Air Fronts: Theaters of Operation - ETO - AP 156: Battle of Britain - 7. The Battle of Attrition
THE BATTLE OF BRITAIN. Air Ministry Pamphlet 156; Issued by the Department of the Air Member for Training, August 1943
THE BATTLE
VII. The Battle of Attrition
28 SEPTEMBER - 31 OCTOBER
Changes in German Strategy
From time to time during the Battle of Britain high officers of the Luftwaffe made candid and often boastful statements about the general strategy underlying the German air force's operations against this country. At the beginning of August, Kesselring had boasted that the initiative lay completely with the Germans, and had explained what this meant in terms of air power. Goering himself had announced the planned destruction of our Fighter Command, and had in September told of the approaching attempt to bomb London out of existence. At the beginning of October a new five-point plan for the Luftwaffe was made public, this time by an officer who remained incognito. In the new phase of air fighting the German Air Force would, he said, be entrusted with the following vital tasks - first, the retention of the mastery of the air over the Channel and the English coastal areas; second, the progressive and complete annihilation of London with all its military objectives and industrial production; third, the steady paralysis of Britain's technical, commercial, industrial and civil life; fourth, the demoralization of the civil population of London and the provinces; and, lastly, the progressive weakening of the British fighter force. Apart from the obvious desire to cloak the defeats so recently inflicted on the Luftwaffe, this statement is interesting as showing that the German High Command had been forced to adopt a long-term bombing policy. It is also clearly recognized that the struggle with Fighter Command would, in the future, take the form of a battle of attrition. The plan also contained an unashamed admission that deliberate war was to be made on civilians. The curious point is that the actual air operations carried out against this country during October corresponded very closely with the plan as it had been forecast.
The Fighter-Bomber Phase
The withdrawal of the German long-range bombers from daylight operations at the end of September, meant that the Germans would have to rely exclusively on large-scale fighter sweeps or employ some entirely new form of strategy. In fact, it was the latter alternative which was adopted, for in October the enemy went in for an offensive which was made with the aid of Me.109 and Me.110 equipped as fighter-bombers, combined with occasional fighter sweeps.* The object of this strategy was to ensure that our fighters would be forced to engage the attacking aircraft, to confuse the defenders as to which formations were actually carrying bombs, and also to ensure that all the fighter-bombers could protect themselves without relying on fighter escort. No further attempt was made to `destroy' Fighter Command by massed daylight attacks, but the effort to wear down our fighter strength by continuous small scale attacks, which were mainly directed on London, was persistently exerted. The plan in essence was to increase the strain on our fighter squadrons by forcing them to operate at much greater heights than previously, and also by the despatch of almost continuous waves of attacking aircraft. The pattern of the daylight air fighting thus radically changed during October - the number of attacks made by day being substantially increased. A few characteristic examples may serve to illustrate this type of activity. On 12 October there were three major attacks on South-East England and London - but from early morning till late afternoon the country was free from enemy aircraft only for a period of 20 minutes between the first and second attacks. Most of the aircraft employed were Me.109 flying at heights between 15,000 and 30,000 feet, and bombs which fell in London were dropped from 20,000 feet. On 20 October between 0945 and 1540 hours there were five attacks over South-East England, of which only three succeeded in reaching Central London. In all, 35 of our squadrons operated, but only seven of them actually intercepted and engaged the enemy. A day of unusual activity was 27 October, when no less than six offensive sweeps-the last being in three phases - were carried out against this country. The night attacks on London were continued by large numbers of aircraft on every night in October, culminating on the night of 15th-16th, when 450 long-range bombers operated.
The Strain on Fighter Command
It would, therefore, be inaccurate to suggest that the enemy in any way relaxed his pressure on Fighter Command during the last phase of the air fighting, or that what happened during October was an anti-climax. It was undoubtedly true that the prospects of an actual invasion of the country were very much less than they had been in September. It was also true that the German long-range bombers had largely been driven out of the air by daylight. That, however, did not mean that the German offensive had been abandoned, or that Fighter Command could relax its efforts. In many ways October was to provide one of the severest tests to which our fighters were put throughout the whole Battle of Britain. The physical strain of fighting at heights up to and over 30,000 feet proved very exacting. The continuous fighter patrols and rapid fighter-bomber attacks made by the enemy called for a far greater operational activity on the part of our squadrons. On clear days, when the enemy was able to multiply the number of his attacks, our fighter squadrons of twelve aircraft averaged about 45 hours flying per day, and occasionally squadrons flew as much as 60 hours a day.**
The volume of operational flying was also greatly increased by the maintenance of standing patrols over Kent. These patrols were flown, whenever the weather was suitable for a German high-flying attack, at 16,000 feet over forward areas. As soon as an attack began to develop these fighters were ordered up to 30,000 feet in order to contain the enemy's highest fighters while other fighter squadrons attained height on the general line of the airfields covering London. This was an effective reply to the new high-flying technique employed by the enemy, but it made a break with the very principle of Fighter Command's organization of its resources which was to economize effort by keeping aircraft on the ground except when required to make an interception.
The German Failure
Nevertheless, it became clear, as time went on, that the Germans could not achieve any of the decisive results that they may have hoped for as a result of this last change of strategy and tactics. They were able to make a large number of `nuisance' attacks using cloud, they were able to cut down substantially the rate of their aircraft losses, and they were also able to maintain the pressure on Fighter Command. Beyond that it is difficult to see what the Germans achieved at this period. The amount of damage that could be done by the daylight activities of the fighter-bombers was limited, and no attempt seems to have been made to carry out precision bombing. Fighter Command found an answer to the new high-flying threat, it altered and re-shaped its tactics, as it had done throughout the battle, to counter all the moves made by the Germans, and our fighter squadrons by enduring to the end found themselves finally victorious. The plan to wear down Fighter Command, like the earlier effort to eliminate it quickly, failed.
Fresh Targets for Our Offensive
Meanwhile Bomber and Coastal Commands, despite bad weather, had continued our offensive against the Axis powers and occupied Europe. During October our bomber effort was approximately equally divided between invasion ports, transport targets, airfields, shipyards and oil targets. An attack made on Cherbourg on the night of 10-11 October may be particularly mentioned, for it was carried out as a preliminary to naval bombardment. Long-term bombing targets included synthetic oil plants, aluminium and nickel works, the Krupps works at Essen, the Fokker aircraft factory at Amsterdam, and on one occasion - the night of 27-28 October - the Skoda armament works at Pilsen in Czecho-Slovakia. Several attacks were made on Germany's main naval units in harbours and, after an interval of six weeks, operations against Northern Italy were resumed on the night of 20-21 October. Above all, since the end of September, the hard-pressed Londoners had been given the satisfaction of knowing that the capital city of Germany was also being bombed approximately one night in every three. It was good to know that we could take it, it was even better to know that we could also hand it out.
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* The Me.110 had been converted to fighter-bombers by fitting two bomb-carriers under the fuselage, each carrying a 250 kg. bomb. The Me.109 were fitted to carry two bombs or one bomb of 500 kg.
** The casualties and damage caused to fighter squadrons by the German night attacks were insignificant, but some loss of efficiency was caused by disturbance and lack of sleep resulting from night bombing. And since operations became continuous throughout the 24 hours, fatigue was caused to the formation commanders and their staff and the personnel of all operations rooms.
