"Many" could reach 500mph? Later models of He-111 could just reach about 240mph when light and in good conditions, otherwise they were normally flying around 190mph. The Ju-88 had a top speed of around 320 mph.

Oops, I mixed up my metric and imperial... updated accordingly.

Quantity is a quality all its own.

"getting into cannon range for the typhoons means flying through the German fighter formation" I dunno they could ascend and come at them from above, and then come from behind. The typhoon can go up to a max speed of 2125kph, and go to a max altitude of 65000 ft and could probably safely outrun and outclimb anything the turned off the bombing run before THEY could get into cannon range (which is about half or less of the typhoon iirc) But I do really like this answer. They'd still be hard pressed to take down all of them

It's only a "kill zone" if they can hit them. You need to lead whatever you're firing at, which means you need to predict how fast they're going and in what direction. The gunners have practised shooting Spitfires and Hurricanes. They have literally never seen anything like a jet fighter. Their chances of hitting anything are really, really low.

@Graham - Never seen anything like a modern jet fighter, perhaps. Depending on when in the war they came from, they may have seen ME-262s (first jet-powered flight in 1942, introduced into service 1944).

@DaveSherohman The question says 1940, so nope. But even if they knew jet planes existed, the ME-262 is quite a different beast to modern fighters, and they probably wouldn't have any training or experience shooting down even ME-262s anyway.

@Luaan - Ah, how did I miss the specific date being mentioned? Good catch.

@Nuclear03020704 if 2500 aircraft appear in their airspace, they will scramble everything they can, reenactment aircraft or not, that is an invasion force.

@Graham I don't expect any single JU-88 to have a decent chance of hitting the thing, but I suspect dozens of them lighting up the sky are likely to hit the thing through sheer luck. I seem to recall the US lost a stealth bomber in Iraq just by flying over way too many guys with machine guns. Even if that does not happen though... the issue of time vs firepower is still likely to prevail.

Even if the planes in question are only flying at, say 200 mph = 320 km/h, the problem remains that they'll only take about 20 minutes to reach London and start dropping bombs. 20 minutes from which all delays need to be subtracted. There won't be as much as 15 minutes fighting time, more likely less than 10. And those 10 minutes are squarely above populated areas where people may be very unhappy when a plane is torn to pieces above their heads and falls down in big chunks.

As noted by others the Bomber's wouldn't couldn't fly at their max (factory) speeds. Firstly for bombers carrying a full bomb load they'd be too heavy. Secondly max speed dramatically burns through fuel at a prodigious rate so they'd never get back to base. Thirdly the engines would start to overheat after only a few minutes. So there were very good reasons WW2 bombers cruised along at 180-200 mph - it was as fast as they could go and have a hope of getting home. They certainly didn't dawdle because they were enjoying the view! If they could have done 350 mph to London & back they would have.

@Aethenosity For board cannon use, fighters always want to come from behind. That's where they are not subject to fire and have the best chance to aim at a virtually unmoving target. And the typhoons will have zero problem at getting behind the slow, sluggish WW2 bombers. What modern fighters may have trouble with, is going slow enough to provide sufficient firing time. But I guess, they would simply use an insane angle of attack and rely on the power of their engine to keep them aloft. So, they will be coming from behind and below at the squadron to get the bombers in front of their cannons.

I would expect that any WWII era fighter that witnessed things traveling at modern speeds would quickly come to the conclusion that "get the hell out of here" would be the best course of action.

@Nosajimiki Not so much. There's a lot of sky, and not that many bombers. In 2 dimensions you can do "suppressing fire", but it really doesn't work in 3 dimensions. Oh, and the F117 you're thinking about was taken out by a SAM over Yugoslavia. (Not stealthy enough!)

Bear in mind that WW2 fighters had no tracking gear beyond the MK1 Human Eyeball. At intercept speeds the Typhoons could be into and through the german fighter cover in less time than it takes to blink.

Also, the poster specified "a squadron" of bombers, not "the entire might of the Luftwaffe". A quick wikipedia check says that'd be about 125 craft in total. And the moment a group that large "suddenly" appears on every air traffic control radar covering the Channel, absolutely everybody is going to, if not immediately assume the worst, at the very least put everything they have on quick scramble standby just in case it is the worst.

.Pretty sure Eurofighters can quite comfortably survive LMG fire.

@Persistence Modern fighters are if anything less well armored than their WWII counterparts. Eurofighters are not designed to survive machine gun fire because they are not expected to be shot at by machine guns. Modern military doctrine (with the exception of close ground suppression aircraft like the A-10) favors avoidance over armor. While I admit, arguments about them flying fast or high enough to not get shot down may be valid, if they do get hit they will not be having a good day.

@Graham I was going off of memory from when it happened. From what I recall, the news back then reported that it was shot down by unguided weapons saturating the sky... or... maybe my memory is just a bit spotty after 21 years. Either way, thanks for the clarification, that does make me less certain of if the Eurofighters could be manually targeted given enough points of fire.