Thursday, August 24, 2006
Revisionist History - The Battle of Britain
The Times reports here on a "challenge" to the view that Britain was saved from a Nazi invasion by the RAF.
Apparently "... three military historians ... at the Armed Forces Joint Services Command Staff College ... " think Hitler was dissuaded by the Royal Navy.
Certainly it is true that at the time the Royal Navy could have prevented a sea attack and invasion, but only insofar as such an operation had no air support. The barges carrying troops and equipment would have been easy targets for the Navy and we had more than sufficient Naval power to deal with any supporting Nazi naval ships.
What these historians seem to be overlooking, and is indeed pointed out in the article by Air Commodore Peter Brothers: “I’m afraid that the Royal Navy would have had a thin time if there had been no Battle of Britain. The German air force would have done what the Japanese did in Singapore. The Germans had Stuka dive-bombers that would have made mincemeat of the Navy.”
The Navy at that time would have been unable to deal with the aircraft bombers of the Luftwaffe. If you look at the convoy situation, an important factor was the importance of air cover and once the ships left the air cover, they were far more vulnerable, simply because aircraft could be called in to deal with any aggressive ship. So I think it's fairly obvious that if one side has aircraft ability against ships, and those ships have no air cover or a means of dealing with the air threat then they are very vulnerable.
In the face of all these inevitable facts, the only question I'm asking is why are these historians taking the view they are in the article: "Peter Furtado, editor of History Today, said: “There is absolutely no intention of denigrating the exceptional efforts of the Battle of Britain pilots. But all the historians are trying to do is to put their efforts into a wider context. Churchill created the myth of the Few for his own reasons.”"
I wonder just who is doing what for their own reasons.
Apparently "... three military historians ... at the Armed Forces Joint Services Command Staff College ... " think Hitler was dissuaded by the Royal Navy.
Certainly it is true that at the time the Royal Navy could have prevented a sea attack and invasion, but only insofar as such an operation had no air support. The barges carrying troops and equipment would have been easy targets for the Navy and we had more than sufficient Naval power to deal with any supporting Nazi naval ships.
What these historians seem to be overlooking, and is indeed pointed out in the article by Air Commodore Peter Brothers: “I’m afraid that the Royal Navy would have had a thin time if there had been no Battle of Britain. The German air force would have done what the Japanese did in Singapore. The Germans had Stuka dive-bombers that would have made mincemeat of the Navy.”
The Navy at that time would have been unable to deal with the aircraft bombers of the Luftwaffe. If you look at the convoy situation, an important factor was the importance of air cover and once the ships left the air cover, they were far more vulnerable, simply because aircraft could be called in to deal with any aggressive ship. So I think it's fairly obvious that if one side has aircraft ability against ships, and those ships have no air cover or a means of dealing with the air threat then they are very vulnerable.
In the face of all these inevitable facts, the only question I'm asking is why are these historians taking the view they are in the article: "Peter Furtado, editor of History Today, said: “There is absolutely no intention of denigrating the exceptional efforts of the Battle of Britain pilots. But all the historians are trying to do is to put their efforts into a wider context. Churchill created the myth of the Few for his own reasons.”"
I wonder just who is doing what for their own reasons.
Tags: revisionist history, Battle of Britain
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.
