The Spitfire relied on fuel manufactured on an island in the Caribbean. If the Germans had sent a U-boat to shell the refinery, it would have reduced the performance of the Spitfire. Luckily, they didn’t know about it.
I did not know Britain fought WWII by themselves.
The Spitfire was a great airplane but I liked the Hawker Typhoon as well.
The Spitfire was very short legged plane and so fragile (Seafire) it was withdrawn from Carrier operations as they crashed most of them on landing even before seeing Combat with the Japanese in 1944-45. They went with the Hellcat and Corsair instead. The US Army Air Force gave the Spitfire a try in 1943 and flipped many of them on landing due to the nature of the Brakes being so touchy and we returned them for US Models coming online.
Yet today, they are happily surrendering, without a fight, to Islam.
The Hawker Hurricane was overall a better plane and more rugged.
Britain didn’t win crap. They were in trouble, and we saved the day as usual.
The Spit was a great short range fighter but the P51 Mustang had much longer range, was faster, and many believed better armed with 6 50 cal. Brownings. The greatest thing about both aircraft was they shared the awesome Merlin engine. Their shared weakness was the Merlin’s liquid cooling.
The USA’s use of big, powerful radial engines(P47 Thunderbolt, F6F Hellcat, F4U Corsair)turned out to be the way to go in piston-powered fighters.
If you want to know what made it formidable try some other article. The article explains it is a great plane but never anything other than it feels great.
Always loved the Hurricane.
I hate Britain and anything from Britain. We fought a war to gain our freedom from British rule. Ever since that war, the Brits have worked to weaken the USA!!
I am not a hating man. But Frig” Britain and its ilk!!
Make no mistake. This media star is not riding in the spitfire version which helped Britain win the Battle of Britain, but in a much newer, more advanced version.
Also, although the spitfire takes most of the credit for the victory it was a relatively minor player compared to the plywood Hawker Hurricane.
Like the Mosquito it was made of wood. Not the scarce aluminum, wood. And, that meant all the skilled Brit cabinet makers could get a job making warplanes.
Great examples of making do with what you have.