How significant a role did Britain play in the war against Germany, 1939-45?

Authors Avatar

 How significant a role did Britain play in the war against Germany, 1939-45?

On the 3rd September 1939, Britain declared war on Germany after they invaded Poland because Britain and France had made an agreement to defend Poland from a German attack. Despite this declaration of war, Britain and France did very little to defend Poland and no combat by the French or British took place for nine months to follow. This period of time was nicknamed the ‘Phoney War’. In April 1940, the Germans invaded Norway; Britain attempted to defend Norway but after their defeat, Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister was forced to resign; Winston Spencer Churchill was appointed Prime Minister and formed a National Government. On the 10th June 1940, France was invaded and defeated by Italian-German forces; this resulted in Britain being alone against GermanY.

Germany came up with a plan to invade Britain called ‘Operation Sealion’ because Churchill refused to negotiate with the Germans. For this plan to work the German Luftwaffe would have to have air superiority. The Luftwaffe had an advantage over the RAF of 2300 more aircraft overall, but they had an equal number of fighter planes. Also, the fighter planes from Germany could only spend 30 minutes over South-East England before having to return to refuel, this sometimes resulted in Bombers being left behind and then destroyed by British fighter planes and anti-aircraft weaponry. This period of time was called the Battle of Britain, as Britain fought alone to keep the Germans from invading. Before the war had started, Britain had developed radar in which meant the British knew when Luftwaffe formations were on their way, giving them time to prepare and get their planes in the air when needed, cutting down fuel waste as there was no need to patrol the skies. Despite this, the RAF bases were badly damaged and it seemed that the Germans would win, but this changed when on the 7th September, Hitler ordered German bombers and start bomb London instead. This meant the RAF had time to recover and then a week later the RAF attacked a large Luftwaffe formation coming over London, resulting in a loss of sixty aircraft for the Luftwaffe. The Germans, stopped raiding London in the day time and only continued to do so at night, meaning that the RAF had maintain air superiority over Britain and that ‘Operation Sealion’ had failed.

Join now!

The British victory of the Battle of Britain was crucial, otherwise D-Day could never have taken place and the Russians would have been fighting the Germans alone. Another reason for why the British victory was so crucial was because if it had not been the case and the Germans had succeeded with Operation Sealion, the Americans could never have got involved in Europe as they would have nowhere to base themselves and attack from.

In 1941 the Germans started targeting British cross-Atlantic trade routes in an attempt to push Britain out the war by restricting its resources. Germany used U-Boats ...

This is a preview of the whole essay

Here's what a star student thought of this essay

Avatar

I query some of the essay's grammar and punctuation and I just found one typo. Whilst all this is nothing major and should not affect the grade the student gets (more so the mark in that grade bracket), it should be avoided as every mark counts towards the final grade obtained. The technical terms used very appropriate and were integrated well into the essay. The essay has been written to a high standard and the student follows the typical convention for the layout of the essay at GCSE level.

The student demonstrates a clear understanding to the level of analysis needed in the essay. They link their points well and although the argument may be 'hazy' in one or two areas, the argument guides the essay well. This gave way to a clear structure which made it easier to follow the argument. The judgement made came to no surprise when reading the conclusion, demonstrating the fluency of the argument and essay throughout. Whilst there were areas where I disagreed with the student, it was only natural to do so and for GCSE level, the student doesn't need to consider historiography and debate. The high level of detail was used very well to support the points that the student made which was excellent.

A well written response to the question; the student clearly understands the facts involved with the war. The argument, whilst not always explicit, is evident in the answer and is very well consolidated in the conclusion. The student is very good with picking out the importance of Britain's involvement and reasoning why. Above this, they highlight a key factor to the war (America's contribution) as an alternative and opens up the essay very well. The introduction sets the scene well for the essay, although I would avoid giving such a lengthy narrative to start off, but this is not too much of an issue here.