Britains secret weapon during the Battle of Britain

[Danny42C]

diginagain (#15),

From the "Battle of the Atlantic" [Wiki]:

..."In essence, the Battle of the Atlantic was a tonnage war: the Allied struggle to supply Britain and the Axis attempt to stem the flow of merchant shipping that enabled Britain to keep fighting"...

and.."

From June until October 1940, over 270 Allied ships were sunk: this period was referred to by U-boat crews as "the Happy Time" ("Die Glückliche Zeit").[29] Churchill would later write: "...the only thing that ever frightened me during the war was the U-boat peril"...

I believe that at this time, the Navy had its back to the wall, as tonnage was being sunk faster than it could be replaced...

Any notion that the Navy could divert ships to combat a cross channel invasion without air supremacy is fanciful, Later experience (Malaya ?) showed what happens when surface vessels without air support come within range of a land based enemy air force.

None of this diminishes the heroism of the RN, and of the merchant seamen, which (IMHO) has never been properly acknowledged.
Danny..