Britain Alone

The Battle of Britain

• Hitler suggests Britain gives up and leave Europe in Nazi Hands

• Churchill vows to never surrender

The Battle of Britain

• Hitler needed to invade before winter– Had to conquer England before the U.S.

entered the war

• Operation Sea Lion- Germans cross the channel into England

• Germany needed to control the skies to be successful

The Battle of Britain

• Britain prepares to defend themselves

• Goering’s war birds exaggerate their success so Germany starts day bombings of British industrial centers.

• He then orders the blitz on London

Blitz on London

The Battle of Britain

• Germans used delayed action bombs– British formed UXB squads

• Battle of Britain comes to a close-Oct. 31, 1940– Did not completely end– Britain needed to be on guard until the end of the

war– Was a disastrous defeat for the Luftwaffe

Battle of Britain

• Winston Churchill:

• “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”

War Beneath the Waves

• Winston Churchill: “The only thing that really frightened me during the war was the U-boat peril.”

War Beneath the Waves

• Germany had many bases along the Northern Coast of Europe

• Used wolfpacks

• Allied losses were staggering

• President Roosevelt starts the Lend-Lease Program

War Beneath the Waves

• Used sonar or asdic as the British called it

• Germans invented Pillenwerfer– Shot small gas bubbles which returned a

ping and confused the sonar

• Also used radar• German Bismark was a feared ship

The Balkans

• Hungary and Romania joined the Axis

• Hitler takes over Bulgaria

• Mussolini (Il Duce) invades in Greece

• Greece reluctant to ask for British troops because fear Hitler will invade– End up asking for British assistance

The Balkans

• The Greeks surrender and British retreat to island of Crete

• Hitler also invades Yugoslavia and takes them over

The Strange Mission of Rudolf Hess

• Fled to Scotland on May 10, 1941

• Thought he could bring peace between Germany and Britain