the best modeled receiver or about 9,420 years of observation. Drag the distance and change the assumptions to see how quickly the gap opens. Lower jansky values mean greater sensitivity.
Hover, tap or use arrow keys to explore the curve.
"Ideal bound" assumes every pulse can be added coherently, which no source yet documents for wartime transmitters; "supported" assumes no pulse-to-pulse coherence. The curve uses ten years, no sky or solar background penalty and the upper EIRP bound for each fixture. It is a favorable receiver requirement, not a pessimistic forecast.
The 30.7× endpoint is the floor, not the expected case. It combines the highest SCR-584 EIRP bound, perfect pulse coherence, full operating hours, a known-signal threshold and quiet solar conditions. Removing those advantages raises the requirement as high as 40,182×. These are non-probabilistic bounds over the declared assumption lattice. Pulse coherence creates the largest share of the spread.
The surviving records do not establish whether these transmitters maintained phase between pulses. This unknown opens the largest share of the range. Holding the other favorable assumptions fixed, removing ideal coherence raises the receiver requirement by roughly 171×.
The SCR-584's gain is derived from its documented 4° beam, not measured. Combined with its documented 250 to 300 kW transmitter-power range, the gain bracket produces a 2.4× span in peak EIRP.
Most scan schedules and all operating-hour fractions are bracketed. AN/APS-6 supplies one source-derived scan. Less time on one sky direction compounds the sensitivity deficit.