The Battle of Britain showed that the British were well prepared as once the British attacked the bombers instead of the fighters, they were destroying many more German planes. This led to the Germans losing more planes than the British. The British pulled together again and started producing 563 planes per month meaning on September 17th, the Germans called off their invasions.
The British were very efficient in taking care of Operation Sealion. This meant that they were well prepared as is suggested by source F which shows that the strong GHQ line would have held off the Germans coming to the South East Coast from the Channel and the reinforcements around London would have stopped the Germans from taking the city. There was also a large line on the East of England to make sure the Germans couldn’t attack the industrial parts. Source C defends this as it shows that Merchant Taylor’s “grew before long” showing that the armies were merging into a “Home Guard Platoon” indicating that they were expanding.
General Ironside organised as large defence scheme and Merchant Taylor’s adapted and took on these schemes. Source A shows that the school had “special trapdoors” and “air raid alarms” indicating that they knew what to do in emergencies and “everyone” was in the “OTC” showing that it was a large effort in which everybody could help. Source B shows that Merchant Taylor’s had “goal posts”, “sandbags…anti-tank ditches and pill-boxes” to stop the Germans again reinforcing the idea that they were well prepared. The pillboxes were also efficient in that they could shoot down many people and could withstand an eight inch shell.
However, Britain was also not prepared for the war.
In terms of the civilian precautions, many gas masks were actually making people sicker and the evacuation went wrong in that people were sent to the wrong places. Although Britain had a Dad’s Army, it was actually said to be ineffective showing that they did not prepare their volunteers enough.
The Battle of Dunkirk was also a disaster as they were very lucky not to all be killed and they also lost most of their weapons as shown by source 11 indicating that people were “deserted” and very “dispirited”.
The Battle of Britain gave a clear indication Britain were not well prepared. The British pilots had a lack of training and were also much lazier than the German pilots who were training a lot. The Germans trained 800 pilots per month and the British only 200 a month. The Germans planes were also much quicker and so the British would find it hard to intercept them.
Britain’s victory was very much down to luck. The fact that Goerin changed from attacking the radar stations to aircraft factories allowed the British to get back on their feet.
From the Merchant Taylor’s Sources, we can see that they were unprepared as Source A shows they were “such youngsters” suggesting they were very inexperienced and would be no match to a trained German army. It also says that they were “very lucky” backing up the last paragraph which suggests that they actually were not prepared. Source B indicates that they lost their “Enfield’s” and also shows how the “Dad’s Army” were inexperienced and much unprepared as they were firing with “drainpipe and lemonade”. Source C shows that they had a “single line” of wire suggesting it was useless against a German army. Source H states that the British lost focus and went “pill-box mad” and shows how they were “wasting money”. Source G says that the pillboxes had “no concealed escape” sowing that death was certain and you could not live for very long in one. Although Source F shows that the British had a strong line on the East of the country, there was not much at all on the west suggesting that they were not prepared to be attacked from anywhere else and if they were to be attacked, they may have lost.
Overall, I believe that Britain was not well prepared for the invasion. The Battle of Dunkirk was an early sign to show how unprepared they were as they were slow and also lost most of their equipment there. The Battle of Britain showed how the pilots and planes were not up to standard compared to the Germans. The victory seemed to be down to a lot of luck from a single bad call from the German general. The Merchant Taylor’s Sources also suggest that they were inexperienced and could not have stood up to a German Army. However, there are also some signs which would have shown they were ready for invasion such as the fact that the Germans could not have destroyed the Royal Navy or Air Force and so the British were prepared already as the Germans couldn’t have defeated the British. The fact that the British won shows that they were prepared and the sources give suggestions that many precautions were taken to make them well prepared.