Battle Of Britain: Combat & Balance of Force

How would the chances of success for Sea Lion compared between 6 July 1940 and 22 June 1941?

Do I detect a German accent?

Very interesting about how the Germans underestimated the RAF's numbers. I wonder, was that Goering's fault? Also, was it a systemic fault - that is, did the Germans tend to underestimate their opponents?
Anyway, thank you for a very informed piece. Keep 'em coming! :-)

The RAF had less Aircraft but Radar helped to redress the balance by Getting the Aircraft vectored into the right place. and a nod to the Poles where very aggressive in the attack.

Prof Overy misses the point. This was not a small battle named by historians. Its significance was such that it was named by Churchill and he underscored its history changing importance.
"What General Weygand called the Battle of France is over.I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization........"
Every word true.

How about this Battle that Drain Germany Oil Resources?! Luftwaffe Planes Ultimately Needs High Octane Gasoline, No Diesels, And Air Travel More with More Planes to Great Britain would Truly Most Spend High Octane Gasoline.

How many Pilots were there during world war 2? I can find tons on how many planes were built but VERY little about the number of pilots.

Short Version: Goering fucked up, and Germany lost the war. He's the best frenemy of all time.

Similar to Finland v Russia, only with aircraft.

I suspect that if the airfields were attacked for about a month more the British would have lost their fighters. That was the real reason for attacking the airfields (They had to defend them.). Ultra intercepts helped Britain during this time. This seems to be under appreciated by historians. But Hitler was in a hurry to attack Russia... so in the end .. isn't this a waste of effort and valuable resources? I get that many theories existed about bombing economies to defeat... but if you are not going to invade.. why continue?
Good analysis. I would respectfully suggest you slow down a little and let images stay a little longer on the screen. I think the icons are a very clever idea.

One wonders what might have happened if the Germans would have been given or lent 300 Zeros from their Japanese allies or constructed as much from license. The Zero had incredible amount of range and could have stayed in the air over Britain a very long time allowing, perhaps, a better chance to establish air superiority.

I have another fanciful imagined idea: In the battle of Arras, what if Britain would have had 100 or even 50 Mosquitos at the battle of Arras and employed them against Rommel’s anti-tank artillery. Imagine if those batteries of artillery had been successfully knocked out by Mosquitos in ground attack and bomber modes, if the Anglo-French had then won that battle, Guderians Panzers farther to the west, as far as the English Channel coast, would have suddenly been cut off from their supply. The German army might have been then isolated and destroyed in Northern France. From there I have no idea what would unfold, maybe a WWII that looked a lot like WWI. This is very fanciful imagining but it is not entirely fanciful. The technology used to make the Mosquito was already mature, with the Rolls Royce engines already in wide sprea use in both the Spitfire and the Hurricanes. The use of wood instead of aluminum was novel but not cutting edge technology, so that it is not to fanciful in that they could have been made and available in. 1940 and the speed of the mosquito cancelling out the air superiority that the Germans seemed to have held over France in the 1st Battle of France in 1940 (the 2nd Battle of France was the one fought in Normandy in 1944 which reversed the outcome of the 1st.).

I know you know the right way but Ill say it anyway,. its pr onounced bomer not bomber the second B is silent,..lol, ty. love your vids!!

Battle of Britain is a sound bite... It was a campaign.

The British i read it a while a go were building air craft faster than the Germans during the Battle of Britain.
So if this is correct then it was inevitable that the Germans would have to quit first and they did because if the battle had continued Germany would have run out of planes and Britain would have bombed Germany even more devastatingly than it did.

I always wondered why the Germans didnt try a ruse....launch a large group of bombers, followed by a large group of fighters...when the British radar showed bombers enroute...and scrambled their fighters hoping to intercept the German bombers and fighters...the German bombers would reverse and fly back to their bases ....meanwhile the German fighters would engage the British fighters on a one-on-one...crippling the British fighter force....and or then send a bomber wave after the British fighters were out of fuel and ammo.

Well if Germany had just operational 3000 planes in July of 1940 then how they deployed total 5600 aircraft in Battle of France?That’s just number of combat aircraft?

Mustn’t be forgotten that the overestimation of the Luftwaffe might have helped the RAF in this theatre and this battle, but causes havoc in other areas like the Far East, where the RAF were woefully under-resourced, with disastrous consequences.

Shows that the RAF wasn't about to break as popular ideas suggest
I kept seeing comments about how the RAF was so close to the breaking point but absolutely no explanation

We British are used to being mocked but it is a little hard to have the Battle of Britain described as a cuddly teddy bear. Four hundred and six Bitish pilots were killed, 29 Poles, 20 Canadian, 14 Australian, 14 New Zealand, 9 South African, 8 Czech, 6 Belgian and 1 American also died. Small numbers perhaps, in the scheme of things, but they gave too much to be ridiculed.

Prof. Overy?

Very enjoyable.... should be noted that the theory of Spitfires taking on the German fighters whilst the Hurricanes attacked the German bombers very often didn’t work out that way - in reality the Hurricane pilots found themselves dogfighting with the Me109s as often as the Spitfires did.

Again sounds to me like the top brass used assumption arrogance and miscalculation in its arsenal.
German High command had an awesome military at its disposal.
But was ever under the command of party leaders with egos rathan veteran general's.

So, this is Military History Visualized a graphic that might have made this excellent video even better might have been one that showed 'apparent' strengths vs 'actual' strengths - over time.

For instance for each phase of the battle, it might have been better to be able to see what each side was actually up against vs what they thought they were up against.

Germans lost, there you go

What should german has done? Not fight the UK?

What if Germany's airforce had concentrated on attacking British merchant shipping in Britain's coastal waters?

That, in conjunction with the submarine campaign would have seriously crippled British trade, no?

As well as inflicting heavier losses on the RAF, because they wouldn't be losing pilots over friendly territory any more, but would have them dropping into the sea, same as the Germans.

If the plan was to actually invade the UK, the Royal Navy should have been the target of phase 3. If bombing the major cities had been the plan for quite some time, I have to ask if invasion was ever really considered.

nice job!

hello and thank you for offering this information. So much work involved and no one out there
is giving such an in depth analysis. Really great. That being said I think alot of what you are telling us is being lost because of pronunciation and rate of utterance. I understand that English is not your first
language but in order for us to get the specifics of your hard work you need to slow down. I imagine you are under a time restraint and maybe can't do that but the speed without an improved pronunciation
makes it very frustrating for the listener/audience and,speaking for myself, I start to feel I can't watch/listen anymore.That is a shame because what you are doing here is really great. Anyway
thanks for this and good luck

The RAF was never on its last legs, a German attempt at an amphibious operation against Britain would have been an unmitigated disaster and the Luftwaffe never sank anything larger than a light cruiser throughout the war. The BoB was NOT a turning point. Even Churchill himself said that the only thing that ever frightened him was the U-Boat campaign.

Targets also included 'indiscriminate bombing on civilians'. Typical Germans. And one side was clearly defeated. They were called Ze Germans.

your figures on German a/c production are not detailed enough. For example, in the excellent book 'Duel of Eagles' 109 production in June 1940 was barely above peacetime levels at 90 planes a month, whereas hurricane production was already hitting 200 a month. Each month saw a large increase by the British, who adopted an 'all citizen total war approach, with all strategic resources demanded by your local fighter factory, whereas the German industry went from a laize-fair approach, to finally only getting the memo by October they were in total war, too late for the BoB. German fighter production needs to be broken down to 109s, the clearly ineffective 110, and other types, while British production needs to be split between Hurricanes, Spitfires, and other types. Where is your video clearly showing whythe Luftwaffe had almost zerochance of winning air superiority during the Battle of Britain?

Saying that there was no defeat of either protagonist, whilst superficially correct, is actually wrong.
Defeat doesn't have to be the complete destruction or routing of one side. Achievement of objectives or failure thereof also determines victory.
The British objective was to prevent the expected German invasion across the Channel.
The German objective was to achieve air superiority over southern England to give suitable conditions to allow the invasion of Britain.

It's pretty clear that the British achieved their objectives and the Germans failed in theirs. That's a totally clear win for the Brits.
As for a clear date/time for victory, it was obviously the point when the invasion was called off and the invasion forces were moved away from the channel ports.

It's true that the aerial assault continued on Britain, but instead of calling it a phase of the Battle of Britain, it would be more correct to call it the bombardment of Britain, rather than the Battle of Britain.

Consider what's happening in Ukraine: the Battle of Kyiv ended with the Russian withdrawal of forces, but the city is still subject to bombardment. No-one is saying that the battle of Kyiv is continuing.

"Had it not been for the magnificent material contributed by the Polish squadrons and their unsurpassed gallantry, I hesitate to say that the outcome of the Battle (of Britain) would have been the same."
Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding, head of RAF Fighter Command

If you'd like to see a visual representation of the outcome of the battle of Britain, type into the YT search box "Cocky fighters who were humbled". That'll give you the general idea.

The subtitles are simply appalling.

You dont mention here something very important ; in the battle for Britain , the ME and FW airplanes could fly in the battle only 12 -15 min ! Because of fuel problem ,long distance !

So the Battle of Britain was ultimately a useless waste of resources and skilled pilots for the luftwaffe. Well also exacerbating Germany's lack of resources?

Germany should of Attacked then Airport only in England (August --
End November 1940). Landing then after an Amphibious Army (October -- November 1940). Taking First South England and then the Rest. So the Allies will not be able to bomb, in the Future German Industry in 43, 44. Letting the Germans build a Large Number of Weapons in 1942 --1944.
After the Germans could easily take Most of Europe, all of Northern Africa and the Middle East in 1941 -- 1943. Then in May 1942 Attack Russia with 4 Army Groups (With about 12 Infant. Army's and 6 Panzer Grouppen). Plus 4 Air Army's (With 8000 War Playns). Japan would of Attacked the US Pacific Fleet in Hawaii in December 1942. Taking Most of the SE Pacific in 6 Months (End of May 1943). After taking Midway and Hawaii (End of August 1943). Preparing to Land an Amphibious Army (300 000 men) in Loss Angeles CA, US in September 1943. And also Astrakan in SW Alaska (150 000 men).

Don't forget the RAF had at least as many bombers in

The Battle of Britain was 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.

The subtitles are interesting! How did that happen? :D

If Prof Avery said all that the he is partly wrong... there very much WAS a "loser" of the battle of Britain. NO if's or but's about it !!!!

I love your channel, but I think you have the four phases of the Battle of Britain incorrectly labled here. A better characterization would be like so:

#1. The Channel War: July 7 to around August 7. The Germans had shorter missions and primarily went after shipping under the false premise that they could help the U-Boats strangle Britain. In truth, the subs never sank more than two percent of all British tonnage for a given month.

#2 The Attacks on Radar: August 7-August 18: The Germans had no idea early that the British had radar, and then turned it. However, they could never get bombing accurate enough to destroy the Home Chain radar system.

#3: The Airfields/Their Finest Hour: August 18-September 6: This saw the Germans then turn to bombing airfields and the RAF Fighter Command on the mistaken premise that the RAF was on its last legs. This is were the RAF began to see its number of skilled pilots drop to dangerously low levels, and roughly where RAF fighter production overtook the Luftwaffe for the duration of the war.

#4: The Ebb Tide: September 7-September 17: This is where the Luftwaffe, in frustration, threw everything it had at the RAF. Fighter Command in 11 Group begins using Big Wing tactics to husband resources for its attacks in larger numbers. Finally, The Germans mistakenly bomb London, which leads to retaliation on Berlin which angers Hitler and causes him to end the campaign to save units for the Invasion of Russia (if you believe that easy way to explain it), and to bomb London at night in "The Blitz".

Great stuff though!

RAF Claims "This figure of seventy-six enemy aircraft destroyed, though impressive enough in all conscience—especially as many were bombers carrying a crew of three or four—came as a great disappointment when it was discovered from secret German archives after the war. Our estimate of the day's successes given to the public at the time was that we had certainly destroyed 182 enemy aircraft and probably destroyed another fifty-three."
page 171
Royal Air Force 1939-1945 Vol I

For "nickdanger" below.

Overclaiming was (and still is) universal. The Luftwaffe overclaimed by a FAR larger amount. By the middle of Sept 1940 the OKL (luftwaffe high command) seriously believed that RAF Fighter Command was down to its last 100 aircraft..... imagine their horror when their major assault on London on 15th Sept 1940 was met by literally HUNDREDS of RAF Fighter Aircraft.


Your point is? Oh yes that's right, your point is to attempt a one sided negative portrayal of events to denigrate and deflate the British achievement in summer/Autumn 1940. Back to the drawing board for you Nick.