Placing the Fairey Battle.

[tcolvin]

Many, and probably all, historians dismiss the Fairey Battle as having been obsolescent in 1939.
John Terraine explained his use of obsolescent by calling the Battle under-powered and lacking in both speed and defensive fire-power. Obsolescent usually means outdated and technically surpassed by Vorsprung durch Teknik..
But the Fairey Battle was not technically outdated. It first flew in 1936, which was the same year as the Whitley, Wellington, Blenheim, Hampden, Hurricane, Spitfire, and Bf110. This was a year after the Bf109, He111, Ju87, and two years after the first flight of the Do17. None of these contemporary and older aircraft has been called 'obsolescent' in 1939.
If the Battle's problem had been lack of power, then it could presumably have been re-fitted with an engine more powerful than the Merlin. If it had lacked defensive fire-power then it could have been fitted with a turret - as indeed it later was when used as a trainer for gunners - or with a gunner like later versions of the IL-2.
The Fairey Battle was designed as a strategic bomber. It was sent to France in the AASF in great numbers to attack the Ruhr and give Germany a knock-out punch. "The bomber will always get through".
By December 1939 this strategy had been revealed as delusional because by December 1939, Blenheims, Hampdens and Wellingtons had been shot out of the daylight skies by LW fighters and Flak and Bomber Command had switched to operating at night. In May and June 1940, the AASF was told to support the BEF. It sent Battles to attack the Meuse bridges in a disastrous charge of the Light Brigade.
The RAF therefore changed its story. It blamed the Fairey Battle for being 'obsolete', forgetting that the RAF had drawn up the specification; that the RAF had tested the aircraft; and that the RAF had ordered 2,500 of them to give themselves the power to deliver Germany a knock-out blow and end the war all on their own.
So what was obsolete was not the Fairey Battle but the strategic thinking of the RAF. After the Meuse Bridge disaster the RAF had only one idea, which was to area-bomb at night with 4-engined heavies and cause a breakdown in civilian morale.
The RAF covered its tracks, and like the bad workman switched the blame for its own shortcomings onto its tools.
That no one saw through this RAF spin until too late was the true disaster, because the RAF was able to continue with its delusion that the war could be won single-handedly by bombing German civilians.
Or is there some objective evidence that the Fairey Battle was indeed a lousy aircraft in 1939?