The Battle of Britain

David Mundell Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd September 2025 Westminster Hall

[David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con)]

The Dumfriesshire town of Moffat, which I have the privilege of representing and of living in, has a close association with a number of famous people. But few of our notable local sons or daughters had such a profound influence on the future of the United Kingdom as Hugh Dowding, who was born on 24 April 1882 and whose leadership of RAF Fighter Command during the battle of Britain was decisive, as we heard from my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith), in defending the nation from both air attack and invasion by Hitler’s Nazi armies. It was during those summer and early autumn months of 1940 that the struggle for what was literally the survival of our nation was fought and ultimately decided.

Central to that fight were the character, leadership and effective tactics of Air Vice-Marshal Hugh Dowding. The later Lord Dowding was not a flamboyant man. He was pragmatic, and a believer in meticulous planning. Having served during world war one and thereafter joined the RAF, he made his mark during the 1930s as a member of the Air Council for Supply and Research, as a firm believer that research and development was essential. He argued for adequate funding for research, knowing that the days of the biplane were numbered, and pushed for development of faster, advanced fighter aircraft. This initiative is largely credited with the development of the legendary Hurricane and Spitfire aircraft, which were ordered into production in 1934, and which would go on to play such an iconic and pivotal role in the Battle of Britain.

Dowding showed enormous interest in emerging technology connected to the detection of enemy aircraft, and threw his support behind radio direction finding equipment, which again was central to victory in the skies over Britain in 1940. The foresight and determination to match emerging advanced aircraft and technologies with new, effective tactics led to the creation of what would become known as the Dowding system, which the hon. Member for Tewkesbury referenced in his opening remarks. That was an innovative air defence network, which integrated radar stations, ground observers and a centralised command structure. For the first time in history, an air force could see incoming attacks, track them in real time, and direct interception with precision. The new system meant that Britain, with its smaller number of aircraft, could resist the numerically far superior Luftwaffe, leaving German pilots often astonished at how swiftly RAF pilots appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, to disrupt their formations.

However, Dowding’s enthusiasm for new equipment, technologies and tactics was matched by an equally important human quality: his commitment to the principle that preserving trained men was as vital as preserving machines. He rotated squadrons to rest them; made full use, as we have heard, of pilots from across the Commonwealth, occupied Europe and even the United States; and was deeply moved by the sacrifice of his young airmen. Behind what was undoubtedly a reserved demeanour, he was deeply concerned for the wellbeing of his pilots and all his men, even speaking in later years of feeling their presence after death.

[Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con)]

It is a fact that partly because of the great efforts of Lord Beaverbrook overseeing aircraft production, we never ran out of aircraft in the battle—but we very nearly ran out of pilots. So does my right hon. Friend agree with me that part of Dowding’s genius was generating enough pilots and then taking sufficient care of them so that we won?

[David Mundell]

I absolutely agree with my right hon. Friend. Dowding was someone who valued the trained individual and who really stood up for his men.

From a number of excellent contributions we have heard Churchill’s assessment of the battle of Britain, in which he paid tribute to the courage of the RAF fighter pilots whose defence of our skies delivered both victory and the survival of our country. However, it is perhaps the more unvarnished estimation of an opposing protagonist that pays the most compelling tribute to Dowding. Following the battle of Britain, Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt commanded German forces in the west and had been involved in planning the invasion of Britain which was ultimately cancelled after the battle of Britain. During interrogation by the allies, the Field Marshal was asked at what point during the course of the war he had seen the tide turning against Germany—was it Stalingrad, Leningrad or El Alamein?

“Oh no,”

replied von Rundstedt,

“it was the Battle of Britain.”

That was the first time he realised that the Nazis were not invincible.

That shattering of progress towards what was seemingly an inevitable Nazi victory was down to the courage of the young pilots who fought and died in the skies over Britain in 1940, and their memory must always be honoured; but the vital contribution made by the son of a schoolmaster from Moffat should also be remembered. The quiet determination of Hugh Dowding, which gave those pilots the tools, the system and the strategy to succeed, was central to winning the battle of Britain and ensuring the survival of a nation and the freedom and liberty we enjoy today.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Francois]

The whole House is grateful to my right hon. Friend for that very telling intervention. While I have the opportunity, I pay tribute to his marvellous speech and, more than that, to the wonderful service of his father, of whom he can be immensely proud.

Also fundamental were the RAF commanders, principally Air Chief Marshal Sir Keith Park, who famously commanded 11 Group, which bore the brunt of the battle. Park, a New Zealander, displayed tactical brilliance in the husbanding of his squadrons, while also fighting a highly aggressive and effective defence.

Overall, however, perhaps the greatest single contribution to victory was that of the leader of Fighter Command throughout the battle, Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding. As well as being a pilot, Dowding was keenly interested in scientific development, which he pursued zealously when promoted to the Air Council in 1930, with responsibility for supply and research. That critical appointment was to have profound consequences for the subsequent conduct of the battle a decade later, as several right hon. Members have alluded to.

Dowding had three great attributes that materially contributed to the RAF’s victory. First, he possessed tremendous foresight. Like Churchill, he realised very early on that Nazi Germany and its nascent air force would one day provide a potentially fatal threat to Britain’s security, and he began to plan accordingly.

Secondly, Dowding’s genius—I use the word deliberately —was that he conceptualised years in advance the battle that the RAF would have to fight. He then used his new appointment enthusiastically to pull together multiple strands of scientific development, crucially including Watson-Watt’s experiments with radar, to create a highly resilient defensive system.

In May 1937, Dowding presciently delivered a lecture to the air staff regarding the air defence of Great Britain, in which the scenario he outlined was one of a war with a European dictator—the inference was obvious —attempting to starve Britain into submission by the aggressive use of submarines, but not before the United Kingdom had been subjected to an all-out assault designed to destroy the RAF and cripple the nation’s ability to make war, by remorseless attack from the air.

As head of the newly created Fighter Command from July 1936, Dowding went on to create a command and control network alerted by radar, all feeding into Fighter Command headquarters at RAF Bentley Priory, and supported by an organisation of group and sector headquarters designed to co-ordinate timely fighter interception of incoming German aircraft. That was all interconnected by a system of telephone and, later, teleprinter communications. The historian and operational analyst Stephen Bungay, in his brilliant book, “The Most Dangerous Enemy”, describes that system as “the world’s first intranet”, albeit an analogue version, half a century before Tim Berners-Lee. Critically, the Dowding system, as it became known, allowed the RAF to make best use of its resources in combating an enemy that frequently outnumbered it three, or even four, to one.

Thirdly, Dowding possessed tremendous moral courage in dealing with superiors, up to and including Churchill. The epic 1969 movie “The Battle of Britain”, with its all-star cast, opens with the Dowding letter of 16 May 1940, which my right hon. Friend the Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) referred to. In it, Dowding famously argued the need to conserve Britain’s fighter strength during the fall of France. As he trenchantly put it,

“if the Home Defence Force is drained away in desperate attempts to remedy the situation in France, defeat in France will involve the final, complete and irremediable defeat of this country.”

In Dowding, Britain possessed a commander with an absolutely single-minded determination to prepare meticulously for, to fight and then to win the battle, for which his pilots, whom he referred to affectionately as “my boys”, held him in particular reverence. His truly was the controlling mind that orchestrated the ultimately successful defence of these islands.

Like many commanders before him, Dowding was a maverick, but he was not an extrovert. He was socially awkward, which led to his nickname “Stuffy”. He never suffered fools gladly, and his manner could be abrupt, even when dealing with superiors, which ultimately led to his downfall. Nevertheless, he was a man utterly dedicated to his task, and one to whom history owes an immense debt. Arguably, had Dowding never been born we might even have lost the battle, as we would undoubtedly have been far less well prepared to fight it.

[David Mundell]

My right hon. Friend will be pleased to know that this Saturday, at his birthplace in Moffat, a bust of the then Lord Dowding will be unveiled alongside a replica Spitfire, and that his former home has been turned into sheltered housing accommodation for RAF personnel, known as Dowding House.

[Mr Francois]

I am sure that I speak for the whole House in saying that that is entirely appropriate.

James Holland, in his excellent book “The Battle of Britain: Five Months that changed History”, highlights the fact that the Luftwaffe made multiple mistakes in the campaign, but nevertheless concludes:

“This should not detract from the achievement of the RAF in the summer of 1940. Had it not had such a superb defensive system and had it not had such inspired and brilliant leaders, the Luftwaffe would still have prevailed, no matter how valiant or skillful the pilots.”

To conclude myself, the importance of winning the battle of Britain cannot be overstated. Had the RAF lost and had Hitler successfully invaded these islands, the whole history of the world thereafter would have been brutally different. Put another way, the debate today would not be taking place and there would be no Parliament or House of Commons for it to take place in. The Royal Air Force, as a service, can rightly be proud of the immense contribution it made in the battle of Britain to the defence of democracy, not just in the United Kingdom, but across the free world. The pilots whom Churchill famously christened “the few” have a special place in the annals of history, but so do the very few who so brilliantly commanded them to victory. We honour all of them today.