Hello all, and thank you once again for listening to the saga of World War II, a Cassus Belly project.

This time around, we cover the Battle of Britain and the life of Winston Churchill.

Visit Cassusbellypodcast.com slash World War II for the podcast blog, and don't forget to like or review the podcast on SoundCloud and iTunes.

Now it's time for episode seven, their finest hour.

Frankly and definitely, there is danger ahead.

Danger against which we must prepare. We shall defend our island, whatever the crust may be.

We shall fight on the beaches. We shall fight on the landing grounds. We shall fight in the fields and in the streets. We shall fight in the a direct result of German preparations for Operation Sea Lion. With Gearing an overall command of the eventual cross-channel

invasion, the emphasis was placed on an extended

preparatory bombardment. Fortunately for the English, Gehring was not the same caliber intellect

as Seguerian or Mannheim. Sure, he was confident in air power, and correct in predicting that it would

be instrumental in modern conflict, but he doesn't seem to have any kind of theory of air power.

This is revealed in multiple ways.

First, the fact that the Luftwaffe was, more or less, an extension of the army.

The entire German Air Force was organized and designed to excel at tactical bombing.

It had lots of excellent short-range fighter escort aircraft and medium tactical bombers,

but it lacked heavy strategic bombers.

Secondly, Gearing didn't seem to have any actual plan for how to defeat Britain

other than just throw aircraft at them.

In fact, it seemed to he approached the whole thing like a giant tactical exercise

rather than a strategic mission that it was.

The capitulation of Britain was, by definition, a strategic goal. Garing didn't have any strategy for achieving this objective, though.

Rather than sending bombers escorted by fighters, he launched his fighters to engage in a massive aerial battle meant to destroy the RAF in the air.

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