Case Studies in the Achievement of Air Superiority - Air Force ...

AIR SUPERIORITY
Left to right: Sir Charles Portal, Admiral Sir Dudley Pound,
and Prime Minister Winston Churchill.
waffe’s airfields in France and the Low countries. Doctrine and lack of
training prevented the RAF from using that part of its resources effectively
in what could have been a devastating counteroffensive. While it is true
that the Germans had their Freya radar, they did not have any better lowaltitude
coverage nor any better night-fighter defense than did the British.
Germany would have had to deploy far more men in an active defensive
role, and the wear and tear on their airfields as well as on their aircraft and
personnel would have been well worth the cost to the RAF in aircraft shot
down by the German defenders. Surprise dawn raids by the twin-engine
Blenheim light bombers escorted by their clones, the Blenheim fighters,
might also have made the Luftwaffe more edgy. The nearest Bomber Command
came to helping, apart from occasional strikes, was attacking the
assembly of invasion barges, but these barges would never have been used,
anyway, unless the RAF had been defeated. It seems clear now that priority
should have been given to knocking out the Luftwaffe, and seizing air
superiority.
To achieve this goal, no fighter cover would have been needed. The
Blenheim bombers (as shown in 1941) remained reasonably safe even from
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