The Battle of Britain Five Months That Changed History, May—October 1940 by James Holland (z-lib.org).epub

suffered at Ventnor, which would have created a massive handicap for the
British fighters. By abandoning attacks on them, Göring was giving Fighter
Command an astonishing boost.
The Reichsmarschall had pulled all his senior commanders away from
the battle front to tell them to use more fighters when escorting Stukas, to
use the Zerstörers more sparingly, to stop attacking British RDF stations,
and to carry on hitting the same targets they were already attacking. Why
this could not have been put on a one- or two-page memo is not clear, but
while they were sitting in his great hall, surrounded by antlers, great
masterpieces and other trophies of war, Britain and the English Channel
were basking in glorious sunshine.
It was therefore fortunate for the Luftwaffe that one staff officer had
been prepared to put his neck on the line and order the planned operations
for that day to go ahead.
Earlier that morning, Oberst Paul Deichmann, Chief of Staff at II
Fliegerkorps, had wandered out of their farmhouse headquarters at
Bonningues, near Calais, and realized that the early-morning cloud was, in
fact, just haze, and that behind it breathed an almost perfect summer’s day,
and not a ridge of low pressure. The weathermen had got it badly wrong.
By mid-morning, the haze had evaporated revealing nothing but blue skies
up above and glorious sunshine. Of the wind, there was barely a breath.
It was certainly too good a day to waste. Aware that most of the bomber
crews would be fuelled up and almost ready to go, Deichmann decided to
issue his orders. Stukas were to attack Hawkinge and Lympne. Dorniers
were to give Eastchurch another pasting while another Gruppe attacked
Rochester. Erpro 210 could attack Martlesham Heath. Having had his
orders acknowledged, Deichmann headed to the Holy Mountain, Luftflotte
2’s HQ at Cap Blanc Nez.
It was ironic, when considering the thrusting, up-front approach to
command adopted by Guderian, Rommel et al. during the western
campaign, that Kesselring should have chosen to have his HQ in a dank,
deep underground bunker of the type favoured by defeated French
commanders. Presumably, fear of British bombs had driven him to use such
a base, but while Kesselring was undoubtedly safe down there, he did miss
things, such as the sun emerging through the morning haze.
So it was that when Deichmann reached the dimly lit underground
command post, Oberstleutnant Herbert Rieckhoff, Kesselring’s operations