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Originally Posted by Sternjaeger II
Bingo.
It was Winston Churchill that spoke first on the radio about "the Battle of Britain", and it became the propaganda name for it, but de facto the air operations of Germany against Great Britain were just a part of the invasion plan, and the bombing of England continued up to 1945 with V1s and V2s.
The glory of the Battle of Britain is a modern phenomenon (you probably know better than me that up until the movie Battle of Britain the public opinion knew or cared little about it. So the idea was to pick up on a moment of national pride and dust it off, but it has been misinterpreted. Surely the brave RAF pilots and everyone involved deserve all the praise in the world for the fantastic effort made to stop the Germans, but the effort to repel the air offensive of 1940 doesn't mean there was a straight victory.
The propaganda was in need of a positive message, so they started claiming the victory of a battle that was perceived as such only from one side.
I dunno if I made myself clear, I reckon I should gather my thoughts and expose them in a more organic form. I am still afraid that national bias is getting in the way here. Nobody is depriving you of your pride or anything like that, it's just a case of a fair assessment of a specific part of the war.
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Stern you have made some really interesting points throughout this discussion. But your comment about the glory of the Battle of Britain being a modern phenonomenon kick started by the 1969 movie is absolutely and totally wrong, laughable actually. The Battle and the 'Few' was part of the british consciousness from 1940 onward and revered.
I'll add an edit, I think you must have been trolling with that remark. Quite frankly its the same as saying to any American on the forum that everyone had forgotten about Pearl Harbor until Michael Bay made a (very, very, very bad) movie about it!
Regards Mike