Horse 1014 - Their Finest Hour

"...if the British Empire and its Commonwealth lasts for a thousand years, men will still say, 'This was their finest hour."
- Sir Winston Churchill

One of the many things I constantly find of forums and the like, is the ill-conceived notion that Britain was unable to defend itself in WW2. Or perhaps more succinctly (and usually as an exact quote) "we saved your ass in WW2". I don't doubt the contribution that the US made in turning the tide of the war, but the theory that the USA "saved" Britain from Nazi Germany is materially nonsense when you look at the events in sequence.

The Battle of Britain which began on the 10th of July 1940, was really as a result of a serious of hideous defeats and pullouts by the British. France had surrendered on June 22, and this more or less led to what Hitler had wanted, his "Fortress Europe", however one thing stood in his way... England. As the order from Hitler himself said:

"Since England, despite its militarily hopeless situation, still has not shown any signs of being prepared to negotiate, I have decided to prepare a landing operation against England and, if necessary, carry it out. The objective of this operation is to eliminate the English home country as a base for the continuation of the war against Germany..."
- Adolf Hitler

Now whilst I don't intend to look at the actual air battle itself (which is the subject of making many books to which there is no end, and much study wearies the body) the key dates are worth noting.

The Battle of Britain ran from 10 Jul 1940 to 31 Oct 1940. The United States itself had a series of Neutrality Acts which prevented US troops or citizens from fighting in overseas conflicts.
The counter-claim always invariably put forward is "what about Lend-Lease?", again, what about it? Lend-Lease didn't come into existence until the Lend-Lease Act of 11 March 1941, some 5 months after the Battle of Britain. How can a program possibly help or even save anyone's "ass" after the event?

The truth is that when Britain was standing on its own against the German War Machine, it was doing precisely that. This fortress built by nature for herself, against infection and the hand of war, this blessed plot, this realm, this land, this England, stood firm; nobody "saved" it but England herself.