Who won the bloody Battle of Britain anyway?

Mad Finn

From today's Daily Telegraph, a delightful bit of revisionism. (free sub needed)

Hitler's failure to invade Britain was all down to the Royal Navy being too strong for the Kriegsmarine. Nothing to do with the RAF and shooting down all those Luftwaffe boys. It was simply that the RN was invincible on the high seas and any attempt by the Germans to chug across the channel in invasion barges would have been doomed to failure. Here's the first few paragraphs.

from Daily Telegraph

Battle of Britain was won at sea. Discuss
By Thomas Harding

The Battle of Britain was not won by the RAF but by the Royal Navy, military historians have concluded, provoking outrage among the war's surviving fighter pilots.

Challenging the "myth" that Spitfires and Hurricanes held off the German invaders in 1940, the monthly magazine History Today has concluded that it was the might of the Navy that stood between Britain and Nazi occupation.

The view is backed by three leading academics who are senior military historians at the Joint Service Command Staff College teaching the future admirals, generals and air marshals.

They contend that the sheer numbers of destroyers and battleships in the Channel would have obliterated any invasion fleet even if the RAF had lost the Battle of Britain.

The idea that a "handful of heroes saved these islands from invasion" was nothing more than a "perpetuation of a glorious myth," the article suggests.



It's a reasonable point as far as it goes. But I've just been reading the memoirs of super terrorist Arthur "Bomber" or "Butch" Harris, he who commanded Bomber Command in its campaign to destroy German cities. He claims in his book that the bombers deserved the credit for deterring the invasion by bombing the invasion barges in their docks.

So: Fighter Command says 'We won it because we shot down the Luftwaffe'
Bomber Command says 'We won it because we destroyed the invasion barges'
The Navy Says: 'We won it because we would have destroyed the invasion barges if they had bothered to invade'

Of course the whole thing is academic. Hitler was never going to invade Britain.He wasn't interested in the West. He just wanted to put them into their box while he concentrated on the main war: that in the East. He was sure that sooner or later, Britain would sue for peace and perhaps even support him in his bid to destroy the Soviet Union.

At which point he could have withdrawn his occupying forces from France and let a collaborationist government get on with ruling the whole of the country and not bothering him while he concentrated on ridding the world of communism and grabbing as much Lebensraum for the volk in the steppes.

mcgarnicle

Wouldn't the Luftwaffe have blown the sh1t out of the navy ships if the raf have been obliterated?

Mad Finn

mcgarnicle wrote:

Wouldn't the Luftwaffe have blown the sh1t out of the navy ships if the raf have been obliterated?

From the Telegraph article: (My emphasis in bold)

Dr Andrew Gordon, the head of maritime history at the staff college, said it was "hogwash" to suggest that Germany failed to invade in 1940 "because of what was done by the phenomenally brave and skilled young men of Fighter Command".

"The Germans stayed away because while the Royal Navy existed they had not a hope in hell of capturing these islands. The Navy had ships in sufficient numbers to have overwhelmed any invasion fleet - destroyers' speed alone would have swamped the barges by their wash."

Even if the RAF had been defeated the fleet would still have been able to defeat any invasion because fast ships at sea could easily manoeuvre and "were pretty safe from air attack".

mcgarnicle

Sorry but battleships are not fast at all and if they were all concentrated in the channel it would have been extremely easy for the luftwaffe to target them. Without any heavy capital ships the remaining fast ships of the royal navy could have been easily taken apart by the german navy.

ScottishDanny

The key to a successful invasion would be air supremacy, Goering boasted that he could defeat the RAF - he didn't and Hitler turned to his obsession, Lebensraum in the east (Russia). Its more to do with the fickleness of Hitler than anything else. Had the Luftwaffe continued their campaign then the RAF estimated they had only 3 weeks fight left in them. As for all the RN ships in the channel, the German tactics when faced by a powerful enemy force was to go around them at speed. The navy could have had every ship in their history side by side in the channel. It would have been as effective a defence for Britain as the maginot line was for France.

Mad Finn

From reading Harris' book one gets the distinct impression that he loathed the Navy and all it stood for. Perhaps this was not an idiosyncracy on his part and there was a mutual antipathy between the 'Senior Service' and these new-fangled chaps in their flying machines who had just appeared on the scene for the first time a mere 40 years previously.

It's amusing to watch a retrospective bitch fight between two branches of the British armed forces about a point that is as academic as arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.

Because my point is that Hitler was not that interested in invading Britain anyway. His real interest, and Germany's, was in the East.

mcgarnicle

His ultimate priority may have been the east, but he had every intention of invading Britain.

insight driver

ScottishDanny wrote:

The key to a successful invasion would be air supremacy, Goering boasted that he could defeat the RAF - he didn't and Hitler turned to his obsession, Lebensraum in the east (Russia). Its more to do with the fickleness of Hitler than anything else. Had the Luftwaffe continued their campaign then the RAF estimated they had only 3 weeks fight left in them. As for all the RN ships in the channel, the German tactics when faced by a powerful enemy force was to go around them at speed. The navy could have had every ship in their history side by side in the channel. It would have been as effective a defence for Britain as the maginot line was for France.

+1
(excuse me, being American, I don't know if seeing +1 is meaningful here. It means I completely agree with this post)

insight driver

From what I recall Hitler got cold feet at Dunkirk. The blitzkrieg succeeded far more than he had expected, and because his logistical supply lines were so thin he hesitated, afraid of a counter-attack. As far as it went, in his strategy, Britain had to be out of the picture before he could look east.

Goering was a blowhard boasting he could destroy the RAF. Hitler knew that no invasion across the channel could succeed without air superiority. Since RADAR gave the RAF enough advance warning, despite overwhelming superiority the luftwafte could not succeed in destroying the air defense capability of the RAF, making an invasion success unlikely. Logistics of supply dictated that Hitler could not wait any longer so he changed his mind, feeling that Britian was isolated successfully and unable to mount an offensive, making it safe for him to shift his assetts to what he thought would be an easy task of taking over Russia. Mother winter and the huge size of the russian army, in spite of the purges of so many competent generals by Stalin stopped the Germans and eventually began pushing them back, though millions of Russians were casualties. I do not remember well, so this is more guess than fact, that the casualty ratio was on the order of 7 to 1 against the Russians.

I do not believe the navy had much of a role in saving Britain from invasion. I do believe it is correct to say that the splendid work of the RAF and RADAR, and lend-lease, saved Britain.

mcgarnicle

I agree that it was Hitler's fickleness that cost the germans the battle but it was not a result of being itchy to invade east. Had the Germans stuck with their original plan of targetting airfields and radar sites for about two more weeks they would have won the battle, however after the RAF raided Berlin Hitler demanded the luftwaffe change tact and attack London. This meant that the British air defences could regroup and continue the fight.

insight driver wrote:

I do not believe the navy had much of a role in saving Britain from invasion. I do believe it is correct to say that the splendid work of the RAF and RADAR, and lend-lease, saved Britain.

Lend-lease had absolutely nothing to do with the outcome of the Battle of Britain. The battle had effectively been won by october 1940 while lend-lease wasn't brought in until march 1941.

tonyboy247

Bit I dont get is if the navy were so great why did the fishing boats save the day at Dunkirk to pick up the cannon fodder.? where were the raf then? or had the Polish and Yankie aircraft boys not arrived at that time?

ScottishDanny

Bit I dont get is if the navy were so great why did the fishing boats save the day at Dunkirk to pick up the cannon fodder?

A good point - the big ships couldn't get in close enough so they had to use smaller vessels - hence the civilian volunteers. There wasn't much the RAF could've done to evacuate soldiers of the beach.

My Dad was in the Merchant Navy in the 1960's and he worked on a little tramp steamer (about 40 feet) on the South coast of England that had been used at the evacuation of Dunkirk. This meant they had some special markings on the bow of the vessel and whenever they sailed past any RN ship (even the modern aircraft carriers) the Navy vessels had to dip their colours as a sign of respect for the wee civilian craft. Cool eh?:cool:

Capt'n Midnight

Factors to consider

http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/operation_cerberus.htm

Radar - this allowed the UK pilots to rest instead of being constantly on patrol. But it would not have been such an advantage when the UK planes had to operate away form thier bases and no doubt there would have been a much greater campign against the radar stations.

Code breaking to find out what's going on - despite all the guff about emigma ( Broken by the Poles and French ) the Germans were just as good at breaking the Allied codes. ( with the exception of one UK system - I'll look up the name later ). The german navy in port and army relied a lot on telephone cables, most info came from the luftwaffe who used radio too much. Depending on how you figure how important the exact location was to success it might not have been revealled since all the air sorties would be over a wide area until the landing had started. Barbrarossa was still a suprise even though it was expected.

The fate of the ships Prince of Wales and Repulse

As for Butcher Harris, the guy did not help win the war. German production was delayed more by lack of raw materials than by loss of workers / factories in urban areas. That person had experiance of how ineffective the blitz was on londoners moral and production, and yet reckoned a similar campaign would work on a population where people disappearing was already part of the landscape.

Supplies in the UK, with the navy defending the channel, the U-Boats would have have a better chance in the Atlantic

The effects of a fleet in being,
Deploying any of the major surface units would have meant the royal navy would need to send more units out to search for them. Decoys if you like.
After sinking Hood, the Bismark was chased by
capital ships ,Renown,King George V , Repulse, Revenge, Rodney and Ramillies
Crusiers Norfolk and Dorsetshire , Suffolk
aircraft carriers Victorious,Ark Royal,
and a load of destroyers

Dyr

tonyboy247 wrote:

Bit I dont get is if the navy were so great why did the fishing boats save the day at Dunkirk to pick up the cannon fodder.? where were the raf then? or had the Polish and Yankie aircraft boys not arrived at that time?

Couple of things to bear in mind was that the RAF had lost a lot of fighters during german invasion of france and the BEF's retreat, they were loathe to lose aircraft and pilots over France when they felt the impending defence of britain was their priority. i think the head of the RAF actually expressed his relief after dunkirk that they wouldnt have to support british troops in France anmore.

As for who won the battle of britain, Goering lost it. He stupidly promised Hitler that the luftwaffe could bring Britain to it's knees alone, something they were never capable of. Hitler really had more interest in the east, Britain was never a priority for him