Easily the most interesting explication of the Battle of Britain that I have read, and I have read many. Superb throughout. COL (ret) Tom Pool

The Battle of Britain stands out among the long list of military clashes for a number of reasons. A struggle for air superiority over the skies of southern England, it was the first battle ever waged entirely in the skies. By successfully holding off the Luftwaffe's aerial onslaught, the British forestalled an invasion in 1940, guaranteeing that the Germans would face a two-front war when Hitler focused the Nazi war machine on the Soviet Union the following year.

Many accounts of the battle have been written, from memoirs by the pilots to narratives from academic historians. In this respect Stephen Bungay's qualifications stand out; a former business consultant and insurance executive, he brings a different approach to examining the conflict. Taking the fall of France as his starting point, he intersperses his narrative of the battle (which is largely free of the management jargon that might be expected given his background) with chapters examining various factors in the struggle, from the performances of the planes deployed to the command structures of the two sides. Here he draws upon both his training and his command of German to provide a more balanced assessment of the two sides. What emerges is a provocative argument that the German effort was hopeless, requiring exhausted pilots to achieve statistically unrealistic ratios of combat victories in conditions that favored their opponents.

Such an unusual conclusion might fly in the face of the mythology surrounding the famous "Few", yet Bungay's analysis is persuasive in marshaling the numbers to prove its point. Combined with a thorough summary of the campaign, it makes this book the best overview of the Battle of Britain. If there is a flaw, it lies in Bungay's rather narrow scope of study, as he only takes into account events from the 1930s onward and largely overlooks the many studies of the "first Battle of Britain" that could have shed light on many of the attitudes participants brought to the campaign. Yet this is a minor flaw in what is otherwise an excellent study of a pivotal struggle of the Second World War.

If you want a book that neatly summarizes the details of the Battle of Britain, this is it. Bungay tells you about the tactics, the planes, the men beyond the respective forces, and everything pertinent to the story. Just a fabulous telling of the story.

History is boring. This book was not. That accomplishment is certainly no easy task. The author provides considerable detail from the fighting participant's, the politician's, the military leader-strategist's and the non-participant's perspective with his genuine British wit. I appreciate Steven Bungay's objective to tell the "whole" story without the legends and myths. And thanks for making me use the dictionary again.