This book has now gone through several editions, and was recently re-issued with a slightly different title. It is a very short history of the Battle of Britain of 1940-41 and in just a few pages, Overy manages to demolish a number of long standing myths about the period. Among these are the idea that the British or Germans at that time were deliberately engaged in terror-bombings of each other's cities. Or that either the RAF or the Luftwaffe was significantly "better" than the other; both air forces had cutting-edge aircraft and outstanding pilots. He attributes Britain's "victory" (he's not convinced it can be called that) to something rarely discussed: Britain was far better at producing large numbers of Spitfires and other aircraft, while the Germans (despite their having conquered most of Europe) struggled to meet their production targets. A good introduction to the subject, but not without controversy. ( )

This is a brief analysis of the Battle from both sides. Overy seems to be trying to prove that it took more than a few airmen to win this battle by also including the navy as a factor in the German decision to abandon the invasion of England. He also shows that while the German forces lost more aircraft than the British, by the end of the battle those planes had been replaced. It was the German aircrew who were dead or in prison camps that was the big loss.

While flying obsolete aircraft, Bomber Command and Coastal Command did best to tie down German resources by forcing bombing enemy land targets and shipping. ( )

Richard Overy has produced another* superb book here. Not a right lot longer than I imagine the pamphlet it mentions at the end that was produced about the battle - that was the first to coin the phrase 'The Battle of Britain' - this is a concise, considered and thoroughly enjoyable snapshot of a few months in late 1940. A few months that have gone a long way to defining the fighting spirit of us British.

It does indeed strip away the myth and present the reality of what actually happened in that late summer and autumn. How many we're 'the few', how many we're they up against? How much do we, the 'many', owe them?

Every one - every British person of a certain age, that is - is surely certain they know what happened and who we owe our thanks to. We do, and then again, this book shows we don't. Read this and you will understand much more about something you thought you knew all about.

Thoroughly enjoyable.

*Everyone should read 'Russia's War' by Richard Overy as well. ( )

Richard Overy—author of The Air War, 1939-1945 and Why the Allies Won, among other things—is, for my money, one of the sharpest and most insightful historians writing about the Second World War. His books are clearly written, crisply argued, and firmly rooted in the evidence . . . about as far from sensationalism as you can get.

This slim volume on the Battle of Britain—the attempt of the German Luftwaffe to achieve air superiority over southern England (and thus the English Channel) in the summer of 1940—is no exception, which makes me wonder whether the vaguely sensationalistic title was his publisher’s idea. The title isn’t inaccurate—the battle has acquired a veneer of myth, and Overy does peel it away by explaining, in his crisp and dispassionate way, what was really going on—but this isn’t, at its heart, a book about demythologization, much less iconoclasm. There were plans for a cross-channel invasion, he shows, but they were still in the conceptual stage, and regarded with extreme skepticism by German commanders. It’s not as if, had the Luftwaffe achieved its goals on Monday, the landing craft would have left Calais and Ostend on Wednesday. The fighter pilots of the Royal Air Force were, likewise, never as hard-pressed as popular memory makes them out to be. Attacks on British airfields were less common and less damaging than the legend suggests, RAF and Luftwaffe numbers were closer to parity, and RAF losses were made good more readily. The resolve that the RAF fighter pilots displayed, and the victory they won, were real, but the battle was not quite the “close-run thing” that popular history has remembered.

Overy spends most of the book laying out the details of what the battle was—the technology, the tactics, the ebb and flow of operations, and the strategic context that gave it meaning—with clarity and economy. It is there that the book’s (considerable) value lies. There are hundreds of books on the Battle of Britain, but Overy’s is the book I’d recommend to someone looking for an authoritative introduction or a brief update on historians now see it.

Richard Overy has made a habit of using impeccable research and clear-headed logic to bust many of the myths that have accrued to the history of the Second World War. 'Why the Allies Won' is still the definitive book on... well... why the allies won in WW2. This slim book (more of a long essay really) takes on the popular myths about the Battle of Britain and shoots them down. The book itself is a concise survey of the issues and historical questions surrounding the Battle, rather than a narrative of events and personalities. So for those looking for a book that captures all the drama and derring-do of the Battle may want to look elsewhere. However, I can't think of a better book than this one to understand why the Battle took place, why it folowed the course it did, why it ended, and its effect on Britain and the outcome of the War. ( )