“If you look about this area, Alec…” Laurence Trumbull continued on screen, regaining his brother’s attention in an instant, “…you’ll probably not recognise this airbase either, although you were stationed here for a little while.” The camera panned around to show large buildings, even larger hangars, and more aircraft which Trumbull again had never seen before. The scene cut in an instant to a pair of aircraft the pilot did recognise. On either side of a set of blue-painted iron gates, a Supermarine Spitfire and Hawker Hurricane each sat atop a thick metal pole no more than a metre or two high, suspended as if in flight. Beyond the gates, a short drive ran past low hedges to a building Trumbull also recognised.
“Biggin Hill…” he whispered softly to himself in awe, allowing the narrative to continue.
“A Spitfire and a Hurricane — I’ve no doubt you recognise them well enough. These replicas were originally erected here in 1989 as the Gate Guardians of St George’s Chapel of Remembrance at Biggin Hill. They’re here in recognition of the sacrifice of all who served and were stationed here between 1939 and 1945. As I speak these words, the war has been over now for sixty-five years.” The scene cut back again to the old man, this time standing side by side with Max Thorne dressed in identical clothes to those he wore beside Alec Trumbull now. “If you’ll bear with us now, I’ll hand you over to someone far more knowledgeable to give you a short history lesson and try to explain to you what’s going on.”
“Thanks, Laurence,” Thorne began on screen, the camera panning slightly to bring him into the centre of frame. “No doubt we’ve already met, Alec, if you’re watching this…” He grinned both on screen and off, almost in unison as he stood beside Trumbull in that small room and recalled exactly what he was about to say on the video. “I’m hoping I haven’t come across as a complete mental case as yet, and that if you’re still watching this you’re still keeping an open mind…” He paused for a breath. “First I’ll tell you about one of the greatest strategic mistakes of the twentieth century…” The picture froze momentarily as Thorne paused the video once more.
“We already talked about this bit — Operation Sealion and stuff — so I’ll zip forward a little…” With the press of a few more buttons on the remote control he held, the video image was replaced by the black and white scenes of British archival film: film of the Battle of Britain itself. It was footage Trumbull found familiar and somewhat eerie at the same time.
“For a while the RAF was in real trouble…the Luftwaffe was hitting British airfields close to the coast and forcing fighter squadrons to use bases further inland, thereby reducing the amount of fuel they had available to engage oncoming bombers. During August of 1940, the loss of RAF fighters, although high wasn’t so bad, as aircraft were being replaced as quickly as they were shot down. The real problem was pilots: by that stage nearly twenty-five percent of Dowding’s fliers had been put out of action — either killed or wounded — and nearly a third of the RAF’s fighter pilots were members of inexperienced Category ‘C’ squadrons commanded by a nucleus of experienced but exhausted ‘old hands’.”
Trumbull nodded as he heard these words, knowing the truth of it: so far, this story sounded identical to his perceptions of recent history. He found he couldn’t drag his eyes from the images on the screen as they held him completely in their power.
The narrative continued: “The Germans on the other hand had no such problems. Their flying schools were quite happily meeting the needs of any losses inflicted, and by the end of August, the RAF was just about done for. A few more weeks perhaps and it would be all over, with nothing standing in the way of Operation Sealion. That was the idea, you see: for the Wehrmacht to send its invasion forces across the Channel, it needed the RAF out of the picture first. Any naval operations would elicit a response from the Royal Navy and without RAF protection, they’d be sitting ducks for the Luftwaffe.”
“I gather something happened to alter this situation?” Thorne halted the DVD once more in order to respond to Trumbull’s question.
“Damn right it did,” he nodded. “One night during August, a lost flight of Heinkel bombers unintentionally drop bombs on London, which at that stage had been declared off limits by The Führer himself. The bombing was a complete accident but it needless to say annoyed the Christ out of Whitehall and they immediately asked Bomber Command, who were also a tad pissed about it, to carry out a retaliation raid a Berlin. There was bugger all damage done, except perhaps for Göring’s pride, but it scared the shit out of a few people high up! Göring had stated categorically that this would never happen and the whole thing had made him and Hitler look foolish. Couldn’t have that, could we?” Thorne added with more than a little sarcasm. “Well, sometimes shit happens anyway…” He started the disc again.
“At the point where it seemed everything was lost, the focus of the Luftwaffe attacks switched from airfields to British cities.” The footage now showed more archival film, this time of The Blitz — the bombing of London — and the new images unnerved Trumbull even more. These were buildings he recognised clearly — he’d spent a large part of his life in London — but the scenes were of something that hadn’t yet happened. Fires raged against a darkened sky while firemen vainly tried to extinguish burning buildings and walls collapsed under the strain. Workmen sifted through rubble that had once been a church, a pub, a corner store, someone’s home.
“Suddenly, Luftwaffe bombers start hitting British cities instead and something soon to be called The Blitz began against London and other cities, the redirection of attacks to civilian targets rather than military that gave Fighter Command a desperately-needed opportunity to regroup. There were a number of factors contributing to the Luftwaffe losing the Battle of Britain, but they ultimately made one major mistake: they halted attacks on the airfields at a time when Fighter Command was on its knees and ready to crumble. They stopped attacking the controller stations and Command HQ units. They stopped attacking the radar installations. In combination with a few lesser problems at a tactical level, such as the fact that they had no effective ‘Fighter Command’-style ground control system, this ultimately cost them an entire world war. The RAF was never beaten, and Operation Sealion therefore never went ahead.