If the RAF had been defeated in the Battle of Britain

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I don't think that Hitler would have relied on a friendly British government; he would have demanded an occupation. I don't think any British government would tolerate that.
 
It was one thing for the Germans to rely on the French Vichy government

As Vichy France was pretty much surrounded by the Axis or friends of the Axis. Not to mention the Germans had occupied most of the industrial (but not all) areas of France. Trusting the British without an occupying force with the British sea lines of communication uncut would have been a really dumb idea.
 

Considering that the German plans after Britain had the temerity to fight back were genocidal, I don't think that anything other than a particularly vicious occupation was planned.
 
I'm sure the occupation would be no more than the brutal occupations through out Europe.
 
psl said:
I'm sure the occupation would be no more than the brutal occupations through out Europe.
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Well the Channel Islands were occupied during the war. It was a grim time for the Islanders which changed strangely from occupation to siege after D Day.
 
pbehn said:
Well the Channel Islands were occupied during the war. It was a grim time for the Islanders which changed strangely from occupation to siege after D Day.
Click to expand...

Neglecting the rather confusing (to a USian) relationship between the government of the UK and the Channel Islands, I believe the residents of them were basically told to keep their heads down and not cause trouble (iirc, they weren't under control of Parliament, so the PM couldn't order them about). The German Army had a well-known and well-earned reputation for being more than ruthless against resistance.
 
I would say that less than 1% of the UK population understand the relationship between the UK and the Channel Islands, I just read about it a few months ago , two crown dependencies and a Bailiwick. While there was a threat of invasion the Germans were almost friendly for propaganda purposes. On such small islands resistance of any serious kind but also as the war went against Germany the threat of reprisals became less too.
 
I don't even buy the draw argument.

For the LW to win, it had to gain total air superiority and eliminate the RAF as a factor in the upcoming battle. they failed spectacularly to achieve that, Later they switched priorities to a sort of terror bombing campaign on a massive scale. There is debate about how close that came to success, but really I see no real evidence of a collapse in british morale. I suppose Halifax's treachery might qualify, but no more so than Hesses attempts to reach agreement with the british. The LWs initial aim of gaining control of the narrow seas around the UK was successful, but not to the extent of allowing invasion. they did succeed in closing the channel coastal traffic for a time. there were several devastating attacks on ports. Lastly the LW attacks on British industry were met with some success, but again not really lasting and not serious. Had those attacks been continued, German losses would have continued to mount to the point of unsustainability

As it was the losses to the LW in the blitz and the battle itself were sufficiently heavy to affect numbers and loss/readiness rates in the Barbarossa campaign. by July 1941, readiness rates had plummeted to under 1000 machines, in part because the supplies of spares had been allowed to dwindle, or otherwise forced to be used to recover from the frenetic pace of operations over Britain.

The so called battle of Britain did not win the war, but in every sense I can think of it was a victory for the RAF. It can gone into the battle determined to remain viable, it emerged more than viable. as a bonus it had inflicted serious and for perhaps perverse reasons, unrecoverable losses on the LW. To me they are the hallmarks of a complete victory
 
The draw argument is a nonsense.

The Luftwaffe was given the strategic tasks of writing down Fighter Command and securing air superiority for the invasion, they failed on both accounts!
BY the Battles end the RAF was actually stronger then at the start thanks to Beaverbrook's aircraft production and the improved pilot training whereas the Luftwaffe was getting weaker

The RAF's task was to remain a fighting force and defeat the German attempts to gain air superiority, they achieved both aims.

It was no draw it was an abject defeat for the Luftwaffe, a defeat Park then repeated in Malta 2 years later!
 
First, the objectives given to the Luftwaffe were more wide ranging and even less plausible than simply defeating the RAF and achieving air superiority for an invasion. It manifestly failed to achieve any of its objectives, and in that sense the campaign was a defeat.

If we play the numbers game, at a more tactical level, then the outcome is not so clear cut. That's the basis of the argument that the Luftwaffe was fought to a draw. You can even argue that on a fighter v fighter basis the Luftwaffe won!

Fighter Command's task was very clear. It included defending its own assets, extended to include the aircraft industry (with varying degrees of success) and the other industries and infrastructure (ports etc.) which were on the Luftwaffe's 'to do' list. Eventually the defence of London became the priority, the very thing that Fighter Command had been designed to do in the mid 1930s. In this sense the Luftwaffe's famous change of emphasis, in a last ditch attempt to force the British government to compromise, played into the hand s of the RAF. By continuing to do this it inevitably denied air superiority to the Luftwaffe.

I do agree that a vital objective was to remain a viable fighting force. It had to do that to even attempt any of the above. In the short term, as various commanders made clear, it had to survive at least until November, when any possibility of invasion was lost until the following year.
 
{stona} If we play the numbers game, at a more tactical level, then the outcome is not so clear cut. That's the basis of the argument that the Luftwaffe was fought to a draw. You can even argue that on a fighter v fighter basis the Luftwaffe won! {stona}

And this is why these arguments are worthless, the RAF was not fighting a 10 v 10 shout go battle against the Luftwaffe fighters like some video game, it was stopping the bombers, the bombers could force a political solution, the fighters could not.

When the RAF took off they were going into battle against the entire attacking force not just the 109's, the Jagdwaffe had only one target, the RAF fighters, so it's a meaningless comparison, it's a bit like claiming the Anti Aircraft guns won because they lost less, Goering was given wide ranging brief, that is true, and every task given to him failed.

Reality was the Luftwaffe was doomed to fail from the start, the RAF had the ability to draw back or disperse and still operate in the critical region but never had to, only one sector station was put out of action for more than 2 days, the RAF was building their force as the battle progressed whilst the Luftwaffe was taking casualties IT could not sustain, especially in bomber crew who were at the end of their tether by September!

You can scrabble around looking for fig leaves, but what matters is the strategic outcome, and the outcome is clear, the Luftwaffe were defeated!
 
The most surprising conclusion of the Battle of Britain that could be drawn, but wasn't at the time, was that Germany was in no way prepared for the war it had brought upon itself and everyone else. During the battle the UK overtook Germany in production of single engine fighters and would remain ahead until about 1944. Its losses in the Battle of France and the Battle of Britain in bombers and transports were never fully replaced. This is a losing situation when you are soon going to be in conflict with two other nations whos production capacity was even higher than that of the UK.
 
As to the numbers game, has some sort of consensus even been reached about what the aircraft losses of the two sides were?
A lot of different numbers have been put forward over time
 
short answer is no.


Many aircraft from both sides were so badly damaged they had to spend many weeks being repaired before returning to service. the LW ate into its logistic reserves so badly, in the battle and its unspoken follow on campaign over Britain (the blitz) that its readiness rates after just a few weeks in Russia plummeted. In 1942-3 they sataged a partial recovery, in 1942, readiness rates hovered around the 50% mark, whilst in 1943, there were a couple of months with readiness levels touching the 70% mark before plunging again to below 50%. These are clear weather rates, in winter, the readiness rates were generally below 25%

Not all this crisis could be attributed to what happened in 1940-41, but what happened over Britain put the LW under strain from which it was never really given much chance to recover. It was always short of airworthy aircraft, Later it began to run short of pilots as well and later still began to run short of fuel
 
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