HISTORIC VICTORIES
chap in the air, not the controller, should decide when, where and how to meet the enemy.’ At the start of the campaign the Luftwaffe had
2,500 aircraft that were serviceable whereas the RAF had only 660. But thanks to the commander of RAF Fighter Command and air chief marshal Sir Hugh Dowding’s decision to grant the funding that allowed Bawdsey Radar to come into existence, the RAF was in a good position to defend against a much larger attacking air force, despite the reservations of some ace pilots. Radar’s significance was complemented
by British and American code breakers who deciphered messages transmitted by the Enigma code machine. The Nazis were using the device to encrypt orders, locations and times – key strategic information. These were read and sent from the code breakers’ base at Bletchley Park in Milton Keynes direct to fighter command where Dowding was given several hours notice of any threat. The RAF could effectively read Göring’s plans
before they were implemented, which made up for the larger air force the Germans used to attack the UK.
The Allied pilots were incredibly brave to take on the Germans who were very experienced – Aviation archaeologist Geoff Nutkins
British military commander General Alexander
said of breaking the Enigma code: ‘The knowledge not only of the enemy’s precise strength and disposition, but also how, when and where he intends to carry out his operations, brought a new dimension to the prosecution of the war.’ Churchill did not, in his stirring accolade to
‘the few’, go into detail over their countries of origin. Although, according to the Battle of Britain Monument, 2,341 RAF fighter pilots were of British origin, and a further 145 came from Poland. The eastern European state had suffered excessively from atrocities performed on it during the Nazi invasion, with its use of ‘Blitzkrieg’ or ‘lightening war’ on September 1, 1939. It went on to suffer a Russian invasion on September 17. Tens of thousands of Polish soldiers and
approximately 8,500 air men evacuated the country through neutral Romania and headed for England where Churchill told them: ‘We shall conquer together or we shall die together.’ Those who joined the RAF first saw service flying Hurricanes in late August 1940, and most
Squadron Leader Douglas Bader and two fellow pilots study an emblem of Hitler painted on an aircraft
An operator plotting aircraft in the Receiver Room at Bawdsey Radar station
were assigned to the RAF’s 303 squadron, led by squadron leader Ronald Kellett. The Polish Air Force was equipped with inferior
aircraft to the RAF’s. Its PZL P.11 was considered to be the most advanced of its kind in 1929 but changes in technology soon left it behind its competitors. Polish pilot Mirosław Feric was surprised at the ease with which he could shoot down Messerschmitt Bf-109Es using a Hurricane. On comparing it with the PZL P.11, he said: ‘The
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