The Battle of Britain
The summer months of 1940 saw World War II come to the English skies as the RAF bravely fought off the endless attacks of Hitler’s Luftwaffe. Immediately after a period of time often called the ‘Phoney War’, Hitler had ordered his army to occupy other European countries and they met hardly any opposition in Belgium, Netherlands or France.
Operation Dynamo saw close to 300,000 men of the British Expeditionary Forces plucked to safety by a flotilla of boats making the journey coming from England to Dunkirk over a number of days. Next Hitler had his sights on England. The white cliffs of Dover were clearly visible as the German High Command gazed across the English Channel from Calais.
Of course, until the skies of England were under German command, Hitler would not authorise Operation Sealion – the invasion of Great Britain. With America being reluctant to participate in the war at this stage and her Allies vanquished, Great Britain would have to face the Germans all alone.
Would Britian hold out until the autumn when the weather would thwart the Germans from crossing the Channel? British hopes was in the hands of the bold airmen of the Royal Air Force, “The Few” as Churchill later referred to them. It wasn’t only British pilots in the RAF, the Commonwealth was represented with airmen from an array of colonial outposts like as South Africa and Rhodesia as well as Poles and even a couple of Americans.
Hitler despatched the Luftwaffe over to pound UK into submission but most importantly, their fighter escorts only had the fuel for only a few minutes battle before they would have to go back leaving the bombers unprotected. For the first time, the Luftwaffe came up against stiff opposition and there was to be no repeat of their quick victories on the Continent. Britain’s airfields in the south east were taking a beating till a night in August 1940, a German aircraft got lost and jettisoned its bombs over London before heading home. In retaliation, the Royal Air Force conducted a raid on Berlin.
Hitler was livid and instructed his aircraft to attack London and not the Royal Air Force airfields. This was a decisive turning point as it afforded the RAF some much needed relief. The German Air Force failed to get the upper hand at any point and in mid September, Hitler indefinitely postponed Operation Sealion. The immediate risk of attack was gone and Churchill spoke of the contribution of Fighter Command in a legendary speech “Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few”.
The top fighter ace was Sgt Frantisek from the Czech Republic with a score of seventeen kills. He flew in a Hawker Hurricane which was the true workhorse of Fighter Command even if almost everyone remembers the famous Spitfire. Sgt Frantisek died in October 1940.
The Battle of Britain was the first occasion the Germans had experienced a miltary defeat in World War II.
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