I guess I have to stand up for the Spit. Would Britain still survive the BoB without it? Yes. Would Britain still win the war (with US and Soviet help, of course)? Yes. Would Britain do just fine in the Pacific without it? Yup.
But the Spit was an amazing airplane with almost mystical development potential and amenable to just about any single-seat fighter role expect for long range escort and long range intrusion. The Hurricane did not have this potential and was approaching obsolecence by 1942. The Typhoon had serious teething troubles and neither it, nor the Typhoon, were nearly as versatile as the Spit. The Whirlwind, for how great it looked, would have been a poor man's substitute for the P-38. And regarding the alternatives mentioned previously, one can only speculate if any of them would have any good. Martin-Baker did have an outstanding fighter (MB-5) that came out late in the war, but this could have been butterflied away in a world withoutt the Spitfire.
Speaking of the P-38, it is worth noting that the Spitfire was the only British-designed aircraft flown in large numbers by the USAAF. With the ability of the US aircraft industry to crank out P-47s, P-51s, Hellcats, Corsairs, etc, it say a lot that - even as a temporary measure - the Americans flew Spits in large numbers.
I think the real result of "no spitfire" would have been the much earlier decline of the British aircraft industry and the earlier large scale adoption of US fighters. In the absence of the Spitfire, the Mustang would almost certainly become the standard high-performance British fighter, and this might have set the stage for the Air Ministry to order and purchase many more P-47s, Hellcats and Corsairs, etc rather than spend effort developing domestic single seat fighters - when the real interest was in heavy night bombers anyway
But the Spit was an amazing airplane with almost mystical development potential and amenable to just about any single-seat fighter role expect for long range escort and long range intrusion. The Hurricane did not have this potential and was approaching obsolecence by 1942. The Typhoon had serious teething troubles and neither it, nor the Typhoon, were nearly as versatile as the Spit. The Whirlwind, for how great it looked, would have been a poor man's substitute for the P-38. And regarding the alternatives mentioned previously, one can only speculate if any of them would have any good. Martin-Baker did have an outstanding fighter (MB-5) that came out late in the war, but this could have been butterflied away in a world withoutt the Spitfire.
Speaking of the P-38, it is worth noting that the Spitfire was the only British-designed aircraft flown in large numbers by the USAAF. With the ability of the US aircraft industry to crank out P-47s, P-51s, Hellcats, Corsairs, etc, it say a lot that - even as a temporary measure - the Americans flew Spits in large numbers.
I think the real result of "no spitfire" would have been the much earlier decline of the British aircraft industry and the earlier large scale adoption of US fighters. In the absence of the Spitfire, the Mustang would almost certainly become the standard high-performance British fighter, and this might have set the stage for the Air Ministry to order and purchase many more P-47s, Hellcats and Corsairs, etc rather than spend effort developing domestic single seat fighters - when the real interest was in heavy night bombers anyway