(1) 8–18 August. Mass, large-scale daytime raids. Hundreds of planes take part, up to 1,000 daily. That number was recorded on 15 August. The attack is not concentrated on one or several major points, but is spread in short bursts over many localities and cities.

(2) 19–25 August. A lull. Minor daytime raids. Few planes in each raid. Scattered attacks. The Germans seem to be searching for and preparing something new.

(3) 26 August to the present day. Raids by day and by night. The daytime raids bring fewer planes than in the first phase, but they are more concentrated and focused. The Germans mainly target the London–Dover–Portland triangle. Their main objectives are ports, airfields, industrial facilities and railways – all in this area. They are obviously paving the way for an invasion. The attacks are frequent, several times a day. At night very few machines fly over England, especially over London. But they go round and round in circles for several hours on end and occasionally drop bombs. This is evidently a form of ‘psychological attack’ against the broad masses of the population. So far the night raids have not made a major impression on the English.

Of course, this is not the end. We’ll see what happens next.

[The ‘Battle of Britain’ was the prelude to Operation Sealion, the plan for the invasion of Britain earmarked for mid-September. It was adopted in Berchtesgaden on 31 July by the naval and army chiefs, who, however, had serious reservations over what seemed to be insurmountable obstacles.

A brilliant analysis is in W. Murray, Strategy for Defeat: The Luftwaffe 1935–1945 (Princeton, 2002). See also R. Overy, The Battle of Britain: The myth and the reality (London, 2002).

Greatly impressed by the public spirit and resilience displayed by the residents of London, Maisky had become convinced ‘that Great Britain will not be invaded by the German army, and that by next year she will be superior in the air … the air raids in Great Britain will dwindle, and air raids in Germany and her occupied territories will increase in destruction and effect’. He was further convinced that Britain would preserve its stronghold in the Mediterranean, but he could not see how she could possibly dislodge the Germans from the territories they had gained in Europe.

The two alternatives he saw then were a negotiated peace or for Great Britain to become ‘a socialised community, not necessarily on the Soviet model, but practically emancipated from capitalism and landlord control. There could be a real and lasting Soviet and British pact to free Europe from Hitler’s dominance.’

Webb, diary, 31 Aug. 1940, pp. 6954, 6958–9.

These views certainly were not in conformity with Stalin’s outlook – to which Maisky was not privy – of extending the Ribbentrop–Molotov Pact to cover the Balkans and bring the war to an end, with the Soviet Union and Germany sharing dominance in Europe.

This argument is developed at length in Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion.

]