[Nick Beale]

Wars are colossal wastes of material, let alone human life. Why else would the exceptions, where the pinpoint target was hit, the crackshot, the ace be so celebrated? These were the exceptions.

Were fighters worth building when the majority of pilots never shot anything down? Most torpedo aircraft never scored a hit, were they worth building? Were ships worth it when most escort sank a U-boat? Were armies worth it when postwar studies showed a high percentage of infantry never even fired their rifles? When most landmines were never trodden on, sea mines never struck?

The point was not what the war or any aspect of it cost in money, for Britain in 1940–42 it was the determination to do whatever it took to hit the enemy. With France out of the war, the arithmetic was transformed and the course embarked on then is wholly understandable. Britain could never raise a field army big enough alone to defeat a German one (too great a population disparity). The RN couldn't overcome the military capacity of a continental power occupying the greater part of Europe to its West and occupying or allied to everything to its east. And the people who'd been Blitzed understandably wanted to hit back.

I suspect that a partial dilution of BC's strength in favour of Coastal Command might have done Britain more good c. 1941–43 than sending that extra (say) 100 machines over Germany. Clearly there was obstinacy over various elements of strategy, tactics and equipment (highlighted by Max hastings and Bill Gunston amongst others) but hitting German with the means at Britain's disposal was a rational choice in the circumstances of the time. The later insistence on hitting cities with a force that had meanwhile developed enough accuracy to hit oil targets etc. is what I find inexplicable.