80 years ago today - Britain Declares War on Germany
Discussion
These reports make excellent reading and underline the chaos of the retreat. The story of the French Mayor crying because he thought that the town archives would be destroyed by the Germans was quite poignant. I wonder if they were or did they survive the war.
And the Germans reached the Channel cost today.
And the Germans reached the Channel cost today.
I think many Brits were secretly thankful that France surrendered. There was a very famous cartoon published in "The Evening Standard" showing a defiant Tommy waving his fist in the air shouting "Very well, alone".
Which more or less sums up the attitude of June 1940 - if not being altogether accurate.
Which more or less sums up the attitude of June 1940 - if not being altogether accurate.
At this stage of the war the Poles looked like they were down and out. A good number of Poles, Czechs and other Continental Europeans had made their way to the UK but the British authorities had not yet formulated any hard plans as to how they might use them. The RAF was not too keen to make use of non-English speaking pilots - especially if they had the added complication of not been trained in RAF fighter tactics.
100% agree.
That is one of the perpetual myths that you keep hearing. The RAF through whatever resources were available against each attack. They did not have the luxury of time or available aircraft to be so choosy.
If a number of squadrons were scrambled to intercept an incoming enemy force, they didn't know what the fighter/bomber mix they were facing would be until they made visual contact.
That is one of the perpetual myths that you keep hearing. The RAF through whatever resources were available against each attack. They did not have the luxury of time or available aircraft to be so choosy.
If a number of squadrons were scrambled to intercept an incoming enemy force, they didn't know what the fighter/bomber mix they were facing would be until they made visual contact.
Ayahuasca said:
The ‘cost of a Spitfire’ raised by the Spitfire Fund was only a convenient nominal amount. In reality the cost was higher.
Nowhere near as high as a modern fighter though.
The aviation tech back then was essentially the same as you would find in a family car - an internal combustion engine, bent metal, rubber.
I didn't know that the Austin 7 had eight machine guns or cannons or a VHF radio transmitter/receiver of a transponder system to indicate friend or foe or a compass or all the pressure instruments or oxygen system or hydraulic retractable undercarriage or a reflector "heads up" gunsight etc that a high performance fighter needed in 1940. Nowhere near as high as a modern fighter though.
The aviation tech back then was essentially the same as you would find in a family car - an internal combustion engine, bent metal, rubber.
By and large, yes. They could be a bit of a handful and had some directional instability. This was improved in later versions by adding dihedral to the tailplanes and later adding an extension to the tailfin. They were as tough as an old boot and pretty reliable.
The bulk of Beaufighters were powered by the Bristol Hercules radial. The MkII had Merlins but the Hercules engine worked best for the various roles the Beaufighter took on.
The bulk of Beaufighters were powered by the Bristol Hercules radial. The MkII had Merlins but the Hercules engine worked best for the various roles the Beaufighter took on.
s2art said:
Europa1 said:
Am I right in thinking there was a variant of the Beaufighter fitted with an unfeasibly large gun for anti-ship duties, or have I mis-remembered?
Certainly there was a Mosquito with one, the Tsetse variant.Its first successes were in the role of nightfighter where they replaced the barely adequate Defiants and Blenheims.
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