Incident #198 Sighting Report — Wakkanai, Japan, 6 November 1948

This document details the investigation of Incident #198, a radar sighting that occurred on 6 November 1948 over Wakkanai, Japan. A radar operator at a ground site detected an unidentified target that remained in the area for 65 minutes. The target, which was never observed visually due to dense cloud cover, was described as circling the radar site within a 20-mile radius. At various times, the radar blip appeared as a single aircraft or as two aircraft engaged in a dogfight, with the target continuously changing course. The speed of the object was calculated to be between 160 and 240 mph. The report notes that the target appeared within a ground clutter area on the radarscope. Following an evaluation by the Far Eastern Air Force (FEAF) and subsequent correspondence with the Air Materiel Command, the object was officially identified as a Soviet 'Ferret' aircraft conducting an electronic reconnaissance mission. The documents include various internal communications, teletype messages, and incident summary sheets that track the administrative process of investigating the sighting. One internal note explicitly states that if the radar report is accurate, the object could not possibly be a balloon. The incident was later indexed in the Project Grudge report as a non-astronomical event with no explanation evident, though the intelligence assessment provided by FEAF remained the primary official conclusion.