The Battle of Britain Was The First Defeat For The German Luftwaffe.

[Al Schlageter]

The Führer and Supreme Commander
of the Armed Forces


Führer Headquarters,
16th July 1940.
7 copies

Directive No. 16 On preparations for a landing operation against England

Since England, in spite of her hopeless military situation, shows no signs of being ready to come to an understanding, I have decided to prepare a landing operation against England and, if necessary, to carry it out.

The aim of this operation will be to eliminate the English homeland as a base for the prosecution of the war against Germany and, if necessary, to occupy it completely.

I therefore order as follows :

1. The landing will be in the form of a surprise crossing on a wide front from about Ramsgate to the area west of the Isle of Wight. Units of the Air Force will act as artillery, and units of the Navy as engineers.

The possible advantages of limited operations before the general crossing (e.g. the occupation of the Isle of Wight or of the county of Cornwall) are to be considered from the point of view of each branch of the Armed Forces and the results reported to me. I reserve the decision to myself.

Preparations for the entire operation must be completed by the middle of August.

2. These preparations must also create such conditions as will make a landing in England possible, viz:

(a) The English Air Force must be so reduced morally and physically that it is unable to deliver any significant attack against the German crossing.

(b) Mine-free channels must be cleared.

(c) The Straits of Dover must be closely sealed off with minefields on both flanks; also the Western entrance to the Channel approximately on the line Alderney-Poitland.

(d) Strong forces of coastal artillery must command and protect the forward coastal area.

(e) It is desirable that the English Navy be tied down shortly before the crossing, both in the North Sea and in the Mediterranean (by the Italians)1. For this purpose we must attempt even now to damage English home-based naval forces by air and torpedo attack as far as possible.

Stern, 2.a was not even close to being met and you still want to call it a draw.

[adonys]

Originally Posted by Al Schlageter

...
(a) The English Air Force must be so reduced morally and physically that it is unable to deliver any significant attack against the German crossing.
...

Stern, 2.a was not even close to being met and you still want to call it a draw.

Hmm.. in this case, you need to re-read the memories of the WWII british fighter pilots, which were brought on (or even over) the very edge of mental and physical collapse at that time..

[Al Schlageter]

Originally Posted by adonys

Hmm.. in this case, you need to re-read the memories of the WWII british fighter pilots, which were brought on (or even over) the very edge of mental and physical collapse at that time..

Yet they still kept flying and fighting, so not even close to your statement.

[Sternjaeger II]

Originally Posted by Al Schlageter

Yet they still kept flying and fighting, so not even close to your statement.

of course they did, what else could they do? They were pushed to the max: the RAF gave their pilots amphetamines, the Luftwaffe benzedrine.. there were cases of nervous breakdown and accidents due to tiredness on both factions.

[Sternjaeger II]

Originally Posted by Al Schlageter

Stern, 2.a was not even close to being met and you still want to call it a draw.

whatever the plan was, it was suspended for other matters. At the time of the suspension of major aerial operation over the Channel the RAF was at the brink of collapse, the Luftwaffe could have won the war of attrition, had they persevered.

Let's give you an example: you're playing football with your friends, at some point the other team needs to leave because more urgent matters require their presence, and so far the score is a draw, but you've been struggling and you know that if they didn't have to leave you might have lost that game. I would understand your enthusiasm for having got away with it, but would you really consider that a victory, or one to celebrate anyway?

[Al Schlageter]

Originally Posted by Sternjaeger II

whatever the plan was, it was suspended for other matters. At the time of the suspension of major aerial operation over the Channel the RAF was at the brink of collapse, the Luftwaffe could have won the war of attrition, had they persevered.

Let's give you an example: you're playing football with your friends, at some point the other team needs to leave because more urgent matters require their presence, and so far the score is a draw, but you've been struggling and you know that if they didn't have to leave you might have lost that game. I would understand your enthusiasm for having got away with it, but would you really consider that a victory, or one to celebrate anyway?

Sure Stern, what ever you say. The Lw abandoned the daylight phase which was to defeat the RAF and switched to night terror attacks on civilians.

As for the war of attrition, the number of Spitfires and Hurricanes increased during the daylight phase of the battle while the Lw's numbers continually declined from the numbers at the start of the battle in July.

13 Aug 40
Strength Summary
Number Type Strength/Svcble
42 1/3 Kampfgruppen 1482/ 1008
9 Stukagruppen 365/286
1 Schlachtgruppe 39/31
26 Jagdgruppen 976/853
9 Zerstrergruppen 244/189
3 Nachtjagdgruppen 91/59
14 Seefliegerstaffeln 240/125

7 Sept 1940
Strength Summary
Number Type Strength/Svcble
43 Kampfgruppen 1291/ 798 > -191/-210
4 Stukagruppen 174/133 > -191/-153
2 Schlachtgruppe 59/44 > +20/+13
27 Jagdgruppen 831/658 > -145/-199
8 Zerstörergruppen 206/112 > -38/-77
18 Fernaufklärungsstaffeln 191/123
6 Seefliegerstaffeln 52/33

[Sternjaeger II]

Originally Posted by Al Schlageter

Sure Stern, what ever you say. The Lw abandoned the daylight phase which was to defeat the RAF and switched to night terror attacks on civilians.

well, according to some of your buddies here that was ok (at least until 1949!)

As for the war of attrition, the number of Spitfires and Hurricanes increased during the daylight phase of the battle while the Lw's numbers continually declined from the numbers at the start of the battle in July.

13 Aug 40
Strength Summary
Number Type Strength/Svcble
42 1/3 Kampfgruppen 1482/ 1008
9 Stukagruppen 365/286
1 Schlachtgruppe 39/31
26 Jagdgruppen 976/853
9 Zerstrergruppen 244/189
3 Nachtjagdgruppen 91/59
14 Seefliegerstaffeln 240/125

7 Sept 1940
Strength Summary
Number Type Strength/Svcble
43 Kampfgruppen 1291/ 798 > -191/-210
4 Stukagruppen 174/133 > -191/-153
2 Schlachtgruppe 59/44 > +20/+13
27 Jagdgruppen 831/658 > -145/-199
8 Zerstörergruppen 206/112 > -38/-77
18 Fernaufklärungsstaffeln 191/123
6 Seefliegerstaffeln 52/33

sources man, don't forget to mention the sources. As for the number of Spitfires and Hurricanes, I'm not that sure about your statement, but even if you are right it's kind of irrelevant, since you need pilots to fly them.

Had the battle continued, you would have soon seen the entrance in service of Bf109F and subsequently FW190s together with extended fuel tanks, then I doubt that the MkV and Hurri had much of a chance there..

[Al Schlageter]

source: http://sturmvogel.orbat.com/LW_OBs.html This is a well known site. I am surprised to you are not familiar with it.

But the day battle didn't continue as the RAF put the run to the Lw. The Lw lost in its attempt to destroy the RAF.

The Lw was loosing even more aircrew, ~5 times more.

[Sternjaeger II]

Originally Posted by Al Schlageter

source: http://sturmvogel.orbat.com/LW_OBs.html This is a well known site. I am surprised to you are not familiar with it.

I don't think you mentioned it before, and the assumption you made that I don't know it is based on?

But the day battle didn't continue as the RAF put the run to the Lw. The Lw lost in its attempt to destroy the RAF.

The Lw was loosing even more aircrew, ~5 times more.

aaawww child

You surely know that Luftwaffe crews had a "one pilot per machine only" policy, so the highly trained personnel loss rate was in fact on par (if not less) with the RAF. Get your facts straight.

[Al Schlageter]

RAF > 544 aircrew killed
Lw > 2,698 aircrew killed

To those numbers should be added POW and WIA.

Since you are such the gung-ho luftwaffler I would think you would at least do some research on the Lw and have found that site, which has been around for a very long time.

By 2 November, the RAF fielded 1,796 pilots, an increase of over 40% from July 1940's count of 1,259 pilots. (Dye 2000, p. 35.) How many pilots did the Lw have?

By 14 September the Luftwaffe's Bf 109 Geschwader possessed only 67 percent of their operational crews against authorised aircraft. The RAF had an excess of pilots on squadron strength, as well as a/c.

Due to the failure of the Luftwaffe to establish air supremacy, a conference assembled on 14 September at Hitler's headquarters. Hitler concluded that air superiority had not yet been established and "promised to review the situation on 17 September for possible landings on 27 September or 8 October. Three days later, when the evidence was clear that the German Air Force had greatly exaggerated the extent of their successes against the RAF, Hitler postponed Sealion indefinitely. (Overy 2001, p. 97.)