Hitler spent much less time than the British supposed contemplating the Luftwaffe’s operations against them. He never visited its airfields on the Channel coast. Instead, for most of the autumn and winter he was wrestling with his fundamental strategic dilemma: whether to consolidate Germany’s western victories and invade Britain in 1941, or instead to follow his strongest inclinations and turn east. On 31 July 1940, long before the Luftwaffe attack on Britain reached its climax, at the Berghof he told his generals of his determination to attack Russia the following May.
