Political and Military Leadership in the World Wars by Carl Cavanagh Hodge

Author:Carl Cavanagh Hodge [Hodge, Carl Cavanagh]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781000364408
Google: LQEWEAAAQBAJ
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Published: 2021-03-16T00:00:00+00:00

The Battle of Britain

With the fall of France, Britain stood alone in Western Europe against a foe intent on, and capable of, enlarging its conquests. But Germany had an inferior navy, incapable of delivering an army safely to a battle zone in Southern England. Its air force, so impressive over the skies of Poland and France, was not a match for the much smaller air force of the United Kingdom. The outcome of the Battle of Britain can be traced to the limited yet particularly effective investments British governments had made during the 1930s on the design and development of fighter aircraft, combined with Fighter Command’s astute deployment of these aircraft in Britain’s defence. This, in turn, was possible due to what the Chain Home integrated radar system told the RAF about the timing and direction of German air attacks.

There was much to criticize in Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding’s management of Fighter Command, in his parsimony with air support over Dunkirk, and his initial dispositions of fighter aircraft for the Battle of Britain. Once the Battle of Britain was properly joined in mid-July 1940, however – ostensibly in preparation for a German invasion of the island, Operation Sealion, which never came – his deployment of fighter strength in the skies over England was increasingly effective. Moreover, the size of the German force attacking Britain was overestimated, while Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring’s Luftwaffe underestimated the size of Britain’s fighter force along with the ability of British industry to replace losses. It is nonetheless doubtful that the RAF could have torn a hole in German air power without Chain Home, at the time the most sophisticated air-defence system in the world, to facilitate the efficient deployment of fighter squadrons. The learning curve of air defence was steep, but the initially tentative nature of German attacks was, to say the least, accommodating:

So in the first period of the battle, the British had a force with little training, some with experience in France, directed by a radar system that was still learning its business, flying planes in the wrong formations, with guns harmonised at too great a distance and using obsolete methods in moving to attack. Moreover, few pilots had mastered the skill of deflection shooting – that is aiming not directly at the enemy aircraft but at a position where that aircraft would be when the bullets arrived. Yet during this first month the Luftwaffe did not put this inexperienced force to the test. […] Why the Germans adopted this tentative approach has never been satisfactorily explained. The widespread German view that this period should not be designated as part of the Battle of Britain at all misses the important point that during this time the Luftwaffe’s tactics allowed Dowding’s men to learn the job without being overwhelmed. When the Germans increased the tempo from 8 August, they were to find a much more experienced force lying in wait for them.15

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