The battle for Britain was won by the many . . . not just The Few
LEO McKINSTRy’S article about the RAF’s World War II aircraft is the stuff of Boy’s Own derring-do, but it propagates a myth that needs debunking (Mail). Group Captain Sir Douglas Bader said: ‘The Battle of Britain was the lot of us, not just the RAF.’ Indeed, perhaps it should be the Battle for Britain and the many, not the Battle of Britain and The Few. Sir Max Hastings has described the Royal Navy as our best fighting service in World War II. Hitler’s invasion plan was flawed and, while command of the air mattered, command of the sea was the critical issue. In effect, the strategic objective of the Battle of Britain was to ensure the barrier to invasion imposed by the Royal Navy could not be breached. The Royal Navy fought the Axis Powers from day one of the war to VJ Day; no other Armed Service was in action for the whole war. The so-called Phoney War of 1939 was not phoney for British sailors. Indeed, a U-boat torpedoed SS Athenia on day one and September 3 is commemorated annually as Merchant Navy Day. There are 2,936 pilots and ground crew named on the Battle of Britain memorial on London’s Victoria Embankment. The Fleet Air Arm’s 804 Naval Air Squadron and 808 NAS, and other naval and Royal Marines aviators, flew alongside the RAF; not all were RAF flyers as claimed on the RAF website. The aerial battle over the skies of England lasted for three and a half months in 1940, but the war continued for five more years. Britain stood alone in 1940 and Churchill rightly praised The Few, encouraging the nation for the struggles to come. Churchill said the ‘U-boat peril’ concerned him most and the convoy system and the Royal Navy’s development of anti-submarine warfare tactics laid the foundation for ultimate victory. Without food, supplies and arms arriving by merchant ship, Britain would have been sunk. Naval aviation was key to victory and naval aircraft such as the Fairey Swordfish biplane in frontline service and the Grumman Martlet and Hellcat should be revered like the Hurricane, Lancaster and Spitfire. The celebrated naval aviator and test pilot, Captain Eric ‘Winkle’ Brown CBE DSC AFC RN, survived the sinking of the escort carrier HMS Audacity in the North Atlantic in December 1941 and, as the castaway on the 3,000th edition of Desert Island Discs, his response about flying from aircraft carriers is worth listening to. The aircrew in their flying machines were part of a team effort of Allied sailors and marines, soldiers, airmen and civilians who contributed to victory. RAF planes helped win the war, but it is revisionist history to claim they won it. Rear Admiral Jeremy Larken DSO, Commodore Steve Auty RN, Captain Martin Reed RD, Commander Mike Evans RN, Commander Paul Fisher RN, Commander Sharkey Ward DSC AFC RN, Lieutenant Colonel Ian Berchem RE, Lieutenant Commander Lester May RN, London NW1.