Why the RAF won the Battle of Britain
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- Опубліковано 7 сер 2024
- The Battle of Britain is often defined by images of Spitfires and Messerschmitts duelling in the skies. But what if the deciding factor in this fight for air supremacy was actually based on the ground?
IWM Duxford Curator Craig Murray takes a look at the Dowding System and explains how it turned the battle decisively in Britain's favour.
0:00 Intro
1:03 The Battle of France
1:47 Sir Hugh Dowding
2:05 RADAR
2:46 The Royal Observer Corps
3:36 The Filter Room
4:48 German failures
5:22 Battle of Britain day
5:51 Conclusion
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Another advantage the British had over the Luftwaffe was that most battles were over the UK. So most pilots shot down that managed to bail out of their airplanes, could go back to their fighting units (after treatment for wounds if needed), while all German pilots bailing out ended up as POWs. As long as aircraft production could keep up (and it did), the ability to get pilots who were shot down back on the line was invaluable.
So very true, except that replacement pilots were still needed, and their training was very sub par.
Imagine if such a matchup was conducted over non-friendly ground . The RAF would have lost the battle of attrition (which is why they didn't take a real stand in France). The LW would have cleaned house by August.
Britain didn't need to "win". Only needed to hold the enemy to a draw.
The thing was "The Battle of Britain" was when an Allied nation under threat of Invasion held the line for the first time. In many ways Hitler had lost the war at this point. It can be argued invading Russia in the first place was the mistake for Hitler. But if Britain had lost. There would be no persistent second front against the Germans.
Correct, AND the majority view among many Military Historians. When boss of the USSR, Nikita Kruschev said, during a anti-West rant at the UN; ''On the first day of WW3, that unsinkable Aircraft Carrier, Will be SUNK ''. A reference to Britains importance during WW2, as a gigantic Air base, for Allied offences against Germany.
@Paul Snell Is it the stupidity or arrogance of self-serving statements like yours which is most irritating?
*IF the Biggest word in English Language !*
@@theblytonian3906 Calm down mate, I disagree with you. But explain, briefly, why you disagree with Paul Snell..
hitler lost the war before he was chancellor. there just isnt enough oil available to germany.
Dowding was not the head of the RAF. He was head of Fighter Command.
Expected better from IWM.
And got fired as a reward. His refusal to squander fighter command in the lost cause of the battle of France saved the UK.
@@stanbest3743 I'd recommend a book by John Reay on the Battle of Britain. Dowding had offered to retire twice before the Battle.
Reading between the lines, both he and Park were burned out. They were only human.
But they were both treated shabbily. Should have been better rewarded
@@stanbest3743 He may have saved us all. A hero by any measure in world history.
Dowding refused to play political games. He just did his job. That counted against him, and lesser men allied to bring him down.
Hitler was stumped post-Dunkirk. It was impossible for him to send his troops across the Channel because of the combination of Britain's powerful navy and air-force. Yet, he couldn't just rest on his laurels (such as they were) and, arguing that Britain was virtually neutralised, he turned on his ideological enemy Soviet Russia. Here we see that the Battle of Britain was the first step in the defeat of Hitler's Germany. (UK)
Stalin broke the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact on 28 June 1940, and was preparing to attack Germany in 1941.
No, germany wanted to expand into the Soviet Union and take the oil fields. The strategic Ural Bomber was developed in the mid 30's for that reason.
Churchill's position was never secure. Lord Halifax was waiting in the wings, and was briefing foreign ambassadors about how Churchill would soon be gone. These assessments were reported to Berlin. If the RAF was receiving a clobbering, Churchill would indeed have been dumped and replaced by a PM who desired a negotiated end to the war. That was AH's number one objective.
Sir Hugh Dowding was Commander-in-Chief of the Fighter Command of the RAF, not "Head of the RAF".
You should read "Fighter" by Len Deighton for a well-researched and accurate account of the importance of Dowding and Park in the air war. Prior to his appointment as head of Fighter Command, Dowding was Air Member for Supply and Research in the Air Council. As such, he was responsible for the development of radar (and the command and control organization that supported it), as well as ordering the Hurricane and Spitfire fighters into production. He should have been promoted to head of the Air Force, based on his rank and seniority, but he was unpopular with the authorities. His appointment to Fighter Command was therefore something of an insult.
Interesting, how come he was unpopular with the authorities though?
And it turned out to be the smartest thing those idiots ever did
Was Britain basically the only country with an air force that could never be caught on the ground?
@@jankutac9753
It is a statistical fact that the RAF had the fewest airplanes caught on the ground in their respective country after having been attacked by the air forces of both Germany and Italy.
Even so, a few (about 2 or 3) of the chain home towers were knocked out of action for a few days (about a week), and during the Battle of Great Britain the Luftwaffe managed to destroy a few RAF airplanes on the ground.
@@ieatoutoften872 interesting
We as a nation owe so much to these men and women and the great dowding and Parker for away of life today
Therefore it follows that, THE WORLD, IS INDEPTED to those people.
A good but brief scenario. Surprised you didn't credit Air chief Marshall, Keith Park, who's organising ability was invaluable to Dowding and the final outcome.
Dowding and Park should have been fired, as Bader admitted in 1940.
@@MarkHarrison733really? Where did they go wrong?
@@robertortiz-wilson1588 The Battle of Britain was irrelevant as Hitler never intended to invade the UK.
@@MarkHarrison733 Bader Was an oaf, his so called big wings took so long to form that the Germans would have arrived dropped their payload and left without a mark on them.
Your museum is amazing 10/10 I’m honoured to go there
All praise to those brave young men who flew fighter aircraft in the Battle of Britain and the young Bomber crews who did the 'dirty work' of attempting to bomb the Nazis into submission with huge losses of life! Other sources suggest that the Germans exaggerated their number of kills and underestimated the ability of the UK to produce new aircraft and train new pilots.
The biggest irony with regards to Dowding,was that he was on the verge of retiring just before the Battle started. High Command umm and arr and kept putting off giving him a definate date. So understandable Dowding was somewhat upset [putting it mildly] at all the run around and give upstairs an ultimatum. If they didn't give him a definate date he would be away on his own account on a date he set, Battle or no Battle in the offing........
Finally, someone who had studied the actual history instead of media hyperbole. Also, Dowding had already made an enemy of the tyrant Trenchard in WWI. Trenchard still had influence in 1940.
Thanks.
Would be nice to see a video about Keith Park
Agree completely. The Dowding system was necessary but not sufficient - if Leigh-Mallory had had 11 Group, and listened to the Big Wing adherents, the Dowding system wouldn't have worked anywhere near as well. Not that the Germans were necessarily going to have won, but the battle would have been much more protracted and painful.
@@thosdot6497 According to Len Deighton's book 'Fighter, Leigh Mallory's big wing was a non-starter. By taking aircraft from all over the country to form it, large parts of Britain would be undefended. Secondly, it would have taken ages to get all the aircraft together to form the big wing, by which time the Germans could have flown over, bombed and flown back without being attacked.
@@Gwynbuck - well, we agree on the practicality of the Big Wings, although it's been awhile since I read 'Fighter' I think the argument that it would have stripped the rest of the country bare is a bit overblown unless you assume the RAF were going to put a big wing wherever there was an existing squadron or two.
Park's "penny-packet" approach was perfect tactics for the situation he found himself in - big wings, or even whole squadrons from the coastal stations wouldn't have been able to get organised and high enough in time. As far as I was aware, the Dowding System was the groups, sector stations and controls, observer corps, and of course RDF. Park's tactical abilities got them the rest of the way.
Check out Stephen Bungay's "Most Dangerous Enemy" too, it's also very good.
I wonder if Bader's and Leigh-Mallory's desire for big groups to smash into the enemy were based on a faulty appreciation of the Flying Circuses of WW1. They were able to swan about and look for trouble, but in WW2 Park's fighters had definite appointments to keep.
From what I know, the reporting system used by Fighter Command actually pre-dated radar. There are still concrete dishes and curved walls on Romney Marsh which are the remains of a sound location system. Radar was simply grafted into a pre-existing system, which Dowding then perfected..
Germany had invented radar decades earlier.
Great effort in a short time. Thanks. May Sir Hugh Dowding be long remembered in the history of not only The Battle of Britain but the survival of the best in humanity.
This is why Britain now elects Hamas supporters.
Sir Keith Park is often not given the recognition he deserves for his role in the Battle of Britain, particularly so in his native New Zealand. Lord Tedder, Head of the RAF, 1947 said "if any one man won the Battle of Britain, he [Park] did.
Dowding was called stuffy and never curried favor; which is why he was quickly shunted aside. Parks never really got the credit he desereved. And Tedder was more of a politician and worked the system so in the end he came out of the war supposedly looking like the best of all when he was third at best. Don't get me started on Leigh-Mallory.
Thanks for posting.
360 degree coverage radar for fighter Control was first introduced into service with the RAF in January 1941 with the Type 8 GCI radar. 6 sets were operational in 11 Group by the end of the Blitz in May 1941.
It was a total dual throughout the War, each country leaping ahead of the other, in the RADAR WAR. My brother was part of this secret war, as member of the 100 group ,
He was a crew member of 199 Sqn, on the last bombing mission over Germany, May 3rd 1945, Most of these Bomber's were fitted with the latest onboard Radar, and one extra crew, to operate it.
Yup. Most people don't understand how difficult intercepts were once the LW hit the Brit coast, then changed course. Hence the need for the faster Spitfires.
Often forgotten is "Huff Duff" or more correctly High Frequency Direction Finding. Whenever a fighter squadron commander transmitted on the radio, his position was triangulated by at least three DF units meaning that the position of fighter squadrons was known exactly and thereby relieving the ROC of a lot of work.
Dowding was amazing for a man born in an age when infantry squares and cavalry won battles, but who understood the modern technology and how to use it.
The ROC still tracked,plotted and recorded every friendly aircraft,they only told on the aircraft that the RAF wanted information on,marked with a red and white counter on the raid plaques.I demonstrate how this system worked in the last remaining ROC Operations Centre in the country.
The Observer Corps were never relieved throughout the war, and continued active service to the end of the war. Across the UK, there was about 30,000 men and women looking up at the skies watching and listening for Aircraft, both enemy and allied. Imagine having to commit to duty whilst watching your friends and relatives being bombed. The Observer Corps (Royal Observer Corps as given by King George VI in 1941) were only stood down on 12/05/1945 and were active during the Normandy Landings, serving as Observer ranking as Petty Officers and serving on both British and American ships thus saving many allied pilots from very trigger happy gunners on board those ships. The Royal Observer Corps lost two men during this campaign, sacrificing their lives so that others might survive. Not bad for volunteers eh? You have been educated.
I love the subject--I've been reading about the Battle of Britain since I purchased the August 1967 "Battle of Britain Special Issue" of Scale Modeler magazine--but to my American ears, Curator Craig Murray's Scottish (?) accent is just on the far side of the "it's an odd accent but I can understand it well enough" line. He obviously knows whereof he speaks, but I repeatedly have to stop the video and replay his parts to make sure I'm understanding him properly.
Yeah I had to set playing speed at 75% just to get what he is saying
Good bless Britain
No blessings for hegemon fascists and colonists
@@xZxOxVxBritain stood up and stood alone for a year and ultimately destroyed a fascist nation determined to implement a eugenics program across all of Europe-only a ignorant fool can't see that.
@@xZxOxVx Britain ended fascism that included a horrific eugenics program. Reciting of modern woke-ism is easier than learning what Britain did that allowed you those freedoms in 2024.
'Chain home, was situated along SOUTHEAST, and East Coast of Britain, not west.
it was along all of it. its just its only really sites in southeast that survive.
@@douglasparkinson4123 Ok , The system was being extended throughout the War, but according to Google, it extended only as far as Weymouth, As I live in South Devon, I was thinking more in those terms ,and Cornwall. But it's true, that for obvious reasons, only the East and South East gets a mention, and shown in Films.
IWM, we expect better, Cyril Louis Norton Newall, was the head of the RAF during the Battle of Britain. We had similar mistakes in the Falklands videos, ex F126 Royal Navy.
Great work by the RAF. Dowding and Park did a great job. Was Leigh Mallory more of a politician than Dowding?
Everyone seems to take for granted that the Germans needed air control to neuter the Royal Navy
Even though the Royal Navy had struggled in the Norwegian campaign, control of the English Channel was the reason that the Air war was so important.
Could the Germans have crossed the Channel considering the strength of the Royal Navy?
they had no chance, regardless of who won the battle of Britain, the tidal changes in the channel imply a full days crossing in Rhine barges, and even that could never have taken a port. That makes heavy weapons and supply impossible. Apparently the German airforce had no armour piercing bombs so keeping the royal navy back would have been very difficult, note the channel dash a few years later. German was doomed the moment they invaded Russia, D days importance is that without it Russia would never have stopped at Germany, they would have swept on over France and Spain, probably would stil be there
@@puddles20mike31 Exactly. The Axis would have faced almost insurmountable re-supply issues, especially for fuel and horse fodder.
Mallory was a self obsessed big mouthed attension grabber. and with further help, eventually brought down both Park and Dowding, by overwhelming Chuchills weakness, for flashy barnstorming ideas.
they never intended to invade Britain at that time. Their strategic goal was always the oil, resources and land in the east.
@@MrDaiseymay LOL. Dowding was due to retire anyways. The movie and media has confused so many, with so much disinformation, for so long.
I don't think is correct.
As stated in the video, Chain Home & the Observer Corp. sent information to the filter room in Bentley Priority .
However, the information was then sent to Group, were there was a large plotting table.
Markers were placed on the plotting table showing the estimated number of bandits and their height.
The Group Air Vice Marshall then decided which squadrons to scramble.
For example, Keith Park was the one who decided which squadrons in 11 Group to send up.
The sector stations then vectored the squadrons into attack.
Radar masts are small lattice structures in a time of no precision bombing and quick to repair so targeting them would have been futile
They stood 360 feet tall, not exactly small. Amazingly, it took the nazis over a year, to suspect them of aiding the RAF, as Radar masts, and decided to dive bomb them with JU87's, that were easy prey for our fighter's, and lost a great deal of planes, so they gave up the idea.
*What about destruction of the Royal Navy, Sea Lion had no hope at all of success without knocking that out !*
I don't think Sea Lion ever was a serious and practical plan, the subjugation of the RN, and to some lesser extent the RAF, was never an obtainable goal in that time period, maybe if the war had started in 1942 as originally envisaged by the Nazis, but nigh on impossible in 1940.
The klystron was the first significantly powerful source of radio waves in the microwave range; before its invention the only sources were the Barkhausen-Kurz tube and split-anode magnetron, which were limited to very low power. It was invented by the brothers Russell and Sigurd Varian at Stanford University. Their prototype was completed and demonstrated successfully on August 30, 1937.[5] Upon publication in 1939,[3] news of the klystron immediately influenced the work of US and UK researchers working on radar equipment.
Like most histories, this is simplistic. Germany needed air supremacy to be able to hold off the Royal Navy long enough to make a Channel crossing. Even with air supremacy, attempting a sea born invasion of Britain with barges would have been a huge gamble against Britains superior fleet.
Reginald Mitchell chief Supermarine Designer Engineer, the father of the Spitfire who won the Battle of Britain!!!! With of course the RollsRoyce Merlin engine!
The Axis did not lose the Battle of Britain.
6:21
The first generation of RADAR had some weak point that cant be fixed. Lucky for us, the germans had even less knowledge in this as the english:
1) The german fighters and bombers could fly very low under the RADAR line of sight. For that time it was 100m and later 30m.
2) The german fighter pilots could fly wing to wing, so on the RADAR they would look like one bomber and scatter at some point. There was no separation into small targets possible for the system.
3) The german bomber pilots could drop down some metallic stripes to disturb the signal and look like very many planes on the RADAR.
4) The germans itself could send a strong radio wave to "burn down" english RADAR system like we do it in our time.
Its wrong to think that RAF system at that time was so superior to the german Luftwaffe. We had luck, god on our side and bravery of our grandfathers.
Radar was a German invention.
4:50 "There they are, Jerries!" Actually they look more like Mitchells. Not He111. Dorniers? With no camouflage?
@@walterkronkitesleftshoe6684 charming.
IWM has underestimated its audience.
Dowding and Park won the Battle Of Britain inspite of the insubordination of Leigh-Mallory and Bader.
Head of RAF? Dowding was head of Fighter Command, not the whole RAF.
Not strictly true as the Royal Navy would have cut off any invasion plus supply
The Royal Navy would have been completely crushed with German air dominance. That was the key of that battle.
Surely comes down to a matter of opinion. Without air support could the Navy effectively have held the channel and stopped an invasion?
@@pablogodi1392 It has been my impression that aircraft did not have a particularly impressive record against warships. After all, even when the Luftwaffe was at full strength, it could not obliterate lightly armed convoys in the English Channel.
@@Allydafc if the RAF Fighter Command have had to withdraw to the West and North, the German Navy would have had a free hand in the Channel covering the invasion. The Royal Navy was more powerful than the Kriegsmarine but it would have suffered losses
But after Norway the brass was reticent to send capital ships into the narrow confines of the Channel ... especially without adequate air cover.
Chain Homealong the East and Southwest coasts ! Have a glance at an atlas my friend ! Though you are obviously a Brit so should be familiar with the orientation of our coasts.
We fought the wrong enemy twice.
thank God for the English subs!! :P :P
So, if Dowding had failed... then Germany would have won? And all because Dowding had a clear idea of how it should be done; with radar and information processing! How did it come that the Germans who were ever so keen on technology, had missed this? This is really a count your blessings thing.
Radar was a German invention.
Whoever made that old newsreel had the metaphor completely wrong: Britain was the Whale. If we want to fit Germany into a whale metaphor, it was Captain Ahab
You forgot the 51st Highland Division, 10000 men, which were not evacuated.
Think they were later on from cherbourg, what was left of them. They fought valiantly alongside the French.
@@jimbo6059 they were eventually captured at St. Valery.
@@Bruce-1956 definately some brave people.
And near the end, the luftwaffe took to giving their briefings close to the latrine blocks because the aircrews were throwing up with fear.
No.
@@MarkHarrison733 You were there ?
@@Kevin-mx1vi My grandfather was.
LOVE YOU ME DAD ETC, THATS WHY WE ARE STILL HERE
He was a spiritualist.
Today, the poms couldn't organise anything remotely like this.
Yet Australia are buying our submarine technology because they don’t have any of their own 🤣
@@Andy-dv4zg The Suez Crisis confirmed Britain no longer mattered at all.
Please fix some easy mistakes such as naming Dowding as head of RAF instead of Fighter Command.
There's an excellent (sadly out of print) biography - Sir Keith Parker by Vincent Orange, Methuen, 1984. it confirms the brilliance of the Dowding Parks team and the near-traitorous behaviour of Leigh-Mallory and Bader. Sholto Douglas doesn't exactly come out as knowledgeable about modern air warfare. The biography is meticulous in its research and the notes and Bibliography in the first division of vigorous academic research. Leigh-Mallory's behaviour, and that of Bader should have resulted in their being court-martialled. The damage they did was aiding and abetting the enemy, albeit by acts of wilful disobedience and deceit. One fault of Dowding was in not having the pair of them removed.
Germany was NOT goind to invade Britain. Their strategy was always to take the land, resources and oil of the USSR and to defeat communism.
The LW lost the battle rather than Britain winning it, although it could be argued that germany achieved its goal in reducing the threat to its rear as it prepared for the invasion of USSR.
The Axis did not lose the battle.
Dowding was a bit of an odd bloke, especially in later life, but his dedication to duty was faultless.
The Spotters are why the British aircraft had the underside of their aircraft painted half black and half white.
Later British AA gunners were why the "D-Day Invasion Stripes" were painted on the bottom of Typhoon fighters for almost 2 years before D-Day!
(They got so used to the idea that the only low flying friendly aircraft would be the Spitfire with its extremely distinctive wing shape and therefore any other single engine fighter must be the enemy. (Periscope Films actually has a British Training Video about this where the British were trying to stop their own AA gunners from shooting "Tiffies" down!!!))
Dowding should be posthumously promoted to MRAF.
repealing?
Britain won not in small part due to out repairing and out building the Germans. Britain developed a fantastic system for assessing the damage to aircraft and either fixing it at the airfield or back at workshops or the factories. They also didn’t throw green pilots right into fight, fresh pilots would go to bases away from the front to gain experience before being brought forward to the front lines. At no point were the British short of aircraft, pilots yes, but there was always a plane for a pilot to use.
The Battle of Britain was irrelevant as Hitler never intended to invade the UK.
The short answer is that Britain won the battle of Britain for four reasons- Ultra, Chain Home, Chain home Low, and a little help from a bunch of folks known as "The Few"...
The audio suck on this vid.
wasnt he caled stuffy by some
He was, but he was held in high regard by the pilots under his command.
Yes, though many leaders, military and otherwise, had such amusing, and occasionally accurate, nicknames. Dowding was indeed well regarded.
@@davesy6969 True. we seem to breed slightly excentric types, just in time to deal with exceptional situations..
One famous British admiral, I forget his name, was a painter's model when he was a little child. Actually the painter was his father.
Wikipedia: As a child, James sat as a subject for several paintings by his grandfather, Millais. The most well-known of these is Bubbles, in which the five-year-old William is shown gazing enraptured at a bubble he has just blown. When the painting was used in an advertisement for Pears soap, it became famous.
So 'Bubbles' stuck with him throughout his entire naval career. Admiral Bubbles.
@@AudieHolland There was a ww2 admiral called Manley Power, he was descended from Lieutenant General Sir Manley Power who fought with Wellington.
The British have a penchant for sacking men who save the nation's collective asses.
We should have allied with the Axis in 1936 against the only threat.
You sound like a communist. We did what was right and correct, it may hsve cost lives but we stayed the course and made sure the UK was free of Nazi oppression.
Disappointing. Didn’t explain the system in detail.
We were bloody lucky the Germans didn't use there aircraft carrier
All whites, British
So how would the Germans be able to invade with the Royal Navy blocking their way?
Since the Intention of the Germans was to bring the RAF up to fight, why would they destroy the RDF stations?
You don't mention Chain Home Low either which was steerable.
Although the 15th of September is marked as Battle of Britain day more aircraft were lost on the 18th of September.
Given all the advantages Fighter Command had it's surprising how badly they did in The Battle of Britain.
(I think the narrator meant to say 'repelling' rather than 'repealing'.
This does look like the IWM is taking their information from the 1969 film, The Battle of Britain, rather than telling it as it actually was.
This is a very limited attempted to understand the air campaign of 1940. their are some inaccurate footage showing a film set at pinewood studios of a filter room. No mention of pilots from the Empire, and from France and Poland. No mention of the British Navy and is success in sinking and damaging much of the German navy making it impossible to carry out a invasion of the UK. An institution such as the IMW should produce better YT's than this.
HOWEVER... ...might I respectfully recommend the film...The Battle of Britain. Made in 1969 and although it was made without CGi, but with real aircraft and a few models, is held in high regard as a general historical reference to the events in 1940, Nomatter what anyone says to the contrary.
Nah, it's even more basic. Germany had no chance of conquering the British Isles because of the British Royal Navy, of which the Home Fleet alone was bigger than the entire German Kriegsmarine.
Even if the Germans had succesfully invaded, they would have been cut off soon after, stuck on an island with miserable weather and the 'Scheisse Kanal' between them and the European mainland.
@@oldgitsknowstuff Your quite right to high light the film Battle of Britain, as it is very arcuate in its port rail of the events and induvials that took part. Some thing unusual in a big budget film.
@@russellnixon9981
Some of the former RAF pilots that were advisers in this film were pilots in 1969, one being Ginger Lacey who taught a friend of mine to fly. He was based at the Bridlington flying club.
Funny old world.
@@russellnixon9981
I think that if you view the very last minutes of the 1969 film you will see an entire list of the number of RAF pilots who took part in the Battle of Britain. As far as I'm aware....every nationality of RAF pilots is listed here.
Further....
A full list of enemy aircrews statistics (killed, POW, missing) are identified as Bomber crews, Fighter pilots, Fast bomber and Stuka crews are listed in the credits. If somebody has been missed then I would find this surprising. The RAF lost 500 pilots. Give or take....
There is also an acknowledgement at the end of this film where Goering says 'You have betrayed me ' (in German) and the soldiers in the machine gun nest look over a Now Empty harbour that was previously full of barges being prepared for operation Sea Lion. Phew !.
Good job they gave up innit.
The Battle of Britain was completely irrelevant, as Hitler never intended to invade the UK.
As soon as Stalin broke the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact on 28 June 1940 the OKW started preparing for Barbarossa.
You must live in an alternate dimension. It was Adolf that broke the pact not Stalin.
There was no “Battle Of Britain”. The RAF could have turned turtle and just let the Germans bomb southern England to their heart’s content and the Germans still would not have invade England because in 1940 they had neither the equipment, the logistics or the will to cross the channel.
Hitler never intended to invade the UK.
A hypothetical German invasion scenario was wargamed back in the 70s, with international invigilators. The outcome was a crushing German defeat, *even* with luck on their side, which included the invasion 'fleet', which consisted mostly of barges, somehow successfully beaching on the British coast with no interference from the Royal Navy. Ergo, the Germans had no realistic chance of successfully invading, must less defeating Britain, even with air superiority. This is not to say that the Battle of Britain was not a turning point in the war - it absolutely was. It did not, however, save Britain.
There was no "turning point".
@@MarkHarrison733 You versus actual historians? Good on you fella.
@@gw7624 Germany was fighting alone against the entire world.
@@MarkHarrison733 It was never fighting the 'entire world' you clown, and certainly not in 1940.
@@gw7624 Judea had officially declared war on Germany in March 1933.