The Bombing War: Europe 1939-1945

For the crews impatiently waiting at airfields across northern Europe, the critical factor was when the assault would start. The order to stand by at full readiness had been sent out on 17 July 1940, but there was still no D-Day. Uncertainty existed at every level about whether the operation would really go ahead. Secret police reports on the mood of the population found a growing impatience with the postponement of ‘the great attack on England’, even more so as RAF bombers flew almost nightly to targets in north-west Germany, forcing millions of people into air-raid shelters and cellars.⁵³ Hitler’s air force adjutant, von Below, observed that even Göring was unsure that an air campaign would be really necessary. ‘We did not know what plan to evolve,’ Göring complained to an interrogator at Nuremberg six years later. ‘I did not know whether there would be an invasion or not, or what would be undertaken.’⁵⁴ Finally, in late July Göring was told to have his forces ready for action, so that when Hitler ordered the air assault it could start at 12 hours’ notice, but no date was fixed.⁵⁵ Operational plans were finally put into the form of a directive from Hitler’s headquarters only on 1 August, a reflection of Hitler’s own hesitancy about the wisdom of the invasion and his growing preoccupation with Russia. The date for the start of the air assault, codenamed ‘Eagle Day’ (Adlertag), was fixed for 5 August, Britain’s grim weather permitting. A separate note from Supreme Headquarters indicated that Hitler would decide whether Sea Lion would go ahead between 8 and 15 days after the start of the air campaign. The deciding factor was the success of the air force.⁵⁶ The concern with the weather had not been misplaced. Weather conditions were to play a critical part throughout the whole of the subsequent campaign, placing arbitrary limits on German action. During the first days of August large-scale air operations were impossible. On 6 August Göring summoned his air fleet commanders to his country estate at Carinhall, where they finalized the plan to destroy the RAF in four days, both its fighter arm and its bomber force, just as they had done in Poland and France. ‘Eagle Day’ was postponed until 10 August, then for a further three days. In Berlin, workmen could be seen building stands decorated with giant eagles and monumental replicas of an iron cross around the Brandenburg Gate, the backdrop, so it was rumoured, to the anticipated victory parade over Britain.⁵⁷

THE ‘ENGLAND-ATTACK’

The long aerial campaign that began in earnest in August 1940 has always been divided in British accounts into two distinct parts, the Battle of Britain, from July to October 1940, and the ‘Blitz’, from September 1940 to May 1941. The distinction owes something to the fact that they were fought by two different forces, the Battle largely by RAF Fighter Command, the Blitz by the civil defence forces, anti-aircraft units and small numbers of RAF night-fighters. There were also differences of geography: the Battle was fought over southern England, the Blitz across the whole of the British Isles. Looked at from the German perspective the conflict has an entirely different shape. The German Air Force fought a campaign almost a year long, from July 1940 to June 1941. It was almost always called the ‘England-War’ or the ‘England-Attack’, and it was treated on the German side as a unity because it was conducted by the same air forces, flying operations from the same bases by day or by night, though increasingly the latter, with the aim of weakening British resistance, perhaps decisively. Accounts by the German Air Force history office written in 1943 and 1944 describe the phases of a ten- or eleven-month bombing campaign. German airmen were dismissive of the idea that there was a distinct ‘Battle of Britain’, though they were familiar with the term; throughout the war they preferred to talk about ‘England’ because of its distinct cultural resonance in Germany.⁵⁸ When public announcements were made of British bombing attacks, it was common to talk of the English ‘Gentlemen’ who had authorized them – polite, hypocritical and ruthless.