ABSTRACT

In this study we try to explore the concept of “Battle of Britain” in a holistic context. The main focus of the research is on “Battle of Britain” and its relation with “importance”. The research also analyzes many aspects of “Battle of Britain” and tries to gauge its effect on “importance”.

Table of Contents

Introduction1

Thesis Statement1

Discussion and Analysis1

Time Frame of 1931-19454

Significance8

The Battle of Britain

Introduction

Battle of Britain began at dawn on July 10, 1940, with attacks by German dive bombers attacking convoys to the south and east of the coastal towns of Dover and Plymouth. The RAF had 700 fighters to face 4 times that number of German bombers and fighters, however, the goal of eliminating British fighters was not achieved and casualties began to rise. At the end of the first week of August the RAF lost 96 fighters and the Luftwaffe 192 aircraft (Air Ministry, Pp.87).

Thesis Statement

Why the battle was important? Battle of Britain was a decisive air battle during World War II (1939 - 1945 AD).

Discussion and Analysis

The period from the beginning of World War I to the formation of the national government in 1931 was marked by the seismic impact of World War I. This monumental conflict ended the long period of peace between the Great Powers that had followed the Napoleonic Wars. Britain entered the war on the side of France and Russia, ostensibly in defense of the neutrality of Belgium. The real causes of the war were much deeper and stretched back to 1870 and the unification of Germany. The united Germany had missed out on much of the first wave of imperial growth and felt strategically isolated in the center of Europe. France and Russia feared the military strength of this central European giant (Bekker, Pp.75). For Britain the strategic concerns were real, but since 1900 it was the economic challenge of the united Germany and the emerging economic superpower of the United States that most worried successive prime ministers. Germany had to be contained within Europe, and access to the free trade area of the British Empire had to be defended in some way against the political economy of protectionism practiced by the Germans. Economic competition, strategic calculation, and the underlying pressure of the prolonged arms race combined to produce total war in 1914. Initially, Britain was under Prime Minister Herbert Henry Asquith (1852-1928), a Liberal who led a government without an overall majority, but in 1916 Asquith was replaced by David Lloyd George (1863-1945), who promised to fight the war in a more vigorous manner. A coalition government was formed (Cooper, Pp.36-45).

Lloyd George's assumption of office introduced new energy into the conduct of administrating and fighting the war but arguably did nothing to break the stalemate that the western front had become. The fall of the tsarist regime in Russia and the entry of the United States into the conflict however altered the picture. Faced with the seemingly endless resources of the United States, the German army surrendered in November 1918. The winning ...