With the new technology and engineering, World War Two was fought both on the ground and in the air. During 1940 from the 10th of July to the 31st of October, the Royal Air Force Fighter Command opposed the German Luftwaffe’s attempt to acquire air superiority over Southern England. The Battle of Britain got it’s name from a famous speech, (Winston Churchill, June 18, 1940) stating “The Battle of France is over. The Battle of Britain is about to begin.”
After Germany had overtaken most of Europe, including France, the only major country left was Great Britain. During July, Hitler gave orders to start preparation on a sea borne invasion of Britain, called Operation Sea lion. To make the invasion easier, he sent his Airforce, Luftwaffe, to destroy Britain’s Royal Airforce before attacking the land. Germany believed it was essential to destroy the British Air Force to stop them from sinking the ships carrying German soldiers across the Channel. To do this they bombed airport runways and British radar. On paper, Germany had a fair advantage. They began the war with around 1,300 bombers and dive bombers, about 900 single engines and 300 twin engine fighters, many more than the Fighter Commands 640 planes. But they lacked any consistent plan of action. Trying to establish a blockade through destroying shipping and ports, attempting to destroy Britain’s fighter Command and attacking London and other cities. Whereas British forces were well prepared, with the most advanced and operationally adapted radar early warning technology, giving the Fighter Command sufficient notice of where and when to direct their forces.
When looking at the magazine ‘London Calling’ the article ‘Guarding Britain’s Sky’ outlines, in detail, the different stages of an encounter with enemy aircraft. This article talks about the difficulties of battling in the air, stating that “one can hardly exaggerate the difficulties of search from the air” (Stewart, 1940).
The Battle of Britain affected the Second World War as it was the first major campaign which was entirely fought with aircrafts. It was also the largest and the most continual bombing campaign to the date. The Battle of Britain was the end of Hitler’s air forces. This in itself was significant from that time as the German military forces seemed to be unstoppable, it gave hope to the conquered. From accounts published in Britain, 21 Australian fighter pilots took part in the Battle of Britain and 14 were killed in action. There weren’t many Australians fighting since Australia, during this time only had a small squadron based in England. The long term effects from the Battle of Britain was that the whole of Europe was not controlled by Hitler or Stalin. Hitler’s plan was to force Britain to negotiate peace terms through destroying the RAF and their airfields. If Hitler was able to overtake Britain, he would have been able to freely bomb Britain’s cities, ports and industries. In these circumstances Britain would have to negotiate peace with Hitler and Hitler would have involved the ending of all hostilities against Germany and forbidden the stationing of foreign troops in Britain. The Battle of Britain showed that Hitler and the Nazis could be defeated, if Germany did win Britain would now be a completely different place.
Both sides lost heavily from the Battle of Britain. The NZ History (2012) states that, over 1,700 Luftwaffe planes were destroyed, and suffered 2,662 casualties, including many experienced aircrew. The Royal Air Force lost around 1,250 aircrafts, this included 1,017 fighter planes. But overall the Bomber Command suffered the most with more than 700 fatalities during the time of the battle. Another 200 men were killed while flying with the Coastal Command. Many others suffered wounds. Men were mostly found enveloped in flames in their cockpits, before managing to recover. Because the British denied the peace offering and stopped them getting air superiority over England, Germany decided to change their tactics to “The Blitz”. On the 7th of September, it became clear for Germany that they were failing to win the fight. Hitler decided to focus on bombing British cities in an attempt to kill it’s war economy. Although the campaign failed to significantly damage Britain’s military operations, over 40,000 civilians were killed.
Overall, The Battle of Britain was a very significant turning point for World War Two as it was the first time Hitler was defeated, giving hope to many people and showing that Hitler was not invincible. It was also significant as it was the first time a battle happened completely in the air, marking not only the defeat of Hitler, but the start of new technology