The Bombing War: Europe 1939-1945

The British forces that opposed the German bomber offensive were organized in functional commands, under commanders-in-chief responsible to the air staff based at the Air Ministry in London. The one command that mattered during the German offensive was Fighter Command, which operated both day- and night-fighters. In early August 1940 there were 60 operational squadrons in Fighter Command, with 715 serviceable aircraft out of an establishment strength of 1,112, not far short of the German figure. There were 19 squadrons of the Supermarine Spitfire Mark IA and Mark II, which had begun to appear in numbers earlier in the year, and 29 of the Hawker Hurricane Mark I and Mark IIA.⁶⁹ Almost all Fighter Command’s resources were devoted to defending southern and central England from air attack by day. There were only seven full night-fighter squadrons available by 7 September 1940, equipped with the Bristol Blenheim light bomber converted to a fighter role, and one squadron of Boulton-Paul Defiants. Both types had failed to prove their worth in daytime fighting, and were not much better as night-fighters. The fixed defences were organized by the Anti-Aircraft and Balloon Commands, both of which had been put under the control of Fighter Command headquarters at Stanmore in 1939. They presented a very porous front line against the bomber. By the start of the German campaign there were 52 balloon squadrons with a total of 1,865 balloons, giant gas-filled obstructions floating in rows above the cities, attached to long hawsers to damage low-flying aircraft. The Anti-Aircraft Command had been starved of resources in the late 1930s and was forced to expand rapidly during the course of 1940, but it failed to meet its plan. By the end of 1940 there were only 1,442 heavy anti-aircraft guns out of the 3,744 planned; as for the more effective Bofors light anti-aircraft gun, the deficit was even greater, 776 out of 4,410. The Inner Artillery Zone around London, first planned in 1923, had 92 heavy guns, only one-third of the number projected before the war.⁷⁰ The commander-in-chief of Fighter Command, Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding, admitted in his later despatch on the Battle of Britain that anti-aircraft artillery had been ‘inadequate for the defence of all the vulnerable targets in the country’, though without advanced gun-laying equipment and radar there was a limit to what anti-aircraft guns could do apart from induce prudence in the enemy and some sense of security among the threatened population.⁷¹

The one outstanding advantage enjoyed by Fighter Command was the system of integrated communication and intelligence-gathering on which the entire system rested. Its success was due in large part to Dowding, whose understanding of technical issues, organizational skills and fierce defence of his force made him a model commander. He was socially awkward, alternately garrulous and aloof (the quality that earned him the sobriquet ‘Stuffy’); he was near the end of his career in 1940 and fought the contest against the German Air Force with compulsory retirement constantly threatened. Unlike in the German Air Force, Dowding enjoyed a good deal of independence from the air staff and from the Air Minister, Sir Archibald Sinclair, a career Liberal politician, appointed in June 1940, whose chief role was to act as the link between Parliament, Churchill and the RAF. Dowding operated a strongly centralized force. Only during the late 1930s did it become possible for the first time, thanks to the development of a chain of radar stations around the British coast, to gain effective advance intelligence of approaching aircraft. Many stations were still not complete early in 1940, but by the autumn the Chain Home network had 30 stations from Cornwall to the far north of Scotland, almost half of them on the south and east coasts, facing the German enemy. To avoid the danger that they might be destroyed by air attack, eleven of the most important had shadow stations set up a few miles distant. In addition there were 31 Chain Home Low stations, to detect aircraft flying under 1,000 feet.⁷² The radar chain was far from perfect (estimating height proved difficult, particularly with crew trained too briefly), but it was supplemented by a nationwide Observer Corps which took over observation once aircraft had crossed the coast. The whole system was held together by telephone. Radar plots of incoming raids were fed into the central operations room at Fighter Command headquarters and then relayed to Fighter Command Groups and sector stations; Observer Corps sightings were sent straight to Groups from Observer Corps Centres. The whole process could take as little as four minutes, which gave just enough time for most intercepting fighter aircraft to be airborne. Once aloft, fighters communicated with each other by radio.