Originally Posted by
pr00ne
friartuck,
Do your own googling and book buying! There are a fair few books and articles that claim that even if the Luftwaffe had gained air superiority over Southern England the RN would still have wiped out the invasion fleet.
They may well claim that, but the destruction of HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse, as well as the severe damage caused to the Mediterranean Fleet during the evacuation of British and Commonwealth forces from Crete offer a salutary lesson in what happens to navies without air cover. The defeat of Fighter Command would have rendered the RN (Home Fleet?) without that protection and just as vulnerable to attack and destruction as those I've mentioned. The relative proximity of the Luftwaffe's airfields in Northern France and Belgium would have meant a high sortie rate that, coupled with the relatively confined waters of the Channel, would have made life for the RN hell. I don't doubt it would have fought as bravely as anywhere else, and it would have had an impact on any invasion attempt, but its neutralisation, if not actual destruction was highly likely and that may well have been before it could impede an invasion force. The Kanalkampf part of the Battle is instructive; it saw severe losses of shipping moving through the Channel such that the RN cancelled them, and that was when Fighter Command was there to protect the ships.
It's worth noting too that the Kriegsmarine was a force to contend with, as it demonstrated to the RN regularly from 14 October 1939 until at least mid-1943, and would almost certainly have contributed to the neutralisation or destruction of the RN with its combination of submarines, fast attack craft and world-class major surface units (Bismark, et al). Of course, the Kriegsmarine would also have been protected by Luftwaffe fighters, reducing its vulnerability to our bombers, which would in turn have suffered high attrition, reducing the number available to support ground forces after a landing in the UK.
As a force in being, the RN would certainly have figured in the Nazi's calculations, but anyone suggesting it won the Battle of Britain does so without a serious understanding of the vulnerability of the naval forces of the era to air power.