Instead of launching an immediate attack on Britain after the Fall of France, Hitler decided to give the British government a month to consider a negotiated peace. By July 2, he had lost patience and the Luftwaffe was ordered to gain control of British airspace in preparation for an amphibious invasion (Sea Lion). Having taken considerable losses during the Norway Campaign, the small German Navy was unlikely to survive a confrontation with the mighty Royal Navy. While both the German Army and the Navy lacked the specialized equipment and planners needed to execute a seaborne invasion of Britain, the Royal Navy and Britain's defences could be leisurely destroyed by bombers if the Luftwaffe was able to gain control of the air.

The Luftwaffe had almost 2,000 fighters and bombers, while the RAF had 504 Spitfires and Hurricanes, so Reichmarschall Hermann Goering, commander-in-chief of the Luftwaffe, was confident that the RAF could be eliminated as a threat within two weeks to a month. Suddenly given a role independent of the army, the commanders of the Luftwaffe had neither the expertise nor vision needed to design a new strategy- victory through bombardment from the air. Despite its victories in Europe, the fearsome Luftwaffe was unprepared for war over long distances. Long-range bombers had not been developed because the bombers' mission was to support the German army, not bomb far behind enemy lines, and as the army advanced, captured airfields could quickly be repaired.

Following the Fall of France, Britain was alone and its defence rested on the fighter pilots. The government remained confident, but Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding, head of RAF Fighter Command, had to face reality. So many fighter pilots had been killed, captured or wounded in France that there were barely enough experienced pilots left to form a core in each squadron, especially since pilots older than 30 were not physically capable of operating a plane in combat. Faced with a desperate need to put planes in the sky, partly-trained pilots were brought in from the reserves. The RAF's shortage of pilots was alleviated by the arrival of foreign pilots. Despite their experience, the all-Polish squadrons and the Czech squadron were not permitted to fly until their English improved.

However, production of planes favored the RAF. Newspaper tycoon Lord Beaverbrook had been appointed Minister of Aircraft Production in May, and he made his ministry an independent fiefdom. The Air Ministry wanted Wellington and Halifax bombers, but he agreed with Dowding's reasoning that fighters were needed to defend Britain. Production was ramped up until British factories were producing almost 500 Hurricanes and Spitfires a month, against German output of 140 Messerschmitt 109s by the time of the battle.

The Dowding System
Although Britain had developed radar later than the United States and Germany, it had built a chain of radar stations that covered British airspace by the time the war started. The radar stations were complemented by volunteer observers in posts along the coast, using binoculars, aircraft identification pamphlets and altitude measuring equipment. Fighter Command divided Britain into four areas: the south-west of England and half of Wales (10 Group); the middle of England and the rest of Wales (12 Group); Scotland and northern England (13 Group); and London and the south-east of England (11 Group). The groups were divided into sectors, and each sector had several fighter squadrons. The radar stations on the coast would notify the main operations room at Fighter Command Headquarters that enemy planes were approaching, and the information would then be sent to the Group Headquarters, where the approaching planes' course would be plotted on a giant map of the group's area by WAAFs. The group's fighter controller would check which squadrons were available and send them to meet the enemy. While this system seems rudimentary today, it was the most sophisticated air defence system in the world at the time.

Even with the warning provided by radar, the British fighters needed twenty minutes to climb high enough to hit the German planes which were moving in at 200 miles an hour. The destruction of the RAF was assigned to Luftflottes 2 and 3, commanded by Field Marshals Albert Kesselring and Hugo Sperrle respectively. Luftflotte 2 handled the bombing of southeast England and the area around London, while Luftflotte 3 was responsible for southwest England and the Midlands, but the two commanders rarely coordinated their attacks or followed the same strategy. Since the Messerschmitt BF 109 fighters barely had enough fuel to cross the Channel and return to France, most of the Luftwaffe attacks took place in 11 Group, since it was closest to France.

Channel Battles: July 10-August 11
The Admiralty, supported by the Air Ministry, had insisted that Fighter Command protect convoys transporting coal from the north of England along the Channel even though the coal could have been shipped by rail. Dowding's protests were overruled. During the three weeks of July before the Admiralty finally abandoned the convoys, the RAF lost 220 pilots. On August 10, Dowding cut operational training (the period between learning to fly and combat) for pilots from one month (six months before the war) to two weeks, which was barely enough time to learn how to land a Spitfire, never mind actually fight.

Eagle Attack: August 12-23
Radar was still relatively secret in Germany, and German intelligence refused to believe that the British had developed radar as well. In preparation for Eagle Day, attacks were made on RAF airfields and four radio stations with 350-foot-tall masts on August 12. Unknown to the Germans, these were radar stations, and three were knocked out of commission. The radar masts were especially resilient to bombs, and were soon back on line. However, coastal fighter airfields had been hammered. The Manston airfield had been hit particularly hard and hundreds of ground control staff fled to the bomb shelters where they remained for days, despite urgent pleas for them to work.

Although Goering had issued a surprisingly long list of targets for Eagle Day, including commercial ports, coastal shipping, and RAF facilities and factories, the really vital targets were ignored. Either German intelligence was genuinely incompetent or no one in the Luftwaffe senior command realized the importance of the two factories that made the Merlin engines that powered the RAF fighters or the only factory that produced Spitfires. An over-confident Goering not only dismissed his subordinates' concerns that there were too many targets, but refused to increase production of planes above 460 a month, even though this had not changed since 1939, and bombers were still emphasized over fighters.

The Luftwaffe targeted airfields further inland on Eagle Day but the RAF was better prepared and the German planes caused little damage. Since Eagle Day had produced negligible results, Goering decided to launch a much larger attack on August 15, where Luftflottes 2 and 3 would be joined by Luftflotte 5, based in Norway and Denmark, so that a total of 1,790 bombers and fighters would overwhelm the RAF. The Luftwaffe planners had expected that most of the planes would be with Groups 11 and 12, leaving only a skeleton force at Group 13, the target of Luftflotte 5. The planners were wrong, and Luftflotte 5 took 20% casualties, therefore the day is remembered as 'Black Thursday' in the Luftwaffe.

The Stuka dive-bombers had wreaked havoc during the Polish and French campaigns, but the planes took so long to reach their dive-bombing height that the radar operators were able to dispatch fighters. Instead of accepting that Stukas were not suited for long-range bombing, Goering ordered that each wing of Stukas would be protected by three wings of fighters. Goring believed that the RAF had less than 300 fighters and would soon be driven from the skies. The Stukas were finally withdrawn from the front after a punishing raid on August 18 when 18 out of 28 Stukas were downed or badly destroyed.

Spared invasion for a thousand years, the British public was accustomed to reading about wars in the newspapers, but the Battle of Britain took place in the skies above British towns and countryside. The fighting in the skies was beautiful but the consequences deadly, since British factories were the targets of German bombers. In essence, the German Air Force was besieging England, kept away only by the RAF. At the same time, the individual nature of dogfights gave the pilots a knightly image.

Every day started at 4 a.m., and pilots made several sorties each day. Every pilot hoped to see rain when he woke up, because there would be no flying that day, but only ten of the 37 days from August 1 were rainy or cloudy. Although the pilots could lounge by the airfield while waiting for instructions, the tension made it almost impossible to rest. Many of the inexperienced, half-trained pilots did not last long enough to be trained. Since most experienced squadron commanders had been killed, wounded or rotated out due to age, new commanders were far too often officers who had never served in a combat unit. Aside from the steady losses of pilots, the fighter bases were taking grueling punishment, so pilots would return to see wrecked living quarters and mess halls.

When pilots died, the other members of their squadron never saw it up close, but they would often hear the pilots' last words, screams or prayers in their earphones. Realizing that they would be unable to function if they acknowledged the emotional shock, pilots learned to live with the 'taste of fear.'

Bailing out of a burning, spiraling fighter or crash-landing in a field was terrifying and often involved injuries, and near brushes with death were a daily occurrence, while seeing and hearing friends die was far too common. The public's genuine appreciation of the fighter pilots helped but nothing could destroy the growing fear within each pilot that his time would be up sooner or later. Most of the pilots were scared almost every waking moment, and the only solution was boisterous boozing with other people. The fighter pilots would race off to the nearest pub once it was too dark for operations, while those without access to cars would congregate in the mess. The men were still under the influence of alcohol when they reported for duty but the RAF's official view was that no pilot could be convicted of drunkenness unless he would be considered drunk by ordinary, reasonable men. Relying on this vague description, squadron commanders turned a blind eye to the state of their pilots as long as they were able to get into their planes.

However, the Luftwaffe was being ground down as well, since the German pilots faced the additional challenge of having to nurse wounded planes over the Channel back to France. Worse, Goering had rejected his senior commanders' advice that the fighters should concentrate on hunting down and eliminating the British fighters.

The effectiveness of the RAF was limited by a debate at its highest levels. Air Vice-Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory, commander of 12 Group, resented being responsible for guarding 11 Group's airfields while the squadrons protected South-east England and London. He believed that fighters should be deployed in large groups, basically a 'Big Wing,' in order to maximize their destructive power. Opponents of this theory argued that by the time the force had been assembled (a minimum of 45 minutes to an hour), the enemy had already departed. The theory had been developed by Squadron Leader Douglas Bader, and the adjutant of his squadron was a member of the British Parliament, who arranged a meeting with Churchill. Part of the support for the Big Wing theory was due to the inability of enemy formations to penetrate far into 12 Group, even though the real reason was that the German planes had reached the limits of their fuel. Although Leigh-Mallory insisted on applying this approach, the Big Wing failed to intercept the enemy roughly 75% of the time, which resulted in the repeated destruction of 11 Group's airfields.

Rejecting the Big Wing approach, Air Vice-Marshal Keith Park, commander of 11 Group, sent his fighters up in small groups, so that German bombers never had an opportunity to catch all of a squadron refueling on the ground at the same time. On August 19, Park told his Sector Commanders and Controllers that their primary objectives must be the defence of their airfields and the destruction of German bombers.

Although the British pilots had learned through experience which tactics were more effective, no effort had been made to instruct those tactics in the squadrons that had been pulled out of the front line to rebuild. Squadrons rotated from the safer northern group areas found that the tactics they had practiced, like the V formation where a leader was followed by two wingmen, were useless and paid a heavy price during their first encounter with the Luftwaffe.

The Luftwaffe targets the airfields: August 24-September 6
Bad weather from August 19 to 24 had caused a pause in attacks but the Luftwaffe returned with a vengeance afterwards, launching several attacks each day, often with hundreds of fighters and bombers. Goering had ordered a round-the-clock offensive, so the bombers made return visits at night, since they were in no danger from RAF fighters. Fighter Command had learned the hard way not to keep planes lined up on airfields but dispersed into blast pens, which were simple squares made of concrete walls with both sides sloping down from the point to absorb the blast, and the fourth side was left open for the planes to taxi in and out. Even so, the German strategy of launching frequent and unpredictable attacks meant that planes were sometimes caught on the ground while refueling or queuing for takeoff. It took time to get all of the planes into the air, and even near misses would send planes spinning into the ground. The low-flying Dornier bombers were particularly effective because they suddenly appeared above airfields.

Goering had declared London off-limits, but navigation errors resulted in the city being bombed during the night of August 24/25. A retaliatory raid on Berlin was launched the following night, although most of the bombers missed the city. Having promised that Berlin would never be bombed, Hitler ordered that the unjustified attack be avenged.

The repeated claims that the RAF was on the verge of defeat became increasingly hard to for German pilots to believe since Hurricanes and Spitfires always appeared once they were over England. Attrition took a toll on both sides but time was on the side of the RAF. If Fighter Command could survive until the fall, the cold weather would ensure that there would be no invasion.

By September 3, Fighter Command had only 840 pilots, and defeat was increasingly likely. 300 pilots had been killed or wounded during August, but only 260 new pilots had been trained. Worse, between August 24 and September 5, the RAF lost 200 more planes than it received (466 destroyed vs 269 new and repaired), so air superiority was within Goering's grasp. Relentless attacks against 11 Group's airfields meant that there were only two serviceable sector airfields left by September 3. Desperate, Dowding allowed the Polish Squadron, No. 303, to become operational on August 30 even though their English was still not up to standard. They were so successful that the group captain refused to believe their claims of planes shot down until he saw them in action.

As more and more damage was done by German bombers, not all German pilots lived to be captured. RAF pilots who had bailed out of their planes sometimes had to frantically explain that they were British when confronted by violently inclined locals.

Pilots on both sides showed no compunction against killing each other, but were mortified when their planes or planes that they had shot down crashed into residences and killed people. Sometimes the police lied to pilots who had called to learn if the house was occupied or not, telling them that it had been empty to spare their feelings.

Change in Tactics: September 7-15
On September 3, Goring informed the senior command of the Luftwaffe that it was time to unleash the full power of the Luftwaffe on London. Relying on intelligence reports that indicated that the RAF was near death, Kesselring pressed for an all-out attack on London to force the RAF to fight at a time of the Luftwaffe's choosing. Sperrle believed that the RAF was much stronger, and even bet that it had 1,000 fighters. It only had 746 at the time, but his overall analysis of the situation was correct. However, the deciding factor was Hitler's fury with British retaliatory raids on Berlin.

Hoping that terror would convince the British public to consider negotiations, Goering launched a massive offensive against London with 350 bombers and 600 fighters on Saturday, September 7. Faced with the largest number of enemy planes assembled until then, Dowding had no choice but to order every Hurricane and Spitfire he had into the air. The fighter escort had burned through most of their petrol while waiting to assemble, so it had to return to France. The bombers were able to reach their target despite the lack of protection because the controller had presumed that the planes would target the RAF airfields as usual, so no British fighters were dispatched to London. The situation was not helped by an almost complete breakdown in communication between 11 Group and 12 Group, due to the personal feud between Leigh-Mallory and Park.

Most of the bombs hit the warehouses along the dockyards, which were full of combustible goods, so the raging fires simply torched entire areas, ending only when there was nothing left to burn. 306 people died that night in London and another 142 were killed in the suburbs by bombers that had not reached the city center. Determined to bomb England into submission, the bombers returned the next 76 nights in a row, missing only one night because of bad weather. This bombing campaign would be called the Blitz.

At the end of September 7, Goering arrived at the Luftwaffe headquarters at Cap Blanc Nez to take personal control of the Battle of Britain. Learning that forty bombers had been lost that day but few fighters had been shot down, a furious Goering decided that his pilots needed more courage, since they clearly outnumbered the enemy. The exhausted squadron commanders were lectured that they must defend the bombers, not waste time trying to increase their personal shooting scores. Protestations that the RAF was still a formidable enemy were brushed off, and he refused to change the strategy of having the fighters closely guard the bombers.

Park was better prepared for the next daylight attack on September 9, and the bombers were prevented from reaching London.

The shift in focus meant that the RAF's infrastructure would remain intact, while the attacks did no serious harm to either London's commercial infrastructure or morale. Londoners quickly became accustomed to spending every night in underground air raid shelters. The firefighters worked at breakneck speed to extinguish fires and decoy fires were lit in the countryside to lure enemy bombers to waste their bombs. The senior officers of the Luftwaffe thought that the RAF was almost out of planes and pilots because German attacks were usually met by small numbers of planes. Actually, the RAF was in good shape. Since the RAF lacked night fighters, the pilots were able to rest at night. In fact, daytime attacks were fewer once the Blitz started, and pilots no longer returned to damaged airfields, so they began to regain their energy.

The Lufwaffe's change of targets seemed to signal that the invasion would happen soon, but Hitler did not feel that the invasion forces were ready, so he ordered Goering to make another attempt to crush the RAF. More than a hundred bombers and fighters were sent against London on September 15, but Park had already developed a strategy to deal with the situation. London was almost at the end of the Messerschmitts' operating range, so the RAF fighters would attack in three stages in order to force the German fighters to burn through their fuel before they reached London. When the German fighters returned to France, the unescorted bombers would be vulnerable. Having been told repeatedly that the RAF had almost no fighters left, the bomber pilots were understandably furious to see several squadrons waiting over London. The durable nature of the Dornier bombers enabled most of them to make it safely home, although riddled with bullets and filled with bleeding crewmen.

An even larger force appeared that afternoon, with 114 bombers guarded by roughly 300 fighters. Having used the priceless two hours' break to re-arm and re-fuel, a total of 276 Hurricanes and Spitfires attacked in waves. Despite the powerful fighter escort, the Germans lost fifty-six planes and 136 men in the five hours of the two separate attacks, which were their heaviest losses since the Battle of Britain had commenced. However, it had been a close call. Churchill had happened to pop by the operations room of 11 Group shortly before the battle started. When he asked how many planes had been kept in reserve, Park's response that there were no reserves was naturally a shock.

While the RAF was straining to protect London, the fierce defense made German pilots ridicule the senior command's claim that there were only 50 Spitfires left in Britain. Goering raged at the fighter squadron commanders, but no one knew what to do. Actually, one person knew what to do. Since the Luftwaffe's heavy casualties demonstrated that the RAF was still a threat, Sea Lion was abandoned on September 17, and Hitler's attention drifted towards Russia.

Unknown to the Germans, the RAF was growing stronger every day. Airplanes were being produced at a rapid rate, while new, more powerful models of Hurricanes and Spitfires were appearing in squadrons. Enough new pilots had been trained to fill the holes in existing squadrons and form six new squadrons.

Among the 2,917 pilots who served in the RAF during the Battle of Britain (July 10-October), 2,334 were British, 145 Polish, 126 New Zealand, 98 Canadian, 88 Czechoslovakian, 33 Australian, 29 Belgian, 25 South African, 13 French, 11 American, 10 Irish, 3 Rhodesian, 1 Jamaican and 1 Newfoundlander. 544 of the 2,917 pilots died during the battle.

Despite being the architect of the RAF's victory, Dowding was removed on November 25, while Park was replaced as commander of Group 11 by Trafford Leigh-Mallory. Summoned to a meeting at the Air Ministry, Dowding and Park found themselves interrogated by all of the Air Marshals. Leigh-Mallory attacked Park's performance as head of 11 Group by stating that his Big Wing strategy would have been much more effective, and claimed that he could have his squadrons assembled and at a targeted area in a very brief period of time. The fact that his Big Wings had repeatedly failed to do so in the time he quoted was not mentioned by Leigh-Mallory. Invited to provide the viewpoint of the actual fighter pilots, Squadron Leader Douglas Bader said that the pilot in the air, not the controller on the ground, should be in charge.

An intensely private man, Dowding simply did not know how to talk to people and had no one to advise him how to handle the situation, so he chose to let his record speak for itself. Shortly afterwards, he was pushed out of the RAF. Incapable of smoothing over hurt feelings, Dowding had made many enemies but it is inexplicable that he should have been treated in such a manner. Given Churchill's micro-management of the war, a considerable share of the blame should fall on his shoulders.

Hitler was not concerned by the Luftwaffe's failure in the Battle of Britain, believing that Britain would finally cave in after the USSR had been defeated. However, Britain's survival had convinced Wild Bill Donovan, President Roosevelt's personal envoy, that Britain had a fighting chance, and should receive support from the United States, despite Ambassador Joseph Kennedy's reports to the contrary.

Related Movies:
Battle of Britain (1969)
Directed by Guy Hamilton, starring Lawrence Olivier and Christopher Plummer
Following the Fall of France during WWII, Britain stands alone against Nazi Germany. The badly outnumbered Royal Air Force must defend Britain against the Luftwaffe, which is ordered to gain air superiority in preparation for an invasion. (please click here to read the review)

Further Reading:
Fighter Boys: The Battle of Britain, 1940-Patrick Bishop, New York: Viking, 2003.

The author grew up in London in the late 1950s when the wreckage caused by German bombs could still be seen. The book excels at bringing the pilots to life but is less effective at presenting the overall flow of the Battle of Britain. Bishop is primarily concerned with relating the experience of the men who flew the planes, and gives less attention to the debate over which strategy would be more effective. Although many foreign pilots served with the RAF, the focus is almost entirely on the British pilots. While the book is not the definitive work on the Battle of Britain, it is an excellent introduction, since it examines the neglect of the RAF during the peace following WWI, the race to re-arm following the militarization of Germany and Italy, and the breakdown of class barriers as the RAF expanded rapidly once the war started.

Fighter: The True Story of the Battle of Britain-Len Deighton, Edison, N.J.: Castle Books, 2000.

Deighton provides a wealth of information about the battle itself, and the development of the fighters that fought the battle, even explaining the history of powered flight and how powered flight works. It sets the standard for books on the Battle of Britain.

Eagle Day: The Battle of Britain-Richard Collier, London: Cassell Military Paperbacks, 1999.

A few character sketches show the patient, determined mood of people in the countryside near the coast as they waited for the air assault that would undoubtedly come. Collier employs testimony from surviving pilots to give a taste of the fear that the pilots felt before contact with the enemy and the confusion that occurred when the fighting started. It is a very even-handed look at the battle, treating both the RAF and Luftwaffe pilots fairly. Clearly an admirer of the prime minister, Collier gives Churchill more attention than is required. Dowding is accurately portrayed, although Leigh-Mallory's Big Wing is described as being effective despite teething problems when it actually took far too long to assemble. The book ends right after September 15, therefore it does not deal with the unfair treatment of Dowding.

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