Bootstrapping the Battle of Britain

Brennen Taylor Fagan; Ian Horwood; Niall James MacKay; Christopher Price; Edward Richards; Andrew James Wood

Bootstrapping the Battle of Britain

Brennen Taylor Fagan, Ian Horwood, Niall James MacKay, Christopher Price, Edward Richards, Andrew James Wood

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

The Battle of Britain is the focus of much historical controversy. We show here how the statistical technique of weighted bootstrapping can be used to create a new quantitative basis to help address such controversies. Bootstrapping facilitates the exploration of alternative campaign possibilities with different tactics. This results in comparative probabilities of “victory” for the actual and various counterfactual campaigns, providing a quantified assessment of the likelihood of German achievement of air superiority, thereby facilitating invasion. We find this more likely had the Luftwaffe targeted airfields more heavily, and greatly more likely had Germany brought forward its air campaign.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	151-186
Journal	The Journal of Military History
Volume	84
Issue number	1
Publication status	Published - Jan 2020

Bibliographical note

© [year], [owner]. This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. Further copying may not be permitted; contact the publisher for details

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© This is an author-produced version of the published paper. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self-archiving policy. Further copying may not be permitted; contact the publisher for details
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Niall MacKay
- niall.mackayyork.acuk
- Mathematics - Professor
Person: Academic

1 Invited talk

Bootstrapping the Battle of Britain
Fagan, B. (Invited speaker) & Horwood, I. (Invited speaker)
5 Nov 2021
Activity: Talk or presentation › Invited talk

Cite this

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title = "Bootstrapping the Battle of Britain",

abstract = "The Battle of Britain is the focus of much historical controversy. We show here how the statistical technique of weighted bootstrapping can be used to create a new quantitative basis to help address such controversies. Bootstrapping facilitates the exploration of alternative campaign possibilities with different tactics. This results in comparative probabilities of “victory” for the actual and various counterfactual campaigns, providing a quantified assessment of the likelihood of German achievement of air superiority, thereby facilitating invasion. We find this more likely had the Luftwaffe targeted airfields more heavily, and greatly more likely had Germany brought forward its air campaign.",

author = "Fagan, {Brennen Taylor} and Ian Horwood and MacKay, {Niall James} and Christopher Price and Edward Richards and Wood, {Andrew James}",

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year = "2020",

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language = "English",

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pages = "151--186",

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AU - Horwood, Ian

AU - MacKay, Niall James

AU - Price, Christopher

AU - Richards, Edward

AU - Wood, Andrew James

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N2 - The Battle of Britain is the focus of much historical controversy. We show here how the statistical technique of weighted bootstrapping can be used to create a new quantitative basis to help address such controversies. Bootstrapping facilitates the exploration of alternative campaign possibilities with different tactics. This results in comparative probabilities of “victory” for the actual and various counterfactual campaigns, providing a quantified assessment of the likelihood of German achievement of air superiority, thereby facilitating invasion. We find this more likely had the Luftwaffe targeted airfields more heavily, and greatly more likely had Germany brought forward its air campaign.

AB - The Battle of Britain is the focus of much historical controversy. We show here how the statistical technique of weighted bootstrapping can be used to create a new quantitative basis to help address such controversies. Bootstrapping facilitates the exploration of alternative campaign possibilities with different tactics. This results in comparative probabilities of “victory” for the actual and various counterfactual campaigns, providing a quantified assessment of the likelihood of German achievement of air superiority, thereby facilitating invasion. We find this more likely had the Luftwaffe targeted airfields more heavily, and greatly more likely had Germany brought forward its air campaign.

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VL - 84

SP - 151

EP - 186

JO - The Journal of Military History

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ER -

Bootstrapping the Battle of Britain

Abstract

Bibliographical note

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Niall MacKay

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Bootstrapping the Battle of Britain

Cite this