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View Full Version : The Narrow Margin, Wood & Dempster


Ruy Horta
8th January 2005, 13:11
Although I have a nice section of Battle of Britain books I never obtained, arguably, the most famous and influential one of all: The Narrow Margin.

In the midst of The Right of the Line, The Most Dangerous Enemy, Battle over Britain, The Battle of Britain-Then and Now or other later publications, does it still have a place?

Also, but that's more of a discussion topic, how much of a narrow margin does the Battle of Britain really present and how few were the few? Were they really a few, I mean compared to the attacking force and its disposition?

Weren't the Luftwaffe and RAF actually pretty well matched in terms of both quality and numbers, didn't the actual number of defending fighters present quite good odds?

Isn't one of the problems that in the whole few and narrow margin concept the dive- and level bombers are always counted into the picture and thus distorting the view between the hunter and the hunted?

Maybe I am distorted in my fighter orientated view, but again, the fighters in the Battle of Britain had the iniative, the only real opponents being other fighters. Again these fighter numbers and their quality were pretty much evenly matched, with RAF Fighter Command having the advantage of home turf and psychology.

Did the RAF even need to commit all its reserves? Although there might have been some tough times, it was often just ahead of a positive trend.

Generally a/c were never a problem, trained pilots at some stage were, only to be offset by a major training program that would take Britain and later allies to unprecented highs of personnel.

Could the Luftwaffe have won the Battle of Britain at all?

Could any AF of 1940 have won a strategic campaign and defeated a country on the basis of air war alone? Of course I am not talking about some two bit Banana Republic or some Afghan tribe, but modern countries, defeat them with only minor assistence of the other arms?

Would Britain have accepted defeat in 1940 if it had lost 50% of Fighter Command and air superiority over southern England?

If the British government was quite confident in WW1 that a German invasion was quite improbable, even when the german fleet at that time was a real player, how could they ever have taken a German invasion serious in 1940?

So how narrow was that margin?

As wide as the channel perhaps?

So one book question and perhaps a bigger debate.

Juha
8th January 2005, 22:17
Hello Ruy
I cannot help You on the "Narrow Margin". It's over 10 years ago when I read it. But IIRC at least there is some good narrative and the weather info.

On the 2nd point I agree with You, the odds in fighters were not too bad for the FC. And after the truth of the vulnerability of their bombers sunk into the LW leadership they acknowledged that the number of Bf 109s were the limiting factor on the daylight activity of the LW. And so they regroupped their units. Most fighters were groupped to LF 2 and LF 3 began to concentrate to night bombing. So the number of fighters was crucical.
But one must remember that the LW bombers were not altogether defendless. In The Battle of Britain. The Jubilee History (1989 & 1990) by Richard Hough & Denis Richards the is a gallup of IIRC some 80 BoB FC veterans on German airgunners. Results were mixed, probably because the level of gunnery of LW bomber formations varied, but some formations could be dangerous. One veteran answered in the style which made British way of expressing themselves so dear to me , "I think that the German air gunners were rather good, they shot me down twice."
Also British bombers, especially those Blenheim Boys made a contribution by tieing up some Bf 109s to defensive work and inflicting some losses to LW.

And Bf 109 pilots had the advantage of much better tactic which suited well to the strong points of Bf 109.

But i think that the LW was in no win position. If they could made life too difficult for FC over southern England the FC could withdrawn beyond the range of Bf 109 and then during the the German invasion they still would be able escort British bombers and RN ships attacking beachheads and German invasion fleet and would also be able strafe beachheads.

Little incoherent but I'm writing this while watching a program on HM King Henry VIII.

Juha

Dick Powers
10th January 2005, 21:44
Although I don;'t have NM at hand presently, it was a ground-breaking study. It covers development of radar, the air forces and presents the BoB in a diary format, describing the BoB action for each day. Losses are given in numbers only with no attempt to identify each loss. These is an appendix By William Green, I believe, which briefly describes the history of each major aircraft type, along with a Dennis Punnet drawing.

I still have my weathered first (American) edition. It compares with Mason's "Battle Over Britain" a;though Mason's starts with Geman raids in WWI and gives loss details.

I have seen NM at used bookstores reasonably priced.It's definately worth having, although I doubt that it will give you new information or a different point of view.

Some of your questions about "how narrow" are discussed in Richard Overy's book "The Battle of Britain: The Myth and the Reality" which, although small is definately worthhaving.