A quick Google search would indicate that the range of the top German fighter (the Me 109) was 528 miles (including the return journey). The distance from Calais to Liverpool is 325 miles. So any British planes from around that area and to the north were safe from attack
They didn't have any barges to begin with (let alone enough warships to challenge the Royal Navy) Hitler cared about expanding eastwards, not about invading Britain. This is the reason why he was so unprepared for an invasion of Britain, because he had spent his entire reign preparing for a war against Russia. If you are intent on invading an island, and need air superiority to do it, wouldn't you be concerned about an enemy reserve of planes that you couldn't eliminate and which could thwart your invasion, even ignoring the supremacy of the enemy navy to your own?
There would be no decent airstrips to land on. 1st rule of a retreating force is to leave nothing for the enemy. The airstrips would be sabotaged. Re-laying them would take time, and did you not read the link in Mahmoud's post. The Royal navy would still inflict horrendous damage to the landing forces and Luftwaffe. They did not expect to cross a sea when they started the war, and were suprised that Britain sprung to the defence of Poland.
"The Royal Navy would have been sunk without air support" NOT TRUE. The Luftwaffe did not have any naval attack planes. The only dive bomber they had was the Stuka, and it was slow and inefficient. PNE I have admired some of your previous retorts with fan but I don't think you have read the article in full.
There was no retreat The fighters were placed according to the plan of defence before the Battle of Britain started (eg the RAF was kept for the defence of Britain instead of trying to save a defeated France) It doesn't matter if the Luftwaffe ever had air superiority in the Channel and were efficient enough to wipe out the entire Royal Navy (which they weren't) as the Germans did not have enough troop ships (including those capable of transporting tanks) to carry out an invasion
Umm Did you not just say that if an enemy retreats out of range he cannot defend himself against your fighters?
Fine. Let's assume the Germans won the BOB and destroyed the RN. How quickly would it have taken them to build enough ships to carry their invasion force? Soon enough for Hitler to not invade Russia by June 1941?
Hitler never intended to invade Britain, and was not equipped to do so. The BoB was started by the Luftwaffe to subdue Britain so as they could concentrate their effort on Russia.
"You watched a documentary". Which could have the same flaws in it as Mahmoud's link. Just another opinion and view of a scenario.
Well I don't know who They are but Hitler was issuing commands in December 1940 for the invasion of Russia after the failed visit of Molotov in November 1940 (in an attempt by Germany to see whether Russia would go after the British Empire and not them)
Actually the Blitzkreig worked very well on land, and was groundbreaking in the way wars are now fought. There is no suggestion that the USA would have put any it's military might into the European struggle had Japan not made the fatal mistake of trying to emulate Hitlers dream of Eurpoean dominance in the east.
Well the German High Command are known for obeying Hitler's orders during the war and blaming everything on him after the war. The only one of them I'd pay any attention to is Rommel, and that's because he actually did rebel against Hitler, to the extent of giving his life
"They". Are some of the best military leaders in history, but were shackled by Hitler, and were, through loyalty to him forced to make call's that were not theirs.
Hitler invaded Guernsey and made all the Guerns drive on the right hand side of the road, it was awful.
Interesting article and comments. The thing is, "if" we had lost the Battle of Britain, then we would of been a very tempting target for invasion and Hitler might of given the go ahead (albeit with limited maritime resources). The link below is to a BBC documantary, which asks the same question as the OP.It's obviously hypothetical, but I tend to agree. http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/battleofbritain/11411.shtml
