Madam, – Into the Storm, shown recently on TV, was a considerable coup for Brendan Gleeson. A great Irishman acting the part of a great Englishman, Winston Churchill.
The story resurrects the questions: why did Hitler not wipe out the British army at Dunkirk and why did he not invade England in 1940 when the country was at his mercy? No one will ever know the true answer to these questions. Why did Hitler choose defeat at Stalingrad, instead of a possible victory at Moscow? Perhaps fate or destiny, or some other greater force guides these things.
It is a carefully concocted myth that the RAF frightened Hitler so much that he had second thoughts about an invasion when he looked across the English Channel from Calais. At that time, the RAF could not have prevented a fleet of rowing boats from crossing, never mind the German army. Nevertheless, these brave young “Knights of the Sky” were the sons of the ruling classes and it had to be proven that they were heroes who saved England. It would never have done had the factory workers; the miners; the postmen; the taxi drivers and all the other common folk who answered the call been credited with saving the nation.
The spindoctors of the time did a good job; even to this day the people of England believe the fairytale that the RAF, a bunch of well-bred adverturers, stopped Hitler in his tracks. – Yours, etc,