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Originally Posted by Kurfürst
There was simply no invasion fleet ready within two weeks (remember
That's all sounds very reasonable but the decision to move against Russia was not decided instead of carrying through the BoB campaign, but the other way around. If you read German papers (I suggest Klee's summary of sea lion, available at AAF Historical studies only), moving against Russia and postponing sea lion to 1941 was considered already in June-July 1940, before the air battle even begun.
This consideration was the effect of Soviet expansion in the East and the final straw in the decision was made in november 1940, after the Molotov visit to Berlin. There the Soviets suggested a "new order" in Eastern Europe which would effectively cut off Germany from all strategic resources. They hinted about annexing Rumania (oil), Bulgaria, Finnland (nickel) dividing up Turkey (chrome) and this put the two countries on an irreversible crash course much sooner than both would want. Maybe Stalin was just probing the Germans after their unexpected victory in the West, maybe they were serious, its difficult to tell, but the decision in Hitler's - who was actually quite desperate to avoid it during the Molotov meetings - mind that war with Russia was inevitable, and therefore he must strike first was made in November after these meetings. Barbarossa was finalized and authorized in the next month. All this had very little to with the BoB.
The German goal was to neutralize Britain, sought by various means (sea blockade, air campaign, the invasion bluff, diplomatic pressure etc.); this certainly failed in 1940. On the other hand I find Wilmott's analysis on the matter - Britain was not neutralized, but Germany was still an undisputable dominant position on the continent, which Britain could not hope to challange - that the BoB was from the military POV a campaign of small scale and limited significance, and change nothing about the strategic situation. It was however an important political/propaganda victory for the British, ie. that could encourage US involvement in the war (which was already taken as a foreign course by FDR regardless of Churchill, his problem was how to sell the idea to the US public and congress).
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I keep seeing references to the outcome of the BoB being "insignificant". While I agree that it may have seemed that way to the Germans at the time, I would argue that from the West's point of view it could be seen as one of the most significant outcomes of the war. By failing to suppress the Brits the Germans were powerless to prevent the massive build up of the Allied heavy bomber force which caused such massive destruction to Germany, its cities and industry. It also enabled the build up and launch of the D-Day invasion fleet, without which victory (if possible) would have been a very Russian affair.
Without Britain holding out against Germany, the US may very well have focused its efforts on Japan alone. After all, from what other friendly territory could they have established such a huge fighting force and launched such effective strikes on the continent?
While I have a healthy respect for the ordinary German fighting man and the technology he had at his disposal, there can be no denying that the BoB was an embarrassing failure for Germany which tried very hard to beat the Brits into submission and came away with a bloody nose and not a great deal to show for it's not insignificant losses. It seems it is still quite a sore point.
Just my take on it.
BTW: Great job Bongodriver, I see you've had a bit of a mini-BoB on your hands here over the past few days. From what I've read, I suspect your prime antagonist is still in high school.