[brando]

While the British regard the Battle of Britain as an epic struggle which resulted in a resounding victory, there is evidence that it barely registered in German consciousness in 1940 and is still of only minor significance today.

Epic struggle....yes. Resounding victory... no, unless you compare it to the spectacle of the years preceding it.

I'd have to add that what registered in the German consciousness back in that year was entirely what the Nazi party wanted to register and wasn't necessarily the whole truth.

Most of the Air Marshals, Goring, Harris, et al, were operating according to the maxim espoused in Douhet's book published in the 30s; to whit, a country could be brought to its knees by aerial bombardment alone. That philosophy prevailed almost throughout the war, but the truth is that it doesn't work unless you can follow up with armies on the ground. Only the advent of the A-bomb in 1945 brought Douhet's prophecy somewhere near the truth, though even that is contested.
In reality it was submarine warfare that prevailed, viz. the Americans ability to sink nearly every oil-tanker before it reached Japan, thereby cutting off the Japanese from that vital resource.

Had it not been for the British resisting the Luftwaffe's attempts to knock them out of the war, everything might have played out very differently in the following years. There is a very strong case for suggesting that the U.S. might never have involved herself in the European conflict if Britain had not hung on - and it's clear that the second front couldn't have been mounted without Britain as a springboard.

It'd be interesting to know where you get the notion of resounding victory from. While wartime British propaganda unsurprisingly hailed the conflict as a victory at the time, much research into the subject has been made since the war years and the overwhelming consensus is that it was "a damned close-run thing". Yet from that stubborn resistance came a glimmer of hope that grew in so many ways as to eventually overturn the Nazis' ambition towards total domination.

Maybe you're trying to see this history in little chunks - when a step back would reveal the whole ebb & flow.

B