Strangely enough, Hitler never showed much interest or enthusiasm for the German atomic project, and that held it back badly. The British were aware of the danger, and they successfully bombed the German heavy water plant that was part of that project.

The British development of radar was indeed the best in the world, and it was one of the key factors that saved them in the Battle of Britain.

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Rapaire, I am happy to continue arguing with you about the relative merits of the Bf-109 (Me-109). ;-) In my opinion, it was the all round best fighter of the period 1939-40. It was very fast, quite maneuverable, and exceedingly well armed for the time (2, sometimes 3, 20 mm cannon and 2 x 30 cal. machine guns). It was also being flown by a highly experienced cadre of pilots who had more combat experience under their belts in 1940 than any other pilots in Europe, because many of them were veterans of the Spanish Civil War, and the campaigns in Poland, the Low Countries, and France. They were already employing what proved to be the finest tactical combat formation for fighters, the "finger four" formation.

In comparison you had the Hurricane and Spitfire which were armed with 8 x 30 cal machine guns. The 30 cal is a light machine gun, rifle calibre. Give it a nominal hitting power of "1". That gives a Hurricane or Spitfire an overall hitting power of "8". Give the German 20 mm cannon a nominal power of "4" in comparison. That gives a Bf 109 either (4 + 4 + 1 + 1) or (4 + 4 + 4 + 1 + 1)...either a "10" or a "14"...so the Bf-109 has a bit more firepower than a Hurricane or a Spitfire.

This problem was eventually addressed when the British began mounting 20 mm cannon on their Spitfires and Hurricanes, but they did not begin doing that until after 1940.

The Bf-109 also had a slightly higher level speed and a higher climbing and diving speed than the Spitfire...but the Spitfire could turn tighter in a turning dogfight.

The British pilots were hampered to some extent by using less effective combat formations, and by the fact that they were fighting more experienced German pilots in the early stages of the campaign.

The German pilots were greatly hampered by the asinine orders they were given by their own high command. Instead of being free to give chase to the British fighters, they were ordered to stay close to the German bomber formations. This made the guys in the bombers feel safer...but in fact it greatly reduced the effectiveness of the Bf-109s in protecting them. The right thing to do would have been to allow the Bf-109s complete freedom in pursuing the British fighters as they saw fit, and doing what they were best designed to do...."free chase". This is what the German fighter pilots kept asking for, and what Goering kept denying them.

Another disadvantage the Germans had was the fact that they were fighting over enemy territory. If they bailed out or crash landed damaged planes, they became prisoners. British who bailed out or made forced landings returned to fight again. These are the advantages that always accrue to the defender in an air war, and some pilots survived quite a number of bailouts and forced landings and returned to fight again.

There is no evidence that would suggest to me that the German single engine fighters were inferior to the British fighters. The Bf-109 was about as even a match for the Spitfire as you could possibly hope to find in 1940, and it perhaps had a slight edge in some respects, while it was way superior to the Hurricane (which was, however, quite a good fighter plane). The Focke-Wulf left all British fighters in the dust at the time of its introduction in '41. Further developments of the Spitfire achieved parity with the Focke-Wulf by late '43 or '44.

The Germans did not lose the Battle of Britain because the British fighter planes were superior. They lost it because they did not have the right kind of bombers to do the job, and they kept changing their minds about what to bomb (they should have kept bombing Fighter Command's airfields), and they finally made the complete tactical error of bombing metropolitan London...which caused a lot of woe to the British public, but it gave the RAF airfields the respite they desperately needed...and that won the campaign for the British.

All they Germans were able to achieve was a lengthy and indecisive battle of attrition, and this was a battle which could not achieve the desired result of crippling the RAF and enabling a German invasion.

In my opinion the Luftwaffe was given an almost impossible task in the Battle of Britain. They failed not because of having weaker fighter planes, but because the whole idea was basically just not that feasible. They were an airforce best designed to tactically support the rapid advances of a land army...and everywhere that they were used in that fashion they won quick, decisive victories in the campaigns of 1939 to early '42.

In the case of the UK, however, they couldn't do that. The German army was stopped dead in their tracks by the Channel and the Royal Navy...so the old One-Two punch of the Luftwaffe + the Werhmacht could not be done.

Without the Channel, Britain would have fallen in a few weeks. With it, they could hold out indefinitely, and the Luftwaffe was just frittering away its strength to little purpose over southern England.

If you cannot follow up air attacks with a land or seaborne invasion...then you cannot occupy and conquer a nation.

(apparent exception to above (?): the surrender of Japan in 1945.......but that was in fact a case where the Americans definitely could follow up their air attacks with a seaborne invasion, and the Japanese knew that. And then you add the atomic bomb? Well, that's a whole other situation.)