Midway: WW2's most important battle?
- Thread starter J.T.B.
- Start date
There is also that the fact that American ships escorted convoys halfway across the Atlantic prior to it's entry into WWII.
But as the war dragged on in Europe US opinion did start to shift towards invovled. The Attack on Pearl Harbour and Hitler's decleration of war on the US ended any remaining doubts.
Britain would have fought on in some capacity, even had the majority of the BEF been destroyed in France. This is clear from Churchill's journals - the Royal Navy, and the RAF would have been sent overseas, to either the United States or Canada should Britain itself fall and the government relocated along with them. What would have been lost is the key strategic foothold of a launch pad back into mainland Europe.
With regards to Operation Sea Lion, it was never going to go ahead if the Luftwaffe couldn't knock out the RAF. Failing to do so mean't that Britain retained both aerial superiority over the channel, as well as a superior naval fleet. Under those factors any German invasion force would have been annihilated in the channel, irrespective of the state of the BEF at that time.
As others have suggested, it's impossible to pinpoint one battle in the war as being the most important, there are any number that could well all come under that umbrella - Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, the Battle for Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk, Normandy, the Battle of Central Burma, El Alamein, Midway, etc etc.
Given that it's widely accepted that Hitler, and the Germans, didn't know of Japanese plans to attack Pearl Harbor, can you imagine his reaction to hearing the news? It would probably make the famous scene from the movie Downfall seem fairly tame by comparison!
Again, from Churchill's journals, Hitler's declaration of war against the United States made in clear in Churchill's mind that winning the war in Europe was now just a matter of time for the Allies.
Hitler didn't have much luck with allies - the stuck in reverse Italians, and the maverick Japanese. By contrast, Britain was able to call on support from the US, Canada, Australia, NZ, India, South Africa. God bless the Empire.....
I havnt read thru all of this, but I would contend that the Most Important events of World War 2 are:
Pearl Harbor and Dunkirk.
Think about it for a second, if Japan had attacked Russia in 1941 instead of the United States, and Germany had destroyed the BEF at Dunkirk, Russia would have been caught in a vice, England would be ripe for an invasion.
The biggest failure of the Axis powers, especially Germany and Japan wasnt a failure on the battlefield, it was a failure to coordinate. That lack of coordination is was what doomed the Axis powers.
Midway was for sure an Important battle, and an argument can be made that it was the Most important battle of the Pacific, but I would say that Leyte Gulf was the most important battle of WW2 in the Pacific. The Japanese Fleet was effectively wiped off the map in that battle
Also, after the American Navy regained its footing after Pearl, the Pacific War was essentially a textbook implementation of War Plan Orange
Pearl Harbor and Dunkirk.
Think about it for a second, if Japan had attacked Russia in 1941 instead of the United States, and Germany had destroyed the BEF at Dunkirk, Russia would have been caught in a vice, England would be ripe for an invasion.
The biggest failure of the Axis powers, especially Germany and Japan wasnt a failure on the battlefield, it was a failure to coordinate. That lack of coordination is was what doomed the Axis powers.
Midway was for sure an Important battle, and an argument can be made that it was the Most important battle of the Pacific, but I would say that Leyte Gulf was the most important battle of WW2 in the Pacific. The Japanese Fleet was effectively wiped off the map in that battle
Also, after the American Navy regained its footing after Pearl, the Pacific War was essentially a textbook implementation of War Plan Orange
And I'll add that they couldn't actually knock out the RAF. For one thing, the British had the advantage of radar. Second, British manufacturing was out of reach of the Luftwaffe. During the Battle of Britain, the British were producing more planes than were shot down. And since they were flying over friendly skies, many of their pilots were able to escape with their lives and continue flying. I just don't see a plausible scenario where Germany could have obtained air superiority and without air superiority, the British navy would keep an invasion at bay regardless of how many land troops there were.
I'm not that convinced.. Germany had the British on the ropes for a large part of the Battle of Britain when they concentrated their efforts against the RAF.. the RAF was close to breaking at several points due to lack of trained pilots and those they had were extremely under pressure and fatigued and had to fight against rested and well experienced german fighter pilots.
The mistake, once again ordered by Hitler for propaganda and ideological purposes (i am really believing that without Hitler the war could have gone on far longer or would have ended with several major german cities nuked), was that they switched the fight from the RAF to bombing cities and initiating terror tactics.
This gave the RAF some much needed respite for refitting, repairs and training and together with their strategic advantage of fighting over their own country is what sealed that battle.
Luckily for all of us Hitler was a strategic moron which he has proved time and time again leading directly to some major defeats.
what if's. What if Churchill lost favor and the government fell with the loss of most of the BEF. It sounds tough that the King would have went to Canada and continued the government would continue the fight from therebut there is no guareentee that he would not have thrown in the towel like the Japanese Emperor later did.
Research undertaken by military historian Stephen Bungay and retired Air Marshall Peter Dye explored the logistics of the battle - research that was leter endorsed by another military historian Richard Overy.
In terms of fighters, and pilots we were never really in much danger. From July through November the supply of pilots more than matched any losses over the same period, and actually increased the pool from 1200 in July to 1800 in November. Throughout the entire battle the RAF had more fighter pilots available than the Luftwaffe did. Similarly, the production of new fighters was always ahead of equivalent losses during the same timeframe, and again, the number of fighters actually increased by 100 between August and September.
Overy's findings were that the Luftwaffe never had any more than somewhere between 1100 and 1200 fighter pilots across the same period.
Bungay, and Overy, also looked at the attacks on the RAF infrastructure and found that there was actually very little meaningful damage done. Biggin Hill was the only sector station actually shut down at any point, and even then only for a couple of hours. Only 2 of the 13 heavily attacked airfields were down for more than a few hours, and letters and reports from Air Marshall Dowding at the time summarized the change in strategy from bombing the airfields to attacking London as being 'non critical'.
Fatigue was also less of a factor for British fighter pilots than it was their German counterparts - The Luftwaffe had fewer pilots available, yet had to either send them across the channel time after time to protect the bomber squadrons, or the alternative was to send the bombers across un-escorted. Of course the latter was attempted, and bombers were lost. German pilots also had to contend with the notion that bailing out meant either capture, or death, whereas British pilots, fighting over British land or waters, would be back to their airbase within a few hours. Eventually this led to morale issues within the Luftwaffe fighter squadrons, and a form of combat fatigue called 'Channel Sickness' manifested itself.
Experience - The RAF squadrons were supplemented by very experienced Czech and Polish squadrons. It was actually a Czech pilot that got the greatest allied score during the battle.
The Luftwaffe were never going to obtain permanent air superiority over Britain - certainly not within the timeframe that they had to achieve it, and likely never at all.
You're kidding. That was never, ever going to happen. George VI and Elizabeth were symbols of national resistance against Nazi Germany - shunning the opportunity to escape the hazards of a bombed London, instead staying in Buckingham Palace. Throughout the war they were constant visitors to bombing sites, munition factories, and our military forces abroad, helping keep morale up both at home and in foreign fields.
There's also the King's relationship with Churchill, which is described as "the closest personal relationship in modern British history between a monarch and a Prime Minister".
If invaded, and if necessary, the government would have relocated, likely to Canada. The King, and Queen, may have gone also, but I suspect that they'd have stayed with the people, but even if they had, I seriously doubt that they'd have chucked in the towel.
To be fair though, it's an irrelevant point - Churchill was the wartime leader of the country anyway - chucking in the towel wasn't the King's decision to make.
When one considers the fact that most of Chancellor Hitler's military staff didn't knew where Pearl Harbor was on a map, I think the situation was even worse for Germany than their leader being forced into declaring war on the United States.
Another key historical moment that isn't discussed is Prime Minister Churchill's decision to destroy ships of the French Navy after France capitulated to Germany. This act proved decisive in convincing the United States into entering into negotiations with Great Britain which culminated in the Lend-Lease agreements.
Another key historical moment that isn't discussed is Prime Minister Churchill's decision to destroy ships of the French Navy after France capitulated to Germany. This act proved decisive in convincing the United States into entering into negotiations with Great Britain which culminated in the Lend-Lease agreements.
Some useful info about the Battle of Britain
The UK were building planes faster than they were being shot down. Production increased 300% during the German campaign. Some German planes had such limited range that London was essentially as far north as they could go (when escorting bombers, this was even more difficult). It was impossible for them to ever hit the manufacturing plants that built the planes, which were in northern England.
Just thought I would supplement Angel4576's post.
The reason Germany switched from daytime attacks on military targets to nighttime bombing of London (the Blitz) was because they had lost the battle for air superiority and needed to attack when it was less likely for them to get shot down. Even then, British retaliation was more effective than the German blitz.
The UK were building planes faster than they were being shot down. Production increased 300% during the German campaign. Some German planes had such limited range that London was essentially as far north as they could go (when escorting bombers, this was even more difficult). It was impossible for them to ever hit the manufacturing plants that built the planes, which were in northern England.
Just thought I would supplement Angel4576's post.
The reason Germany switched from daytime attacks on military targets to nighttime bombing of London (the Blitz) was because they had lost the battle for air superiority and needed to attack when it was less likely for them to get shot down. Even then, British retaliation was more effective than the German blitz.
^^ Cheers for that Alidar Jarok 
There were a number of contributing factors behind the switch of strategy.
One, as you say, was that the battle for air superiority was not going well. They were losing more planes than us, more pilots than us, and their replacements were taking longer than our's. Plus, while they were hitting the airfields, they were operational again within hours. In the war of attrition, we were outlasting them. Switching to civilian targets was seen as another way of applying pressure on the government to capitulate as it was expected that high numbers of civilian casualties would take its toll on the morale of the people, and then by extension, the government.
Secondly, Hitler had decreed that there should be no unauthorized bombings of London - unfortunately, over the course of two nights, London, or the outskirts of London, was accidentally bombed. The RAF retaliated by bombing Berlin. Göring was alarmed as he'd confidently stated beforehand that Berlin was out of the RAF's reach, and Hitler was infuriated. At this point Hitler rescinded his earlier directive of NOT bombing London.
The problems for the Luftwaffe was woeful intelligence, and the increased range to their target. Whilst the Bombers could easily reach London, the escorting fighters could barely make it there and back, resulting in large groups of bombers being undefended. Rich pickings. The Luftwaffe were also constantly unaware of the actual state of fighter command, always predicting a dire situation, and then being confounded as they put up one repulse after another, at will.
In the end, the decisive factor was radar, and the concept of the 'Big Wing' - as soon as radar picked up enemy bombers coming in, numbers of RAF squadrons formed up to intercept them en masse.
There were a number of contributing factors behind the switch of strategy.
One, as you say, was that the battle for air superiority was not going well. They were losing more planes than us, more pilots than us, and their replacements were taking longer than our's. Plus, while they were hitting the airfields, they were operational again within hours. In the war of attrition, we were outlasting them. Switching to civilian targets was seen as another way of applying pressure on the government to capitulate as it was expected that high numbers of civilian casualties would take its toll on the morale of the people, and then by extension, the government.
Secondly, Hitler had decreed that there should be no unauthorized bombings of London - unfortunately, over the course of two nights, London, or the outskirts of London, was accidentally bombed. The RAF retaliated by bombing Berlin. Göring was alarmed as he'd confidently stated beforehand that Berlin was out of the RAF's reach, and Hitler was infuriated. At this point Hitler rescinded his earlier directive of NOT bombing London.
The problems for the Luftwaffe was woeful intelligence, and the increased range to their target. Whilst the Bombers could easily reach London, the escorting fighters could barely make it there and back, resulting in large groups of bombers being undefended. Rich pickings. The Luftwaffe were also constantly unaware of the actual state of fighter command, always predicting a dire situation, and then being confounded as they put up one repulse after another, at will.
In the end, the decisive factor was radar, and the concept of the 'Big Wing' - as soon as radar picked up enemy bombers coming in, numbers of RAF squadrons formed up to intercept them en masse.
Three others factor for Germany's defeat in the Battle of Britain were:
* the Heinkel He-111 - an outdated type of medium bomber. The Luftwaffe wouldn't have a heavy bomber until 1943.
* no fighter coverage for the Luftwaffe bombers - a factor that the Allies 'forgot' and had to re-learned at great cost in the early bombing runs into German-dominated Europe
* civilian resolve - This was something that all war powers underestimated in this war. Bombing a civilian population doesn't make them frighten; it makes them mad and more determined to defeat the enemy.
* the Heinkel He-111 - an outdated type of medium bomber. The Luftwaffe wouldn't have a heavy bomber until 1943.
* no fighter coverage for the Luftwaffe bombers - a factor that the Allies 'forgot' and had to re-learned at great cost in the early bombing runs into German-dominated Europe
* civilian resolve - This was something that all war powers underestimated in this war. Bombing a civilian population doesn't make them frighten; it makes them mad and more determined to defeat the enemy.