By 1940 Germany had taken over most of Europe, Britain was the only country in Europe Hitler had left to concur. Britain had turned down several surrendering offers from Hitler, so he decided to push the situation by forming what was to become known as ‘The Battle of Britain’.
After France surrendered to Germany, it was Hitlers opportunity to fight for Britain and their surrender, over the seas. Hitler decided to use his most powerful force to attack the RAF after being reassured by a commander named Hermann Goring that his German air force will destroy the RAF within 4 weeks.
Britain was expecting an attack because France had surrendered to Germany. It was Germany’s goal to get through France to Britain. Britain had invented something called ‘Radar’, it detected when the Luftwaffe were coming for an attack over the English Channel. It was located all around the edge of south England and gave the RAF twenty minuets to get into the sky to fight the German attacks. To win the Battle of Britain the RAF used their best and most technical planes, which were the Spitfires and Hurricanes. The Battle of Britain lasted 114 days and over this time 3000 air crafts were lost, 3,800 aircrew and it cost 30,000 civilian life’s.
Within one hour, on the 15th September, the RAF shot down 56 invading Luftwaffe planes, leaving the Germans with no hope of achieving their goal of taking over Britain. By October, 1,700 Luftwaffe planes were lost and 2,662 German air crew were lost. Eventually without expecting it, the Germans stopped attacking. Hitler had finally given up and he concentrated on Russia instead, leaving full victory to Britain on the 31st October 1940.