Behind all these great aviators and fighter pilots were lots of support personnel such as administrative, logistics, electronic and mechanical technicians, radar operators and vectoring personnel, medical, and the list is vast. The pilot's success rested also on many other peoples' effort and shoulders.
This is true. And some ground personnel were killed in air raids. But the "point of the spear" were the fighter pilots, and their casualty rate during the Battle of Britain is HIDEOUS.
my dad flew out of England with a bomber division..he once told me that he had alot respect for these RAF pilots..called them English cowboys !! (he was from texas)'',,,,,,,,God bless all of them..their courage is needed now more than ever..
we lost our home during an air raid on Birmingham in November 1940. I was in the Royal Air Force stationed at Bently Priory Headquarter Fighter Command for 3 years from 1953. I worked in the officers mess. Bentley Priory was an historic mansion and i did meet Douglas Bader when he came for a visit.
I don't think people realize what amazing courage and skill was required for a pilot to make contact with another plane or a V-1. As a Marine Air Traffic Controller, I saw many amazing feats, but never that move. The sky is just so big, and hitting a moving target with your wing tips... amazing daring and skill. The RAF truly saved England, IMO. The organization and logistics alone, with new and primitive equipment, young Pilots and new planes took super -Human effort. The movie about Bader (no legs) "Reach For The Sky" is a good watch.
Those De Havilland Mosquito's were wooden! Apparently they were very light, powerful and so fast they flew under German radar and were used in unbelievably daring ways. They're truly some of the unsung heroes of the RAF to be sure. At one point they even destroyed the walls of a prison where over 100 members of the French Underground were due to be executed the next day in a mission that was so insane it actually worked! My god, my hats off to those guys! The Germans claimed they were in shock at these birds whizzing by the anti-aircraft batteries so fast they couldn't even react fast enough to get a bead on them before they were long gone. Nice!
What would be a further subject to compliment this video would be to show the process of salvaging downed fighters, their speedy repair (parts of several damaged fighters to re-assemble flyable ones and their return to operational use.....those responsible for that whole process have been, to date too long, grossly under appreciated and under recognized.....!
The commentator of the Radio broadcast where he is describing a Stuka attack got into trouble with his bosses. There were a lot of complaints from the public who expressed their dismay on his manor of reporting, saying that he was talking like he was commentating on a football match instead of a life and death struggle in which young men were being killed. Of cause this was early in the battle, before the Germans started to bomb British cities and towns, after that attitudes understandably hardened.
+likesmilitaryhistory Alan Moore. His aircraft recognition wasn't too good either. The aircraft he described as german crashing into the sea was in fact a Hurricane.
The Hurricane was not an all metal aircraft as suggested at 4:30. It was partly because it was fabric covered that it was so successful ( required less metal to manufacture, easy to repair and could take lots of damage).
+rjk69 Good catch. The Hurry has always been underestimated and downplayed. I believe that it was statistically a more successful fighter than the Spit. True?
Ian Findlay no mate. that's a myth. spit was a superior fighter. but hurry did the lion's share in the bofb as it was more numerous - & very very good indeed. that's true. great turning circle too + great gun platform. did much more after the bofb too, in North Africa, CBI theatre of war, & was a very decent naval fighter. but ultimately the spits performance & especially development potential as the war progressed was something else in terms of actual fighter/intercepted & dog fighting terms. it was a very great plane though for sure. because it's relatively low fighter performance later in the war, it tends to be a bit underrated given what it achieved, especially early in the war & it won the bofb more than the spit did. it's box steel tube fuselage construction with stringer & fabric covering & only partial metal body on the cowling & wings etc, meant it was of obsolete design philosophy from the time of the start of the war, & therefore it didn't have much development potential, even though it was very versatile & very good as it was. ofcourse that old style construction used in a high performance sturdily built monoplane fighter did indeed mean that it could withstand a great amount of punishment & battle damage & still get home AND be repaired & sent back up. great plane absolutely!
Actually, development of the metal frame monoplane was already well advanced in the private sector (e.g., the Supermarine Spitfire came from aircraft racing), but the military was slow to keep up. When the Nazi threat showed up, the RAF was motivated to quickly upgrade to the better technology that already existed
A good videogramme esp as to the footage seldom seen of all of the brilliant old 1930s biplanes, lovely but dead obsolete. Otherwise, the documentary conflates excessively the questions of relief squadrons from other groups & the rawness of new pilots. Dowding & Park in my book are the best of the best, but John Ray in his 1994 Battle-book of "New Perspectives" gives the best & most detailed analysis both of command strengths & weaknesses, and the 1940 political problem & effects on command.
The Ray Holmes bit at about thirty-two minutes, about ramming (!) & breaking off the tail of a Luftwaffe ship on 15 September whilst being filmed from the ground is new to me!
Hardly likely when its entitled RAF Fighter Command. The Gloster Gladiator being an inter-war design and a biplane was recognised as being sorely handicapped before WW2 broke out, so its role was severly limited, before the few remaining aircraft were either lost in action or scrapped.
Don't knock it! The first German aircraft (He 111) shot down over Britain fell to a Gladiator flown by an RAF Reserve officer, a lawyer in civvy life. And don 't forget "Faith, Hope & Charity" in Malta!
Beaverbrook was a wonder during 1940, forcing companies to work together to mass produce the Hurricane and Spitfire. He was completely ruthless as Ministry of Aircraft Production and deserves more credit for his role than has been given. He stopped the production of bomber aircraft almost altogether and focused on fighters and focused solely on the two aircraft already in service deciding two was enough and keeping production simple. Interestingly, Adolf Galland when he became General of Fighters urged the German High Command to do the same. Focus solely on fighter production. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on your point of view he was overruled consistently. A pilot without an aircraft in the evening would find a new one waiting for him in the morning. One Spitfire pilot who landed a very damaged aircraft, and feeling pleased with himself for having done so, was brought to earth by his crew chief who told him off for having brought it back. He was unhappy because now his men had to work through the night repairing it when if he'd bailed out he could have a new aircraft by the next day and told this poor pilot not to do it again. The lack of pilots, especially trained ones, was the biggest worry for Dowding. It would be interesting to know if Dowding or Park had they remained in command of Fighter Command would have allowed those Fighter Sweeps across France. I suspect not. They achieved little except to lose trained pilots and valuable aircraft.
When Baden was shot down he bailed out but left one of his tin-legs behind; Galland petitioned Göering to allow an RAF bomber safe passage to deliver a replacement, however on the return run the RAF dropped bombs on several targets - so much for the moral high ground!
One of the biggest criticisms of the ME 109 fighter was its narrow main gear. It was said this caused the loss of more aircraft and pilots in takeoff and landing accidents than were suffered in combat. Yet it always struck me that the Spitfires gear isn't much wider, if it's wider at all, than the messerschmidt. The angle is greater on the 109 giving it a look of a triangle kind of where this angle is less on the spit, this creates an optical illusion making the spits gear appear wider but I really don't think its by that much. I wouldn't think the difference, if there is a significant one, would make a huge difference. I know takeoff and landing and training accidents, aircraft, and pilot losses were an issue with the spit but I don't know if it was as bad as the 109. Much of that had to do with the way they did things back then. No two seat trainers and pilots with little time or experience right out of flight school, having only flown docile forgiving trainer aircraft, are handed the operation manual told to read it, ploped into the cockpit and told to fly. No wonder training accidents were so high.
German ace Gunther Rall preferred the P-51 to the Spitfire. He flew both, and said in an interview "...I think the best airplane was the P-51. Certainly the Spitfire was excellent, but it didn’t have the endurance of the P-51. I think this was the decisive factor. They flew for seven hours, and we flew for one hour and 20 minutes."
P 51 was crap until it was fitted with a Merlin engine. Didn't exist in the Battle of Britain. Just like the yanks, sitting on the fence, waiting to make some money.
German Gunther Rall missed the point just as his mates lost the air war. The point is even if the P-51 was a better aircraft, it was not available when most needed ~ The Spit and Hurricane were available and did the job, stopped the Luftwaffe and went onto the offensive long before the first American planes appeared. Furthermore, later versions of the Spitfire, Mk IX and later to Mk XXI, were easily a match for the best German and American planes. As for the very last engagement between the immortal Spitfire and the famous Me 109, it was fought over the Sinai, an Egyptian Spitfire took on an Israeli Me 109. The Egyptian lost. Personally I think 'was a better plane' is totally irrelevant and smacks of pique, jealousy, egoism. The Spitfires and Hurricanes were there when needed and did the job. There were no F17's available just as there was no nuclear submarine to stop the Bismark. If it wasn't for the British, their European allies, the Spit and Hurri, all Europe would still be speaking German. Our gallant American allies and yes they were gallant, arrived to late to stop Hitler. The RAF and Royal Navy had already done that while on lane the Germans suffered their first major defeat not at Stalingrad but at El Alamein .at the hands of British and Commonwealth troops.
The later models used wing tanks giving them the greater range. In all other area the Spit still out performed the P-51 which only played a minor role and in small numbers at the tail end of the war. It was designed to British specification and only worked with the British Merlin engine and as a result could hardly be claimed to be an American aircraft at all.
timothy phillips , The P-51 was designed by a German-American engineer and manufactured by North American Aviation. It was not in any way made to British specifications. Its later Packard-built engine was made under Rolls Royce license.
In "Reach for the Sky", the biography of Douglas Bader, he claims that he was brought down in a collision with a Bf109 during a dogfight after engaging a section of 4 109s. The Luftwaffe claim that he was shot down by one of the 109s he attacked. I also see on another comment below that he was shot down by another Spitfire, but that this was kept secret by Bader and the other RAF pilot involved. Whatever the truth (and my view is that it was most likely he was shot down by a Bf109), he was NOT shot down by a Fw190 as claimed in this documentary.
One of life's ironies; one of God's practical jokes. Bader in prison camp met the man who shot him down. While exchanging combat stories they realised what had happened. Barder had been so close to the 109's the other Spitfire pilot mistook him for a 109.. Times, place, dates, etc, all matched. With the typical British spirit of that period they decided to say nothing because that might damage public morale and the reputation of the RAF. If I remember correctly the story only came to light after Barder had died.
the Hurricane, accounted for more air victories than the Spitfire despite its fame. Mostly due to it's intangible construction allowing it to shrugging off damage as bullets would just pass right through the body, and that they were much more numerous than the Spitfire.
+gemyni raptor -either that or the fact that hurricanes were mostly responsible for shooting down bombers which are easier to hit and less capable to defend themselves. context my friend. and as you say more numerous so therefore having a greater exposure to shoot down more planes. self evident, really.
Sorry but it is not true that Hurricanes just shot down bombers. The hurricane shot down some 60% of the aircraft destroyed in the Battle of Britain so they must have taken on fighters as well. Also in attacking the bombers they left themselves open to the bombers defences and the defending fighters. I quote from a recent article from the Daily Mail (not that I'm a fan of that paper but the article is worth reading). "On the eve of the Battle of Britain in early July 1940, Fighter Command's operational force throughout the United Kingdom was made up of 29 squadrons of Hurricanes and 19 of Spitfires, proportions that were to remain the same throughout the coming months." "The overall distribution between the two fighters was largely reflected in German losses. According to the Air Ministry's own figures, for every two Luftwaffe planes brought down by the Spitfires, three were shot down by Hurricanes." Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1293468/The-unsung-plane-REALLY-won-Battle-Britain.html#ixzz4IfCrndqU Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
A patronising comment without point. "ALWAYS draw conclusions from statistics with great caution". Our comments do not refer to the numbers of Hurricanes or Spitfires but to how many each type shot down. I would point out that you should READ what is written, words usually have a surprise in store for anyone not looking at them carefully. gemyni raptor points out that Hurricanes were much more numerous than Spitfires, I even give the relevant squadron numbers for each type so where is the misunderstanding of statistics.
As a POW Bader got a message back to the British that he needed new legs, which were delivered by parachute during a bombing raid. Not nice on the British side. Much Allied airpower was wasted trying to find V-1 launch sites. The American view was that the planes would be better used helping move the front line to put London out of range of the V-1, but for political reasons the British insisted that Operation Crossbow attempt to seek and destroy the almost impossible to find V-1 ramps.
Thanks Peter, Check out my comment at the link you answered Cezar with: Prokofiev - Dance of the Knights: ruclips.net/video/DUmq1cpcglQ/видео.html Then search comments for (ctrl f): "Mr Miss 8 Ball Pool" Then click on: view all replies Then look for my comment: "Ken Cosi" Lastly click on: read more
The Canadians where flying for the R.A.F. Along with Manny other nations Respect I hope we never see another world war. I'm not a soldier but please God if your out there no war it's a part of man tho
I MWonder where the germans used the v1 firsttime? My city Antwerp,Belgium was bommed oftenboth v1's and. V 2's. A cinema was hit while playing Buffalo Bill. My grandma was a witness to it!
I think 'did not loose' would be a better opening. Just because some crazy guy with a strange moustache didn't push it doesn't mean you 'won'. check also 'The best pilot in the world' and his comments on this ;)
errmmm ,Baders fate ..debatable , in a fairly recent uk documentary , i think it was called 'who shot down douglas bader ' , it was said that his own wingman ,from whom he had become disconnected and who saw an airplane breaking off from a bunch of enemy planes ..and shot the tail section clean off , from a distance ,mistaking Baders spit for a Me 109 . Bader in his book , said that he collided with an enemy aircraft .He had been leading the Tangmere wing over France that day.
You would think the producers of this video would realize that the Waffen SS decal - on the helmet (at 0:14 into the programming) would be placed correctly on the left side of the helmet. Actually to the rear of the round metal band retainer. - sheese! -
The Air Ministry: Tried to undermine Dowding. Ditto Beaverbrook (rescinded everything he did when he left for the US). Tried to swat the Mosquito. Failed to mount a campaign against the Flak batteries (which advertise their location). Eton twits with hardly a professional soldier/airman amongst them.
The very important point that this video misses is that the RAF squadrons dispached to France in support of the BEF did not have radar guidance and a command and control system to manage them. Fighting far from home, THEY GOT CHEWED UP. When all aspects of a fighter defense system were in place, and they were fighting to defend the homeland on home turf, they prevailed, but just barely, because Hitler intervened to take pressure off of them by switching attacks from airfields to London. If not for Hitler, Germany would have won.
The assertions made by the gentleman at 37:50 don't seem to match facts. Spit mk9 : speed 408 FW190 "Dora" top speed 472 Spit mk9 service ceiling 43,000 FW190 Dora 48,556 Rate of climb and range for the FW190 Dora were also far better than the Spit mk9. So, the statement that the Spit mk9 "reigned supreme over the FW until the end of the war" is FAR from accurate. p.s. the Dora also had heavier armament.
+Blade Obsidian . You need to get your facts straight my friend. The Dora Nine had a top speed of426mph and by then we had the Spit XIV which was good for 448mph. I was luck enough to talk to Heinz Marquart years ago (an eastern front FW190 ace with 121 kills I believe). Also present was the man who shot him and his wingman down whilst flying a Spit XIV. However, both great planes and an honour to talk to both men
hurricane6339 Sadly the facts are correct. Only "selective sourcing" seems to be at work in over gear regarding your supposed "facts". Of course, I am not surprised at all. Brits are notorious for it. lol the Germans were beating you Brits all around the world and you NEVER had a major land campaign victory until when?? Until 1942 and only then because the US was supplying you with MASSIVE amounts of war material..
+Blade Obsidian . Well if you check your supposed facts the figures you refer to are for the TA152, of which only a handful saw combat. The comparable brit fighter was the Spiteful which had a similar performance. Most of the time Spit XIV pilots didn't even jettison their drop tanks such was its superiority over the German fighters. We never bothered with the Spiteful as by then we had reliable jets which in the latter part of 1945 had 75% more power than the 262. Never won any battles, El Alemain? The air battle for Malta? Outnumbered as usual. Guess your superior fighters weren't so superior after all. But in the end with these things it was those who made the fewest mistakes that won the day. 99% of the Germans I have met including my recent trip to your homeland have a great deal in common with us Brits so I'm not sure what your problem is.
hurricane6339 exactly where is there anything suggesting a "problem"??? Additionally, my post in no way suggested anything about US fighters being superior (even though the Mustang is universally known to be the best piston fighter serving in the ETO and also considered the best fighter of the war). And where Malta is concerned, you fail to mention the US involvement in that conflict. US Aircraft carriers delivering fighter squadrons, US cargo ships and Oilers,etc,. Not to mention the fact that the siege of Malta was NOT a major land campaign as was CLEARLY stated...in fact it wasn't a major campaign itself. It was merely a side show for the Germans, whose major concern was Rommel's actions in N. Africa. Before getting all that exercise jumping from one conclusion to another, it would pay for you to actually READ the post and address it as such. Malta...a major LAND campaign....laughable.
+Blade Obsidian The brilliant Mustang, like most American forces, arrived late; after the battles of Britain and el alamein had shown the Nazi beasts could be stopped. The Mustang helped 'turn the tide'; but the hardest work was already done when they arrived.
Not to mention Czechoslovaks, Argentinians, West Indians, South Africans, Rhodesians, Canadians, Chileans, Indians, Australians, New Zealanders, Norwegians, Danes and more!
Sq12Sq22u22 ho hum , was nt going to reply but u might be surprised by the stuff and reputation that catholics and the catholic church has earned , even in ww2 , google vatican and nazis for example .
This is an incorrect statement. The British government invited all Polish forces to parade....It was the Communist Polish government that did the forbidding.
+manictiger I just meant that Robert Powell could've better emphasised that Berlin raid caused little damage, rather than the bombing of London causing little damage.
Massimo O'Kissed The bombing of Berlin wasn't, though; not near the end. We did so much damage that 1 million people died in 1946 from starvation and freezing. (Though, some people blame Eisenhower for deliberately and genocidally neglecting Germany, post-war.) They were just really expensive bombing runs. Bombing crews continually had horrible casualty rates throughout the war. That didn't stop anyone, though. It didn't even stop them from trying to light civilians on fire.
I still find it very difficult to understand the decision by the RAF to arm these early war fighters with a machine gun that fired the .303 rifle cartridge. They actually had browning to rechamber the Browning M2 .50 Cal to fire the enemic .303 standard infantry rifle cartridge. At 1000 meters the .303 would have only a small fraction of the energy the round had when fired and so far less lethal. Fired at a human target it would be necessary to hit directly above the heart to achieve lethal results and fired at an aircraft it would have to punch its way through armor and engine to make a difference. The fact that there were right and they fired very fast helped but still. On top of that, unlike the polish air force, the British trained their pilots, and calibrated the guns, to fire at maximum range for safety as it was believed destroying the enemy at minimum ranges would endanger their pilots too much. Not much fun to fly into an engine block of the fighter you just destroyed its true but in war, especially in such desperate situations as they were in safety must be a secondary concern and you myst trust in pilots reactions and skill, as well as luck, to see you through. The polish, trained to open fire at minimum ranges were thee highest scoring squadrons of the battle because of it. It was also far easier to hit the enemy at all at the closer ranges as deflection shots become much easier to envision. The third compounding factor was the logic defying Vic formation of the british. Common sense should have immediatly revealed the folly of two of the three pilots forced to pay close attention to the lead to avoid collision, unable to look for or pay attention to the enemy, absolutely lethal in air combat. Then the complicated maneuvering with any turns, with the outside aircraft having to slow and swap positions with the inside while the inside adds power and assumes the outside position--for every turn and there's lots and lots of turning in air combat. No Time at all for doing anything except concentrating on the leader and getting shot down. How they didn't see the incredible folly of that right away especially when the superiority of the German finger four and then breaking off into wingman pairs after, was right in front of them proving devastating to them. The British never went for the fifty, choosing instead the 20 mm cannon later on. Too bad they either didn't just leave the Browning M2s as .50Cals or go with 20mm right away because I don't think the battle would have been quite so close and less British pilots would have been killed. Eventually, though all these errors were rectified but it took far too long.
sabra,your history on bader & the legs has a pegleg,,bader was hosted with champaigne and a tour of the luftwaffe base & pilots ready room,even sitting in a bf109,,galland truly respected this 2 no legged guy,,the eartificial legs,as told him by galland,were to have been air dropped over the german base by a brit plane under a white flag,,this suggestion was relayed to brit hq in open air r/t,,,bader was 'informed' of this by galland,douglas huffed & laughed,,haw! I bet they drop it in the regular course of bombing raids'' which indeed they did.the narrow margin,,they were.
Even if the RAF was shot out of the sky the Germans had no means to cross the channel safely and without fatal losses. Now if they could lease the RN evacuation ships used in Dunkirk to get the Wehrmacht across in numbers they could have a shot at it. ;)
+DataWaveTaGo That statement is so far out of touch with reality one hardly knows where to begin. Without control of the air the RN would have been bombed and torpedoed into nonexistence. If you would do a little research, you would find the Channel ports opposite Britain were FULL of transport vessels of every sort. Some purpose built, others retrofitted to serve as landing vessels. The Japanese showed just how useless capital ships were against air power when they sank the Repulse and POW, ships which were under full steam and could maneuver, but to no avail.
Blade Obsidian The size of the RN in 1940 was huge. The Luftwaffe had no effective anti-capital ship weapons, the number of U-boats available was tiny.. The "landing craft" concocted by the Wehrmacht were puny, many unpowered (had to be pushed or towed) and most were un-seaworthy. We are not talking of two capital ships on their own here (P of W & Rep.), but a channel-deployable navy more than 10 times the size of the German navy with capable crew and good AA protection. England had already put 25% of the Germany navy on the bottom in the Battle of Norway with very few of her own ships committed. I did plenty of research, 40 years worth.
+DataWaveTaGo The Luftwaffe had several variants capable of torpedo bombing and dive bombing, not to mention that the Channel would have been mined on both flanks, cutting off the Home Fleet more than long enough for even towed barges to make landfall. The RN may have been large, but it was spread across the globe. Only the Home Fleet at Scapa Flow could have been called up quickly. Additionally, I do not know where your research came from but it is critically flawed. Additionally, I'm not sure why you disagree with the British military who knew that without air cover, Sea Lion was imminent? The German Army had MORE than enough seaworthy vessels captured from the various nations it had overrun to transport the 19 divisions allocated for the invasion sir. I mean no disrespect, but your research and conclusions therefrom are historically incorrect. tc, sir. I won't argue the point, will just leave it at that sir.
The British government did invite the Soviet-backed government in Poland to send a party to represent Poland at the celebrations. However these were not the "Free Poles" who had fought against the Germans for the allies. Winston Churchill, supported by some MPs and senior officers in the RAF strongly protested the decision, which was seen as an affront to the 200,000 poles who fought for the Allies and kowtowing to a communist power. As a result 25 pilots were invited to join the RAF parade and invites were also sent to senior "Free Polish" Officers. They all declined, the pilots because of the omission of other Polish Forces from the parade. The Russian backed Polish Government declined to send a delegation as the Pilots had been invited. It is important to remember that the Attlee (Labour) Government had only been in power for a year and from an ideological and national point of view would not have wanted to upset the Russians who effectively controlled Poland at the time. I remember the parade as I was there in the crowds and it was fantastic for a small boy to see the heroes who had fought for freedom. Also my father was in the RAF and served with 145 Squadron which in 1943 was joined by a team of experienced POLISH pilots led by Squadron Leader Skalski. 145 shot down more enemy aircraft in the first two months of 1943 than any other Polish unit in the whole year. My father was very proud that he had been part of the Squadron and always spoke about them.
Nothing get a argument going like the mustang spitfire subject ! Both aircraft had a assigned role to play and did their job well ! So better ? For what ? The people who flew these aircraft are all dead and I'm sure they think the aircraft they flew was best their airman were best there tactics were best all who fought knew that all that mattered was who won its what's on the score board that counts !
indeed dowding pretty much had a single vision that saved the UKs arse. For his vision and hard work they replaced him with someone who was upper class. The big wing and the suicide missions to berlin were insane at best. Instead the let the royal navy bleed by failing to put any real effort into coastal command. This was a point made by the USA after WW2 in assessing strategies and actions. British class snobbery at its worst
You make the assumption of bountiful resources of men and materiel. That was not the case until much later when the US got involved with men and machines on the ground and lend-lease began to feed into British forces.
Although I thank those brave pilots which saved the British from NAZI invasion. However putting it into perspective. The vast vast majority of the pilots were from the UK.
+Barbarossa Errare Still, the large majority of the Pilots during the BOB where British (about 1800). During this battle, there were only 13 French pilots and... 7 Americans (more than 100 Poles and about 90 Canadians, that's true)
Buxton - are you quite sure about that? It looks as tough you could be mistaken! A total of 126 squadrons served with Bomber Command. Of these, 32 of these were officially non-British units: 15 RCAF squadrons, 8 RAAF squadrons, 4 Polish squadrons, 2 French squadrons, 2 RNZAF/"NewZealand" squadrons, and 1 Czechoslovakian squadron.
Yes I'm quite sure - by *_French_* we must mean by definition the French Government - in France. Undoubtedly French Nationals will have flown in bombing missions over Berlin but that's not quite the same as *_The French_* So I'm certain sure - In WWII bombing policy was directed and controlled by the British and not by Johnny Foreigner.
It seems I owe you an apology Mr Hunter... This from Wikipedia... *_Berlin, the capital of Nazi Germany, was subject to 363 air raids during the Second World War. It was bombed by the RAF Bomber Command between 1940 and 1945, by the USAAF Eighth Air Force between 1943 and 1945, and the French Armee de l'Air between 1944 and 1945 as part of the Allied campaign of strategic bombing of Germany._* So I was wrong - and not for the first time...
Good for you, my friend ... Apologies accepted. I moved to France because I wanted to explore the country and its people.The climate also played a part in the decision being rather attractive compared to Blighty weather,so you understand why I have become a little sensitive to the clichéd French Bashing by Americans and Brits.
This gets very tiresome. There was one squadron Poles and one Squadron of Czechs in the RAF during the battle of Britain. While their individual, and Squadron, kills were good they alone did not win the Battle.
true and when they became operational the kill claims went through the roof. had a wonderful book ,a day by day diary of the battle. Up to mid August claims and actual German losses were very close.
The RAF was a joke the went begging 20 countries for help summer 1940. The spitfire was a cheap carburetor plane that used 100 American octanes to make decent power. Those that know give the bf109 the ultimate fighter and did so with 87 octanes it’s truly remarkable. The Bf109k4 is truly a feat of speed and agility but guys get the truth stop the grandpa lies is sickening! Don’t forget the Canadians and the Polish stop leaving them out show them their due respect esp since the Brits discriminated against them.
After the war German and English historians could agree on the simple fact: Germany lost the Battle of Britain. Mostly because the were commanded by a fat blimp. Hadn't Barbarrosaa happened. FW190's would have roamed free over southern UK.
Forgive me for speaking what I believe in commenting but the entire myth of this war for democracy is a propaganda is true but why was the Allies be the ones with no flaws and hailed as righteous when the nation of Germany is still to this day being controlled by them. It's why we're righteous and fighting for democracy with all all prosperity has made flawless. No one is without flaws in my opinion plus Oceania, North and South America was bashed except Pearl Habor. Not saying I know it all but alot is missing in these films. But I watch them religiously because I'm a war monorail 😅
Pawel Sikora I can understand why you would want to believe that that was the case. But I'm afraid you are wrong. It was acknowledged that the best RAF squadron was No. 603 City of Edinburgh Squadron.
@John Cornell Fighters can't wreck you, bombers can. Bombers are the more valuable target. Also, the No. 303 squadron kill=claims were almost all verified, so saying they "over counted 3 times" is ... let's be nice and just call it a MISTAKE and not a LIE.
Neither the Brits or the French are our Allies today...neither is any other EU Country.....we should let Vlad and Mohammed do what they want with them and finally be done with protecting them for Free...
Behind all these great aviators and fighter pilots were lots of support personnel such as administrative, logistics, electronic and mechanical technicians, radar operators and vectoring personnel, medical, and the list is vast. The pilot's success rested also on many other peoples' effort and shoulders.
This is true. And some ground personnel were killed in air raids. But the "point of the spear" were the fighter pilots, and their casualty rate during the Battle of Britain is HIDEOUS.
Those fighter pilots were kids of 19 or 20 years of age. Must have enormous admiration for RAF Fighter Command.
my dad flew out of England with a bomber division..he once told me that he had alot respect for these RAF pilots..called them English cowboys !! (he was from texas)'',,,,,,,,God bless all of them..their courage is needed now more than ever..
Martin The Brits were not alone !!!! They had help !!!!
Yes. Some of the British pilots were starioned them in Southeast Asia to fight the Japanese.
we lost our home during an air raid on Birmingham in November 1940. I was in the Royal Air Force stationed at Bently Priory Headquarter Fighter Command for 3 years from 1953. I worked in the officers mess. Bentley Priory was an historic mansion and i did meet Douglas Bader when he came for a visit.
What did you do in the officers mess?
Frank Smith
soaringtractor sWhy don't you use your name? Are you afraid some may guestion your comments? A truely heroic character.
Thanks for your service, chap. The air crews said the most important people in the air wing were the weatherman, and the cook.
I liked the chap sweeping snow off the wing -- onto the bomb pullers :)
Haven't gotten that far yet but I'll be watching ' it sounded like it worth a chuckle !
Excellent presentation with some remarkable original footage! Thanks for posting.
I don't think people realize what amazing courage and skill was required for a pilot to make contact with another plane or a V-1. As a Marine Air Traffic Controller, I saw many amazing feats, but never that move. The sky is just so big, and hitting a moving target with your wing tips... amazing daring and skill. The RAF truly saved England, IMO. The organization and logistics alone, with new and primitive equipment, young Pilots and new planes took super -Human effort.
The movie about Bader (no legs) "Reach For The Sky" is a good watch.
God bless the RAF. At the time the free world was carried on the shoulders.
thank you RJ.MITCHELL you truly saved Britain .
Those De Havilland Mosquito's were wooden! Apparently they were very light, powerful and so fast they flew under German radar and were used in unbelievably daring ways. They're truly some of the unsung heroes of the RAF to be sure.
At one point they even destroyed the walls of a prison where over 100 members of the French Underground were due to be executed the next day in a mission that was so insane it actually worked! My god, my hats off to those guys!
The Germans claimed they were in shock at these birds whizzing by the anti-aircraft batteries so fast they couldn't even react fast enough to get a bead on them before they were long gone. Nice!
Wow, a video which actually mentions Sailor Malan - the ace who wrote the "Ten Rules for Air Fighting"!
40. Sailor Malan had 40 rules.
"My they're awful silent, these guns." lmao....That was just hilarious.
What would be a further subject to compliment this video would be to show the process of salvaging downed fighters, their speedy repair (parts of several damaged fighters to re-assemble flyable ones and their return to operational use.....those responsible for that whole process have been, to date too long, grossly under appreciated and under recognized.....!
God Bless RAF. The Battle of Britain was our finest hour!
18:16 A Link trainer! There is a working one set up with it's control table and original "flight" logs in the town of Leavenworth. Kansas.
The commentator of the Radio broadcast where he is describing a Stuka attack got into trouble with his bosses. There were a lot of complaints from the public who expressed their dismay on his manor of reporting, saying that he was talking like he was commentating on a football match instead of a life and death struggle in which young men were being killed. Of cause this was early in the battle, before the Germans started to bomb British cities and towns, after that attitudes understandably hardened.
+likesmilitaryhistory Alan Moore. His aircraft recognition wasn't too good either. The aircraft he described as german crashing into the sea was in fact a Hurricane.
The Hurricane was not an all metal aircraft as suggested at 4:30. It was partly because it was fabric covered that it was so successful ( required less metal to manufacture, easy to repair and could take lots of damage).
+rjk69
Good catch. The Hurry has always been underestimated and downplayed. I believe that it was statistically a more successful fighter than the Spit. True?
Ian Findlay no mate. that's a myth. spit was a superior fighter. but hurry did the lion's share in the bofb as it was more numerous - & very very good indeed. that's true. great turning circle too + great gun platform. did much more after the bofb too, in North Africa, CBI theatre of war, & was a very decent naval fighter. but ultimately the spits performance & especially development potential as the war progressed was something else in terms of actual fighter/intercepted & dog fighting terms. it was a very great plane though for sure. because it's relatively low fighter performance later in the war, it tends to be a bit underrated given what it achieved, especially early in the war & it won the bofb more than the spit did. it's box steel tube fuselage construction with stringer & fabric covering & only partial metal body on the cowling & wings etc, meant it was of obsolete design philosophy from the time of the start of the war, & therefore it didn't have much development potential, even though it was very versatile & very good as it was. ofcourse that old style construction used in a high performance sturdily built monoplane fighter did indeed mean that it could withstand a great amount of punishment & battle damage & still get home AND be repaired & sent back up. great plane absolutely!
@@ianfindlay865 Of the German aircraft shot down during the BoB, Hurricane pilots were responsible for 60%.
God bless the Bloody RAF.
Vanguard.....OOOOOHHHHH Those Brits are so damn wooooooonderful !!! Nobody else did anything in the war !!!! Wrong !!!!!
@@wilburfinnigan5627 They did more than thirty fair share.
Real badasses, all of them.
Very good documentary.
Amazing that Britain went straight from bi-planes to the Spitfire.
Actually, development of the metal frame monoplane was already well advanced in the private sector (e.g., the Supermarine Spitfire came from aircraft racing), but the military was slow to keep up. When the Nazi threat showed up, the RAF was motivated to quickly upgrade to the better technology that already existed
Hurricane came between. Also, the Fokker J-1 (all metal monoplane) flew for Germany during WW 1.
To Hurricane.....which downed the majority of German and Italian planes in the BOB😎
A good videogramme esp as to the footage seldom seen of all of the brilliant old 1930s biplanes, lovely but dead obsolete. Otherwise, the documentary conflates excessively the questions of relief squadrons from other groups & the rawness of new pilots. Dowding & Park in my book are the best of the best, but John Ray in his 1994 Battle-book of "New Perspectives" gives the best & most detailed analysis both of command strengths & weaknesses, and the 1940 political problem & effects on command.
Tuck! And had never seen the gun camera footage of the guy who shot down Bader, that was fascinating, thanks
The Ray Holmes bit at about thirty-two minutes, about ramming (!) & breaking off the tail of a Luftwaffe ship on 15 September whilst being filmed from the ground is new to me!
Parts of his aircraft were found just a few years ago, under the London street where it fell after he bailed.
Damn. I was hoping that this was a documentary about Gloster Gladiators.
Hardly likely when its entitled RAF Fighter Command. The Gloster Gladiator being an inter-war design and a biplane was recognised as being sorely handicapped before WW2 broke out, so its role was severly limited, before the few remaining aircraft were either lost in action or scrapped.
Theduke71000 read about Sqn Ldr Caesar Barrand Hull first Gloster Gladiator pilot Ace
Don't knock it! The first German aircraft (He 111) shot down over Britain fell to a Gladiator flown by an RAF Reserve officer, a lawyer in civvy life. And don 't forget "Faith, Hope & Charity" in Malta!
spacecadet35
Theduke71000 my husband flew gladiators during the war.how can you say they were too old to use.......
Omg I think thats my cousin Michael (my 2x great Uncle's son) at 6:34 holding the puppy :O
Beaverbrook was a wonder during 1940, forcing companies to work together to mass produce the Hurricane and Spitfire. He was completely ruthless as Ministry of Aircraft Production and deserves more credit for his role than has been given. He stopped the production of bomber aircraft almost altogether and focused on fighters and focused solely on the two aircraft already in service deciding two was enough and keeping production simple. Interestingly, Adolf Galland when he became General of Fighters urged the German High Command to do the same. Focus solely on fighter production. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on your point of view he was overruled consistently. A pilot without an aircraft in the evening would find a new one waiting for him in the morning. One Spitfire pilot who landed a very damaged aircraft, and feeling pleased with himself for having done so, was brought to earth by his crew chief who told him off for having brought it back. He was unhappy because now his men had to work through the night repairing it when if he'd bailed out he could have a new aircraft by the next day and told this poor pilot not to do it again. The lack of pilots, especially trained ones, was the biggest worry for Dowding. It would be interesting to know if Dowding or Park had they remained in command of Fighter Command would have allowed those Fighter Sweeps across France. I suspect not. They achieved little except to lose trained pilots and valuable aircraft.
When Baden was shot down he bailed out but left one of his tin-legs behind; Galland petitioned Göering to allow an RAF bomber safe passage to deliver a replacement, however on the return run the RAF dropped bombs on several targets - so much for the moral high ground!
One of the biggest criticisms of the ME 109 fighter was its narrow main gear. It was said this caused the loss of more aircraft and pilots in takeoff and landing accidents than were suffered in combat.
Yet it always struck me that the Spitfires gear isn't much wider, if it's wider at all, than the messerschmidt. The angle is greater on the 109 giving it a look of a triangle kind of where this angle is less on the spit, this creates an optical illusion making the spits gear appear wider but I really don't think its by that much. I wouldn't think the difference, if there is a significant one, would make a huge difference.
I know takeoff and landing and training accidents, aircraft, and pilot losses were an issue with the spit but I don't know if it was as bad as the 109. Much of that had to do with the way they did things back then. No two seat trainers and pilots with little time or experience right out of flight school, having only flown docile forgiving trainer aircraft, are handed the operation manual told to read it, ploped into the cockpit and told to fly. No wonder training accidents were so high.
Narrator has a good voice for this.
18:34 There were also Argentine volunteer airmen. They formed the 164th fighter squadron.
No mention of the 24 pilots from India, of which 16 returned home after the war. A few earned the DFC as well.
German ace Gunther Rall preferred the P-51 to the Spitfire. He flew both, and said in an interview "...I think the best airplane was the P-51. Certainly the Spitfire was excellent, but it didn’t have the endurance of the P-51. I think this was the decisive factor. They flew for seven hours, and we flew for one hour and 20 minutes."
P 51 was crap until it was fitted with a Merlin engine. Didn't exist in the Battle of Britain. Just like the yanks, sitting on the fence, waiting to make some money.
That is nonsense. The P-51 was excellent at low levels. And you bitter socialists can piss off.
German Gunther Rall missed the point just as his mates lost the air war. The point is even if the P-51 was a better aircraft, it was not available when most needed ~ The Spit and Hurricane were available and did the job, stopped the Luftwaffe and went onto the offensive long before the first American planes appeared. Furthermore, later versions of the Spitfire, Mk IX and later to Mk XXI, were easily a match for the best German and American planes. As for the very last engagement between the immortal Spitfire and the famous Me 109, it was fought over the Sinai, an Egyptian Spitfire took on an Israeli Me 109. The Egyptian lost. Personally I think 'was a better plane' is totally irrelevant and smacks of pique, jealousy, egoism. The Spitfires and Hurricanes were there when needed and did the job. There were no F17's available just as there was no nuclear submarine to stop the Bismark. If it wasn't for the British, their European allies, the Spit and Hurri, all Europe would still be speaking German. Our gallant American allies and yes they were gallant, arrived to late to stop Hitler. The RAF and Royal Navy had already done that while on lane the Germans suffered their first major defeat not at Stalingrad but at El Alamein .at the hands of British and Commonwealth troops.
The later models used wing tanks giving them the greater range. In all other area the Spit still out performed the
P-51 which only played a minor role and in small numbers at the tail end of the war. It was designed to British specification and only worked with the British Merlin engine and as a result could hardly be claimed to be an American aircraft at all.
timothy phillips ,
The P-51 was designed by a German-American engineer and manufactured by North American Aviation. It was not in any way made to British specifications. Its later Packard-built engine was made under Rolls Royce license.
In "Reach for the Sky", the biography of Douglas Bader, he claims that he was brought down in a collision with a Bf109 during a dogfight after engaging a section of 4 109s. The Luftwaffe claim that he was shot down by one of the 109s he attacked. I also see on another comment below that he was shot down by another Spitfire, but that this was kept secret by Bader and the other RAF pilot involved. Whatever the truth (and my view is that it was most likely he was shot down by a Bf109), he was NOT shot down by a Fw190 as claimed in this documentary.
One of life's ironies; one of God's practical jokes. Bader in prison camp met the man who shot him down. While exchanging combat stories they realised what had happened. Barder had been so close to the 109's the other Spitfire pilot mistook him for a 109.. Times, place, dates, etc, all matched. With the typical British spirit of that period they decided to say nothing because that might damage public morale and the reputation of the RAF. If I remember correctly the story only came to light after Barder had died.
the Hurricane, accounted for more air victories than the Spitfire despite its fame. Mostly due to it's intangible construction allowing it to shrugging off damage as bullets would just pass right through the body, and that they were much more numerous than the Spitfire.
+gemyni raptor -either that or the fact that hurricanes were mostly responsible for shooting down bombers which are easier to hit and less capable to defend themselves. context my friend. and as you say more numerous so therefore having a greater exposure to shoot down more planes. self evident, really.
Sorry but it is not true that Hurricanes just shot down bombers. The hurricane shot down some 60% of the aircraft destroyed in the Battle of Britain so they must have taken on fighters as well. Also in attacking the bombers they left themselves open to the bombers defences and the defending fighters. I quote from a recent article from the Daily Mail (not that I'm a fan of that paper but the article is worth reading).
"On the eve of the Battle of Britain in early July 1940, Fighter Command's operational force throughout the United Kingdom was made up of 29 squadrons of Hurricanes and 19 of Spitfires, proportions that were to remain the same throughout the coming months."
"The overall distribution between the two fighters was largely reflected in German losses. According to the Air Ministry's own figures, for every two Luftwaffe planes brought down by the Spitfires, three were shot down by Hurricanes."
Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1293468/The-unsung-plane-REALLY-won-Battle-Britain.html#ixzz4IfCrndqU
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
A patronising comment without point. "ALWAYS draw conclusions from statistics with great caution". Our comments do not refer to the numbers of Hurricanes or Spitfires but to how many each type shot down. I would point out that you should READ what is written, words usually have a surprise in store for anyone not looking at them carefully. gemyni raptor points out that Hurricanes were much more numerous than Spitfires, I even give the relevant squadron numbers for each type so where is the misunderstanding of statistics.
Bader had an advantage, he could sustain higher G forces.
An early Hawker Hurricane. First versions had a two blade wooden propeller which severely limited performance.
As a POW Bader got a message back to the British that he needed new legs, which were delivered by parachute during a bombing raid. Not nice on the British side. Much Allied airpower was wasted trying to find V-1 launch sites. The American view was that the planes would be better used helping move the front line to put London out of range of the V-1, but for political reasons the British insisted that Operation Crossbow attempt to seek and destroy the almost impossible to find V-1 ramps.
Sabra S hind sight is 20/20. We could all be wise in the rear view mirror.
What is the name of the song from the begining and the end of the episode?
Dance of the knights - Prokofiev
ruclips.net/video/DUmq1cpcglQ/видео.html
Thanks Peter,
Check out my comment at the link you answered Cezar with:
Prokofiev - Dance of the Knights: ruclips.net/video/DUmq1cpcglQ/видео.html
Then search comments for (ctrl f): "Mr Miss 8 Ball Pool"
Then click on: view all replies
Then look for my comment: "Ken Cosi"
Lastly click on: read more
The Canadians where flying for the R.A.F. Along with Manny other nations
Respect I hope we never see another world war. I'm not a soldier but please God if your out there no war it's a part of man tho
I MWonder where the germans used the v1 firsttime? My city Antwerp,Belgium was bommed oftenboth v1's and. V 2's. A cinema was hit while playing Buffalo Bill. My grandma was a witness to it!
I think 'did not loose' would be a better opening. Just because some crazy guy with a strange moustache didn't push it doesn't mean you 'won'.
check also 'The best pilot in the world' and his comments on this ;)
If you fight him until he stops -- you win.
What is the name of the opening music?
errmmm ,Baders fate ..debatable , in a fairly recent uk documentary , i think it was called 'who shot down douglas bader ' , it was said that his own wingman ,from whom he had become disconnected and who saw an airplane breaking off from a bunch of enemy planes ..and shot the tail section clean off , from a distance ,mistaking Baders spit for a Me 109 .
Bader in his book , said that he collided with an enemy aircraft .He had been leading the Tangmere wing over France that day.
You would think the producers of this video would realize that the Waffen SS decal - on the helmet (at 0:14 into the programming) would be placed correctly on the left side of the helmet. Actually to the rear of the round metal band retainer. - sheese! -
The Air Ministry:
Tried to undermine Dowding. Ditto Beaverbrook (rescinded everything he did when he left for the US). Tried to swat the Mosquito. Failed to mount a campaign against the Flak batteries (which advertise their location).
Eton twits with hardly a professional soldier/airman amongst them.
Very amusing comments Thanks for the memories. 11 Group F.C.
The RAF shined brightly during BoB but failed spectacularly in Operation Zerberus
As usual The NewZealander Parkes Contribution is basicly ignored.
In the Czechoslovak 310th Squadron and Polish 303rd Squadron were the best pilots..
Thanks man!
27.41 what is that aircraft with a 2 bladed prop ?????
This was a fight to the death
The very important point that this video misses is that the RAF squadrons dispached to France in support of the BEF did not have radar guidance and a command and control system to manage them. Fighting far from home, THEY GOT CHEWED UP. When all aspects of a fighter defense system were in place, and they were fighting to defend the homeland on home turf, they prevailed, but just barely, because Hitler intervened to take pressure off of them by switching attacks from airfields to London. If not for Hitler, Germany would have won.
The assertions made by the gentleman at 37:50 don't seem to match facts.
Spit mk9 : speed 408 FW190 "Dora" top speed 472
Spit mk9 service ceiling 43,000 FW190 Dora 48,556
Rate of climb and range for the FW190 Dora were also far better than the Spit mk9. So, the statement that the Spit mk9 "reigned supreme over the FW until the end of the war" is FAR from accurate. p.s. the Dora also had heavier armament.
+Blade Obsidian . You need to get your facts straight my friend. The Dora Nine had a top speed of426mph and by then we had the Spit XIV which was good for 448mph. I was luck enough to talk to Heinz Marquart years ago (an eastern front FW190 ace with 121 kills I believe). Also present was the man who shot him and his wingman down whilst flying a Spit XIV. However, both great planes and an honour to talk to both men
hurricane6339 Sadly the facts are correct. Only "selective sourcing" seems to be at work in over gear regarding your supposed "facts". Of course, I am not surprised at all. Brits are notorious for it.
lol the Germans were beating you Brits all around the world and you NEVER had a major land campaign victory until when?? Until 1942 and only then because the US was supplying you with MASSIVE amounts of war material..
+Blade Obsidian . Well if you check your supposed facts the figures you refer to are for the TA152, of which only a handful saw combat. The comparable brit fighter was the Spiteful which had a similar performance. Most of the time Spit XIV pilots didn't even jettison their drop tanks such was its superiority over the German fighters. We never bothered with the Spiteful as by then we had reliable jets which in the latter part of 1945 had 75% more power than the 262. Never won any battles, El Alemain? The air battle for Malta? Outnumbered as usual. Guess your superior fighters weren't so superior after all. But in the end with these things it was those who made the fewest mistakes that won the day. 99% of the Germans I have met including my recent trip to your homeland have a great deal in common with us Brits so I'm not sure what your problem is.
hurricane6339 exactly where is there anything suggesting a "problem"???
Additionally, my post in no way suggested anything about US fighters being superior (even though the Mustang is universally known to be the best piston fighter serving in the ETO and also considered the best fighter of the war). And where Malta is concerned, you fail to mention the US involvement in that conflict. US Aircraft carriers delivering fighter squadrons, US cargo ships and Oilers,etc,.
Not to mention the fact that the siege of Malta was NOT a major land campaign as was CLEARLY stated...in fact it wasn't a major campaign itself. It was merely a side show for the Germans, whose major concern was Rommel's actions in N. Africa.
Before getting all that exercise jumping from one conclusion to another, it would pay for you to actually READ the post and address it as such. Malta...a major LAND campaign....laughable.
+Blade Obsidian The brilliant Mustang, like most American forces, arrived late; after the battles of Britain and el alamein had shown the Nazi beasts could be stopped. The Mustang helped 'turn the tide'; but the hardest work was already done when they arrived.
thankyou Vasile luga
Why hasn't an episode been made about Soviet units,the 13th Guards for instance in Stalingrad
English,Scottish,Irish,Free French,Polish,American Fought Together Over Britain And Ireland.
Not to mention Czechoslovaks, Argentinians, West Indians, South Africans, Rhodesians, Canadians, Chileans, Indians, Australians, New Zealanders, Norwegians, Danes and more!
Over 20 countries because they couldn’t win not even close! RAF was a joke they loved the 100 American octanes for that slow carburetor spitfire.
My Great Grandpa Was in RAF.
And the went begging 20 countries for help in summer 1940 they are a joke! 100 American octanes for the slow spitfire
@@garyseeseverything8615 yeah he was from Italy he enlisted when they were searching for help.
Wow yes the navy had more ships, perfect target to Stuka, without air superiority they will be destroyed
Dear people, it was a war against the powers of evil. authority's in low places, powers & principality's of a vary vary dark world.
Jim Vet The world today is much worse.....1984 is coming.
Also, and I knew one, German Spitfire pilot, a very nice man named Werner Bier, Jewish bless him!
37.06 Werner Molders ,Luftwaffe me 109 ace and 1st to 100 kills , he died in an aircrash in 1941 ,he was a devout catholic .
That figures!
WOW! Devout catholics kill human beings do they? I would say he was not TOO devout!
Sq12Sq22u22
ho hum , was nt going to reply but u might be surprised by the stuff and reputation
that catholics and the catholic church has earned , even in ww2 , google vatican and nazis for example .
As a Brit/American, God bless him. He was a soldier of Germany and did as he was ordered.
@@Sq12Sq22u22 "Render therefore unto Caesar ...." that means, you follow the law of the land. If you get drafted, you go.
what about Polish pilots from 303 Division?
;-) ...and the Irish too of course
There was mention of Polish pilots.
This is an incorrect statement. The British government invited all Polish forces to parade....It was the Communist Polish government that did the forbidding.
@@thehobgoblin9790 Polish Communist government? Stalin's Communist government - it wasn't chosen by poles.
Fenicja Fenato. Nobody said it was chosen by the Poles....it was still that government that issued instructions for the Poles to return home.
29:34
"Although it caused little damage, Hitler ordered attacks on London, day and night".
_Queue footage of a city-wide firestorm._
"RAF bomber command ordered a retaliatory attack on Berlin. Although it caused little damage..."
+Massimo O'Kissed
I'm not saying it's propaganda if that's what you're implying.
I'm saying the script writing and the video don't match up.
+manictiger I just meant that Robert Powell could've better emphasised that Berlin raid caused little damage, rather than the bombing of London causing little damage.
Massimo O'Kissed
The bombing of Berlin wasn't, though; not near the end.
We did so much damage that 1 million people died in 1946 from starvation and freezing.
(Though, some people blame Eisenhower for deliberately and genocidally neglecting Germany, post-war.)
They were just really expensive bombing runs.
Bombing crews continually had horrible casualty rates throughout the war.
That didn't stop anyone, though.
It didn't even stop them from trying to light civilians on fire.
I still find it very difficult to understand the decision by the RAF to arm these early war fighters with a machine gun that fired the .303 rifle cartridge. They actually had browning to rechamber the Browning M2 .50 Cal to fire the enemic .303 standard infantry rifle cartridge. At 1000 meters the .303 would have only a small fraction of the energy the round had when fired and so far less lethal. Fired at a human target it would be necessary to hit directly above the heart to achieve lethal results and fired at an aircraft it would have to punch its way through armor and engine to make a difference. The fact that there were right and they fired very fast helped but still. On top of that, unlike the polish air force, the British trained their pilots, and calibrated the guns, to fire at maximum range for safety as it was believed destroying the enemy at minimum ranges would endanger their pilots too much. Not much fun to fly into an engine block of the fighter you just destroyed its true but in war, especially in such desperate situations as they were in safety must be a secondary concern and you myst trust in pilots reactions and skill, as well as luck, to see you through. The polish, trained to open fire at minimum ranges were thee highest scoring squadrons of the battle because of it. It was also far easier to hit the enemy at all at the closer ranges as deflection shots become much easier to envision.
The third compounding factor was the logic defying Vic formation of the british. Common sense should have immediatly revealed the folly of two of the three pilots forced to pay close attention to the lead to avoid collision, unable to look for or pay attention to the enemy, absolutely lethal in air combat. Then the complicated maneuvering with any turns, with the outside aircraft having to slow and swap positions with the inside while the inside adds power and assumes the outside position--for every turn and there's lots and lots of turning in air combat. No Time at all for doing anything except concentrating on the leader and getting shot down. How they didn't see the incredible folly of that right away especially when the superiority of the German finger four and then breaking off into wingman pairs after, was right in front of them proving devastating to them.
The British never went for the fifty, choosing instead the 20 mm cannon later on. Too bad they either didn't just leave the Browning M2s as .50Cals or go with 20mm right away because I don't think the battle would have been quite so close and less British pilots would have been killed. Eventually, though all these errors were rectified but it took far too long.
No mention of the Poles? Really??????????
Fighter Command(Tactical Air Command).
Bomber Command(Strategic Air Command).
sabra,your history on bader & the legs has a pegleg,,bader was hosted with champaigne and a tour of the luftwaffe base & pilots ready room,even sitting in a bf109,,galland truly respected this 2 no legged guy,,the eartificial legs,as told him by galland,were to have been air dropped over the german base by a brit plane under a white flag,,this suggestion was relayed to brit hq in open air r/t,,,bader was 'informed' of this by galland,douglas huffed & laughed,,haw! I bet they drop it in the regular course of bombing raids'' which indeed they did.the narrow margin,,they were.
cheers :)
Two Germans disliked this.
Even if the RAF was shot out of the sky the Germans had no means to cross the channel safely and without fatal losses. Now if they could lease the RN evacuation ships used in Dunkirk to get the Wehrmacht across in numbers they could have a shot at it. ;)
+DataWaveTaGo That statement is so far out of touch with reality one hardly knows where to begin. Without control of the air the RN would have been bombed and torpedoed into nonexistence. If you would do a little research, you would find the Channel ports opposite Britain were FULL of transport vessels of every sort. Some purpose built, others retrofitted to serve as landing vessels.
The Japanese showed just how useless capital ships were against air power when they sank the Repulse and POW, ships which were under full steam and could maneuver, but to no avail.
Blade Obsidian The size of the RN in 1940 was huge. The Luftwaffe had no effective anti-capital ship weapons, the number of U-boats available was tiny.. The "landing craft" concocted by the Wehrmacht were puny, many unpowered (had to be pushed or towed) and most were un-seaworthy. We are not talking of two capital ships on their own here (P of W & Rep.), but a channel-deployable navy more than 10 times the size of the German navy with capable crew and good AA protection. England had already put 25% of the Germany navy on the bottom in the Battle of Norway with very few of her own ships committed. I did plenty of research, 40 years worth.
+DataWaveTaGo The Luftwaffe had several variants capable of torpedo bombing and dive bombing, not to mention that the Channel would have been mined on both flanks, cutting off the Home Fleet more than long enough for even towed barges to make landfall. The RN may have been large, but it was spread across the globe. Only the Home Fleet at Scapa Flow could have been called up quickly. Additionally, I do not know where your research came from but it is critically flawed. Additionally, I'm not sure why you disagree with the British military who knew that without air cover, Sea Lion was imminent? The German Army had MORE than enough seaworthy vessels captured from the various nations it had overrun to transport the 19 divisions allocated for the invasion sir. I mean no disrespect, but your research and conclusions therefrom are historically incorrect. tc, sir. I won't argue the point, will just leave it at that sir.
+Blade Obsidian OK.
@@DataWaveTaGo One word: TORPEDO
It's a pity there was no word on Polish pilots not being allowed to take part in the final parade over London in 1945.
+Marcin Grynberg it may not be aknowledged but most of us brits know how hard and furious the polish pilots in the raf fought
+Blaze 883 The Poles had to be "written out" of the war because of the biggest betrayal of the war, when Poland was left in the Soviet (Stalin) zone.
The British government did invite the Soviet-backed government in Poland to send a party to represent Poland at the celebrations. However these were not the "Free Poles" who had fought against the Germans for the allies. Winston Churchill, supported by some MPs and senior officers in the RAF strongly protested the decision, which was seen as an affront to the 200,000 poles who fought for the Allies and kowtowing to a communist power. As a result 25 pilots were invited to join the RAF parade and invites were also sent to senior "Free Polish" Officers. They all declined, the pilots because of the omission of other Polish Forces from the parade. The Russian backed Polish Government declined to send a delegation as the Pilots had been invited. It is important to remember that the Attlee (Labour) Government had only been in power for a year and from an ideological and national point of view would not have wanted to upset the Russians who effectively controlled Poland at the time. I remember the parade as I was there in the crowds and it was fantastic for a small boy to see the heroes who had fought for freedom. Also my father was in the RAF and served with 145 Squadron which in 1943 was joined by a team of experienced POLISH pilots led by Squadron Leader Skalski. 145 shot down more enemy aircraft in the first two months of 1943 than any other Polish unit in the whole year. My father was very proud that he had been part of the Squadron and always spoke about them.
Yes their squadron record was excellent, and the treatment of them after the war was not our finest hour. However, one Squadron does not a Battle win.
It was not one squadron.
Nothing get a argument going like the mustang spitfire subject ! Both aircraft had a assigned role to play and did their job well ! So better ? For what ? The people who flew these aircraft are all dead and I'm sure they think the aircraft they flew was best their airman were best there tactics were best all who fought knew that all that mattered was who won its what's on the score board that counts !
33:58 - 34:16 Douglas Bader :)
indeed dowding pretty much had a single vision that saved the UKs arse. For his vision and hard work they replaced him with someone who was upper class. The big wing and the suicide missions to berlin were insane at best. Instead the let the royal navy bleed by failing to put any real effort into coastal command. This was a point made by the USA after WW2 in assessing strategies and actions. British class snobbery at its worst
You make the assumption of bountiful resources of men and materiel. That was not the case until much later when the US got involved with men and machines on the ground and lend-lease began to feed into British forces.
Who's got the biggest balls of them all
Dont Forget the polish, amerikan, French, canadian pilots and pilots from other nations. The british allone were not able to defend.
Although I thank those brave pilots which saved the British from NAZI invasion. However putting it into perspective. The vast vast majority of the pilots were from the UK.
+Barbarossa Errare Still, the large majority of the Pilots during the BOB where British (about 1800). During this battle, there were only 13 French pilots and... 7 Americans (more than 100 Poles and about 90 Canadians, that's true)
+Barbarossa Errare Australia and NZ.
tonde 10 % of the pilots were foreigners.
Barbarossa Errare
One of the aussie aces had almost as many kills as the top brit.
search RUclips for "bloody foreigners" for a documentary/re-enactment of the polish pilots and their mis-use by the RAF
46:34 Wow...were most of the RAF really young and gay?
Look up "gay" in a dictionary. Had a different meaning before the pervs took it over.
Brits never quit
oh, I never knew the brits bombed berlin first...
Well the French never bombed Berlin...
Buxton - are you quite sure about that? It looks as tough you could be mistaken!
A total of 126 squadrons served with Bomber Command. Of these,
32 of these were officially non-British units:
15 RCAF squadrons,
8 RAAF squadrons,
4 Polish squadrons,
2 French squadrons,
2 RNZAF/"NewZealand" squadrons, and
1 Czechoslovakian squadron.
Yes I'm quite sure - by *_French_* we must mean by definition the French Government - in France. Undoubtedly French Nationals will have flown in bombing missions over Berlin but that's not quite the same as *_The French_*
So I'm certain sure - In WWII bombing policy was directed and controlled by the British and not by Johnny Foreigner.
It seems I owe you an apology Mr Hunter...
This from Wikipedia...
*_Berlin, the capital of Nazi Germany, was subject to 363 air raids during the Second World War. It was bombed by the RAF Bomber Command between 1940 and 1945, by the USAAF Eighth Air Force between 1943 and 1945, and the French Armee de l'Air between 1944 and 1945 as part of the Allied campaign of strategic bombing of Germany._*
So I was wrong - and not for the first time...
Good for you, my friend ... Apologies accepted.
I moved to France because I wanted to explore the country and its people.The climate also played a part in the decision being rather attractive compared to Blighty weather,so you understand why I have become a little sensitive to the clichéd French Bashing by Americans and Brits.
All I can think seeing this: WHAT A SHAME FRANCE!!!
Everyone knew it was the Polska pilots that helped in the Battle of Britain.
This gets very tiresome. There was one squadron Poles and one Squadron of Czechs in the RAF during the battle of Britain. While their individual, and Squadron, kills were good they alone did not win the Battle.
true and when they became operational the kill claims went through the roof. had a wonderful book ,a day by day diary of the battle. Up to mid August claims and actual German losses were very close.
Pity they were so useless in the battle for Poland. There wouldn't have been a war then.
I don't think they a good airplane at the time.
The RAF was a joke the went begging 20 countries for help summer 1940. The spitfire was a cheap carburetor plane that used 100 American octanes to make decent power. Those that know give the bf109 the ultimate fighter and did so with 87 octanes it’s truly remarkable. The Bf109k4 is truly a feat of speed and agility but guys get the truth stop the grandpa lies is sickening! Don’t forget the Canadians and the Polish stop leaving them out show them their due respect esp since the Brits discriminated against them.
After the war German and English historians could agree on the simple fact: Germany lost the Battle of Britain. Mostly because the were commanded by a fat blimp. Hadn't Barbarrosaa happened. FW190's would have roamed free over southern UK.
I always thought that gladiators were mainly slaves whose role was to entertain spectators with staged combat duals?
The Roman ones were. But it is a word that has become symbolic of individual heroic combat.
Forgive me for speaking what I believe in commenting but the entire myth of this war for democracy is a propaganda is true but why was the Allies be the ones with no flaws and hailed as righteous when the nation of Germany is still to this day being controlled by them. It's why we're righteous and fighting for democracy with all all prosperity has made flawless. No one is without flaws in my opinion plus Oceania, North and South America was bashed except Pearl Habor. Not saying I know it all but alot is missing in these films. But I watch them religiously because I'm a war monorail 😅
Real Gladiator of WW2: business men making money when fools are killing each others.
I have a frend that is polish sooo sad yes they are welcome to evray contrary
y
Well if it ain't Hugh Dowding a.k.a Sir. Pus Gut! What a coward he turned out to be.
o
Squadron 303 the best in RAF...
Pawel Sikora I can understand why you would want to believe that that was the case. But I'm afraid you are wrong. It was acknowledged that the best RAF squadron was No. 603 City of Edinburgh Squadron.
lord daver 303 had higher number based on the time they were active in this battle. I think they also had the highest number of kills on one day.
@John Cornell Fighters can't wreck you, bombers can. Bombers are the more valuable target. Also, the No. 303 squadron kill=claims were almost all verified, so saying they "over counted 3 times" is ... let's be nice and just call it a MISTAKE and not a LIE.
+waffle ss
laosnews
Hahahahaha so funny
Neither the Brits or the French are our Allies today...neither is any other EU Country.....we should let Vlad and Mohammed do what they want with them and finally be done with protecting them for Free...
how exactly are you protecting us?
nobody force them to fight they didnt kill and die for sport