Really... From June 1940 to February 1941 the Luftwaffe Fw200 units alone sank 365,000 tons of Allied shipping.
They
claimed 365,000 tons of shipping. How much did thy actually sink?
The Luftwaffe sank, crippled or damaged about 300 vessels of varying size in the 10 days in and around Operation Dynamo (Dunkirk).
British and French loss numbers for Dynamo vary but are between 225 and 260 ships, with another 20 or so heavily damaged enough to put them out of action and a further 20-50 damaged. Most of the losses (around 160-180) were small, non-naval ships.
Of the 49 destroyers in action (French, British and Dutch), nine were sunk, 19 damaged (with five put totally out of action for several months). Of the other 150 or so actual combat Royal Navy vessels, the major losses was in trawlers and minesweepers.
Losses were not to aircraft alone. There E-boats and U-boat attacks with both torpedoes and mines, accounting for four of the nine destroyer losses.
I don't count Dynamo as a particular success for the Luftwaffe. Over 10 days of attacks, against mostly static and unarmed targets operating without major air cover, they (and the Kriegsmarine) managed to sink a combined total of 35-38 surface combatant warships - including nine destroyers - and put another 30-40 out of action.
Sealion what-ifs are a running joke on a number of alternate history and WW2 aviation boards, and for a good reason.
