But when I think how on earth we are going to win it, my imagination quails. HAROLD NICOLSON, DIARY, 8 NOVEMBER 19401 We shall win, but we don’t deserve it; at least we do deserve it because of our virtues, but not because of our intelligence. WINSTON CHURCHILL, 10 AUGUST 19402 Britain was not driven into the ground in 1940 and Germany did not win the war. These statements are commonplace enough. The difficulty is to decide what, if anything, connects them, for the Battle of Britain did not seriously weaken Germany and her allies, nor did it much reduce the scale of the threat facing Britain (and the Commonwealth) in 1940/41 until German and Japanese aggression brought the Soviet Union and the United States into the conflict. The issues in 1940 cannot be reduced to a simple dividing line between victory and defeat. In the first place the threat from the German Air Force was just one of the problems Britain faced in the autumn and winter of 1940. The war against Italy in north and east Africa was a major contest, whose outcome was just as critical for the long-term survival of Britain’s global imperial position.
