Salute
People who dismiss the Battle of Britain as being insignificant are suffering from a complete lack of Strategic understanding.
Germany made the same mistake in both World Wars: They fought on two fronts at the same time, forcing them to divide their strength and fatally weakening their tactical options.
In World War I, Germany was able to finally beat one of their opponents, Czarist Russia, but by that time, America had entered the war, and their strength had been weakened too much by the three previous years for them to finish the British and French in the Spring of 1918 before the Americans arrived in strength.
In World War II, Hitler and Ribbentrop had brought off the brilliant coup of taking the Soviet Union out of the equation by signing the Nazi-Soviet Non Aggression Pact, and dividing up Poland. Germany was then faced with the much easier task of fighting a one front war, and of beating the French and British. After France fell, and the majority of the British land forces were destroyed as a fighting force, (Dunkirk only saved the men, not the equipment) the Germans were in a completely dominant Strategic position, facing a British Empire nearly fatally wounded. All they needed to do was get across the 20 miles of the English Channel, and the war against the West would be won. The British Army was in no position to fight back, there was only one division on their OOB, (the 1st Canadian) which was fully equipped and ready to fight. If the Germans could land their Wehrmacht divisions in England, the ground battle would be a forgone conclusion.
Hitler gave Britain a little less than a month to surrender, while he massed his forces on the Channel coast and accumulated supplies and equipment. He then drew up his plans. For a detailed look at those plans, take a look at my previously posted map, and look here:
http://www.kretsen.nu/bytebattler/do...LION%20OOB.pdf
(note the comments about the S.S. 'Special Action Groups', or Einsatzgruppen, who were tasked with arresting and liquidating all members of British society deemed potential opponents, Churchill was slated for immediate execution)
The key to a successful invasion was command of the air over the channel. Without air superiority, the Royal Navy would sortie from the ports further up in the North Sea, and make short work of the invasion fleet. The German Kriegsmarine was nowhere near strong enough on its own to deal with the Royal Navy. During the invasion of Norway, the German Navy was seriously damaged in its clashes with the Royal Navy, and unable to support its troops landed in the north. In the event of an invasion of Britain, the Royal Navy would have isolated the first wave of German troops, which would have been lightly armed and without heavy artillery and tank support, and cut the supplies and reinforcements crucial to a successful consolidation and advance.
Of course, even if the Germans obtained air superiority over the channel, the Royal Navy would have still sortied, but its chances of prevailing would have been much reduced. A Stuka might be a sitting duck when intercepted by a fighter, but when it was operating free from aerial interference, it became a terrifyingly effective anti-shipping weapon.
Everything depended on the battle in the air. With Aerial Superiority, the all powerful Werhmacht stood a very good chance of crossing the channel and landing successfully, without it, its chances were not good.
The failure of the Luftwaffe to defeat the RAF meant the chances of a costly defeat for the invading forces were too great for the Germans to risk. So they called it all off.
At that point, Hitler could have continued his neutrality policy with Soviet Union, but instead, he made his greatest mistake, and opted to begin an invasion, a two front war, with Britain still undefeated.
His original plan was for the invasion to begin on May 15th 1941, but this was delayed by British operations in the Balkans.
First, the Italians were bogged down in their war with Greece. The British compounded this by reinforcing the Greeks with British divisions and RAF units, threatening to throw the Italians out of Albania.
Then, British supported factions in Yugoslavia overthrew the German controlled government there, planting a hostile entity on the German southern flank.
Hitler reacted by posponing the invasion of the Soviet Union, and sending his Panzers south. Even though the Nazis overran Yugoslavia and Greece, and decisively defeated the British, the time lost during these campaigns meant OPERATION BARBAROSSA, the plan to invade Russia, was postponed till June 22nd, much later than the Werhmacht planners had hoped for. If the British were no longer an entity, none of this would have happened.
And even though the invasion initially went well, with much of Western Russia being overrun, the advent of the rainy season in October of 1941 saw the Wehrmacht still far short of achieving its goal of capturing Moscow. For nearly three weeks, till frost set in, the advance slowed to a crawl in the mud, giving the Soviets time to build defences, and most importantly, to bring the battle seasoned troops from its Siberian Army, (fresh from their victories over the Japanese at Khalkin Gol in 1939) into position in front of Moscow. The Germans then had a few good campaigning weeks in the November frosts before the snows came, but it wasn't enough, they fell just short of capturing Moscow. With the snows, came the Soviet Winter counteroffensive, led by the Siberians, and the first substantial defeat of the Wehrmacht. It wasn't till the next summer that the Germans were able to resume their attack, and by then the Soviets had grown in strength and tactical skill, and the attack led only to defeat at Stalingrad.
The events of the Second World War are not isolated instances, each battle affects the next one, and the Battle of Britain was a crucial link in the chain of failures which led to the defeat of Nazi Germany.