I was pleased to see the paragraph in the linked news story that mentioned the role of Fighter Controllers in the Battle of Britain:

http://www.raf.mod.uk/news/archive.cfm?storyid=897DACD3-1143-EC82-2EE423A596858C...

Did Nick have anything to do with this?

Richard Jenner

I'm not sure that one can claim that the Battle 'turned the tide of World War II', though - as critical as it was....

I posted the original message because of the FC mentions rather than the article's description of the battle.

I do agree that 'turning point' is a better description than 'it turned the tide'. Churchill's famous speech in August 1940 actually said:

'The gratitude of every home in our island, in our Empire, and indeed throughout the world except in the abodes of the guilty goes out to the British airmen who, undaunted by odds, unweakened by their constant challenge and mortal danger, are turning the tide of world war by their prowess and their devotion.'

His full speech made as much mention of the bomber crews as the fighter pilots so the 'turning' would seem to refer to the whole effort by the RAF and not just the Battle of Britain (which was still going on at the time of this speech).

It was Nov 1942 after El Alamein that Churchill said:

'Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.'

So perhaps even this wasn't the turning point!??

Whatever, the summer of 1940 marked the first time that the German military intentions were thwarted and that the war was taken to Germany on a near daily basis.

Richard Jenner

Hi Dave, From your first post I see you are still a sailor at heart. Good for you.
While the B of B no doubt gave the Germans a bloody nose and was their first defeat of WW2, I agree with Dave that any attempt to invade in 1940 would have been carnage in the Channel as the RN got stuck in. The airborne troops who would no doubt have landed in S. England would have caused great disruption but would not have been able to hold out without rapid relief by the seaborne invasion. Much like our failure at Arnhem in '44. I would not wish to detract from anything that Fighter Command did in 1940, but compared with the Battle of Berlin and the Bomber Command offensives it was  a minor skirmish. Total Ftr Cmd losses about 1000 compared with over 600 bomber boys just on the night of the Nuremburg raid, let alone the rest of their campaign.
RvG