Was Allied bombing of Germany Jan - April 1945 a war crime?

Not sure if I found my brain yet, or not. But when someone commits
a horrible act in revenge does that change ...

1) what they did
2) the effect it had
3) the morality of doing it
4) the legality of doing it?

What I mean is, if the US deliberately bombs civilian targets for a specific intent, do the ethics or the law change - depending on what other people did somewhere else? Ever?


Would it, for instance, be okay to run a few concentration camps now? Other people did it to us! And they did it first! And they did it way worse than the devious little torture thingies we want. But we're stressed out from our War Of Terror - the scary context makes it necessary!

Do other people's behavior make it right, or or even legal, for us?

Well, I say . . . I say . . . d'oh . . . "Remember the Hindenberg"!

I clicked "yes". But I gradually regretted doing so.

What is a war crime? The holocaust is a war crime. Because it had nothing to do with war. It is not like that situation: Hey look at that bridgehead, major. Go to kill a number of jews and we will capture it.

By and large, while there may have been some insane guys who took killing as enjoyment, the bombing is a means related to war, a strategic means. Maybe it had no essential strategic impact on the course of war, but it still remains a strategic means.

Someone may argue that the casualties were to great. I do admit it. But that can't be the reason of a CRIME.
Somebody intends to steal your purse. You deparately grapple with him . Under the name of self-protection you slap a brick on his head. Sadly, you overdo it. It finally lead to a serious concussion and he will be asleep forever in his lifetime.
So, do you do any crimes? Why not? You have made a brain dead just for your goddamn purse with goddam money inside!

No, it is not a crime, nor is the bombing.
They are the tragedies of the mankind.

Interesting point of view ^JB^, and one i'll warrant will not sit well with others who read it. I think you have made a cogent point.

I had only read a few posts of this thread before I churned out my post. It just derived from a little but light enough spark of my mind. So I am not sure whether it will be strong enough to withstand the questioning. But up to now I still keep my mind.

It would require a good deal to summarize what has gone on in this thread. Although discredited today, the Doheny theory of breaking the will of an enemy through strategic bombing was accepted by many in the mid-20th century. Hitler was very enamored of the idea. So much so, that he disparaged the fighter arm of the Luftwaffe, and constantly demanded new bombers.

I rather doubt that Doheny's claptrap had any influence on Churchill and Arthur Harris and Sons, House Removers. Churchill rather dances around the topic in his monumental The Second World War, but it has been asserted elsewhere that he articulated the idea that factory workers who got no sleep were ineffective the next day at work. The English did not intend to practice daytime bombing, and had nothing to match the American Norden bombsight, which allowed a reasonable degree of accuracy. So Air Marshall Sir Arthur Harris instituted a program of night-time area bombing. In the book Decision Over Schweinfurt, the author asserts that upon viewing the results of the first American daylight raid over that crucial center of ball- and roller-bearing production, Albert Speer (the architect who had become Hitler's chief of production) was appalled and stated that 65% of Germany's ball- and roller-bearing manufacturing capacity had been lost for at least three months.

Whatever one may adduce in arguing the merits of the bombing programs, i personally have no doubt that the fire bombing of Dresden was an act of pure, malicious spite. If any part of the Allied bombing campaign merits the term "war crime," that certainly does.

What about Hamburg, that was equally horrendous.

Yes, but Dresden was an "open" city, which the Germans had purposely kept free of any military targets to preserve it. Hamburg was a major manufacturing center, and a major seaport. I don't purport to say that the bombing was justified, only to point out the difference between the two targets. Some who defend the bombing of Dresden assert that it had military targets, but i've seen nothing convincing to support that contention.

An official 1942 German city guide proudly described Dresden as " ... one of the foremost industrial locations of the Reich". Among the factories located within the city or its environs was the huge Zeiss-Ikon complex, which produced nearly all of Germany's precision optics, such as submarine periscopes, bombsights, ground and naval artillery gunsights, tank, anti-tank, aircraft, and anti-aircraft gunsights. Other German industrial firms with war-related production facillities in or contiguous to Dresden were branches or afilliates of Agfa, BASF, Krupp, and Rheinmetal-Borsig. Also located there was one of Germany's largest petroleum product storage and trans-shipment facillities. Following the war, The US Strategic Bombing Survey identified over a hundred industrial activities in Dresden devoted to the production and/or distribution of chemicals, armaments, munitions, and petroleum, employing some 50,000 people. Hardly an "Open City" under the terms of The Geneva Conventions, Dresden was the site of a military airfield, several barracks, a conscription center, and was defended by hundreds of anti-aircraft guns and searchlights and thousands of Flak troops under the command of the Combined Dresden (Corps Area IV) and Berlin (Core Area III) Luftwaffe Administration Commands.

Dresden, with its huge railyards and rail switching facillities, river and canal shipping facillities, and well developed road network was the nexus of almost all rail, barge and highway traffic between central Germany and Czekoslovkia, Austria, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Romania, Bulgaria, and Poland, and had been a key marshalling and debarkation point, as well as supply center, for both the Austrian and Czek annexations and the invasion of Poland. The city also was a hub point for highway and barge transport between and among the East and the South of the Reich and its posessions. Prior to February of 1944, Dresden largely had escaped significant bombing by virtue of its distance from Allied airbases and by the exigencies of target prioritization attendent upon first the Normandy invasion and its follow-on strategic and tactical support, then by actions related to countering and driving back German forces which had participated in December 1944's "Battle of the Bulge".

By January of 1945, Soviet units were pushing into Germany proper, with Dresden the center of a bulge of some 100 miles into the Soviet lines, dangerously exposing the Soviet Left Flank, while blocking the Southern approach to Berlin. The city's importance as a transport center became a critical consideration in Allied planning, particularly with the Soviets' demand for strategic protection of their advance's Left Flank and aiding their advance on Berlin from the South. Allied intelligence estimated Germany was withdrawing as many as 42 Divisions, perhaps as many as a half million fighting men and their equipment, from France, Italy, The Balkans, and elsewhere specifically to bolster their Eastern front. Much of this traffic, as well as evacuation from the East and South, depended on the transport facillities centered on Dresden. According to a mid-January intelligence assessment, " ... We consider, therefore, that the assistance which might be given to the Russians during the next few weeks by the British and American strategic bomber forces justifies an urgent review of their employment to this end".

On January 27th, Bomber Command received orders to step up attacks on Berlin and simultaneously carry out attacks on "... Dresden, Liepzig, Chemnitz, and other cities where a severe blitz will not only cause confusion in the evacuation from the East but will also hamper the movement of troops from the West". At Yalta, on February 4, 1945, Red Army Chief of Staff Alexei Antonov specifically asked for strategic air support aimed at impacting Germany's capability to shift combat assets to the East, mentioning by name Chemnitz, Dresden, and Liepzig as critical threats to the planned mid-February "Finishing Effort" of the Red Army's thrust on Berlin. Plans for the air campaign in support of the Soviet Spring Offensive were laid on, with targeting essentially complete within a few days, but weather prevented carrying out the attacks for over a week. On February 13, the weather broke to the Allies advantage. The raids, which were conducted over a period of several days and nights struck transport assets in Chemnitz, Freiburg, Liepzig, Pirna, Radeberg, and Zwickau as well. Less than three months later, The War in Europe was over.

War in general sucks. The technical means available at the time permitted nothing near the precision strike capability of today's weaponry. It has been calculated 50% of bombs dropped by Allied strategic bombers during WWII fell within 5 miles of their intended target. The only reliable way to take out an industrial or transport target was to saturate its environs with munitions. The bombing of Dresden, a legitimate, defended, enemy-war-effort-critical target was a military necessity, and was conducted in full accordance with The Rules of War and the technical means then extant.

Sources:

United States Strategic Bombing Survey Summary Report (European War)

Airforce Historical Studies Office: Historic Analysis of the 14-15 February 1945 Bombings of Dresden

Dresden: Tuesday, February 13, 1945: Taylor, Frederick
Harper-Collins, New York, 2004

The Bombers: Longmate, Norman
Hutchins & Co., London, 1983

Berlin: the Downfall, 1945: Beevor, Antony
Penguin-Putnam, New York, 2003

Airwar: The US Airforce In WWII (4 Vols): Jablonski, Edward
Doubleday, New York, 1971

The Luftwaffe War Diaries: Bekker, Cajus
Doubleday, New York, 1969

Bomber Offensive: Harris, Sir Arthur
Collins, London, 1947

The Arms of Krupp: Manchester, William
Little, Brown & Co., Boston, 1968

The Last Six Months: Shtemenko, Sergei
Doubleday, New York, 1977
(Sidebar: General of the Army Shtemenko was Chief of Operations for The Red Army, and Deputy Chief of the Red Army General Staff, throughout 1944 and 1945 - timber)


Now, I dunno what it would take to convince you, Set, but I'm well satisfied re The Dresden Question. By voluminous credible evidence, there is no basis for there to be such a question in the first place.

Those are excellent points Timber, but the Allied bombing was aimed not at those targets, but at the city itself ,in an attempt to create a firestorm similar to that created at Hamburg. I think the issue here is what is a legitimate target, a factory, infrastructure, or the population of an urban center.

I understand what you're saying. Acquiunck. I just can't get there with you. Given the technical means available at the time, the only way strategic bombing could take out a target was to visit devastation on the environs of the target. Yes, that meant damage to civilian populace and infrastructure - but while argument may be made that destroying an enemy's will as well as ability to resist is a legitimate application of military force, the overall question of civilian impact was subordinate to the strategic and tactical necessities of contemporary warfare. It had been determined the setting of a firestorm was an efficient, effective way - the most efficient, effective way prior to the availability of nuclear weapons - to ensure militarily significant destruction of a target or target complex embedded within an urban area. War-critical German assets and infrastructure - perfectly legitimate targets - abounded in Dresden and vicinity. War sucks. Innocent people suffer. But that's war, and we didn't start it, we ended it

Is populace the synonym for refugees?

Probably Walter, if they werent before, chances are they were afterwards.

My father was a Fireman in London during the Blitz. He was also drafted to Coventry, Liverpool and Bristol at various times.

He didnt like what happened to Dresden, Cologne and indeed Berlin (which he thought was an exercise just to appease Stalin, and help with post war "break up" negotiations), because he could readily identify with what those people were going through.

He understood it to be an exercise to break the will of the German people, and nothing more.

They were dark times, and Germany had to be stopped, at all costs so it seems.

What's your point Walter? Refugees or residents, they were in the vicinity of a complex of legitimate targets, targets critical to the prosecution of the Allied, paricularly as regards Soviet, war effort. War sucks; thats a given.

I find that contention odd, Big Bird. The first raid against Schweinfurt was the first large-scale daylight bombing mission undertaken by the United States Army Air force. They were looking for an outcome of 10% of the bombs in the "magic thousand foot circle." Due to a lack of experience in analyzing aeriel photography, they concluded that they hadn't done so. However, the evidence of the Germans is that they had put better than 10% within the "magic thousand foot circle," and that the only evidence of bombs falling outside the industrial target area onto civilian targets in Schweinfurt were from three "sticks" of bombs dropped when a lead bombadier mistook his aiming point. I refer you Decision Over Schweinfurt, the best brief policy study of daylight bombing i've read--very accessible to the non-specialist.

And, i refer you to The Magic 1,000 Foot Circle: Eighth Air Force Precision Bombing, which details a raid against the Marienberg FW factory.

Dresden was bombed long after the USAAF had developed considerable experience and skill in daylight raids. It occurred at a time when the Luftwaffe were hiding their few fighters in forests, all their airfields destroyed and too dangerous to use. For that, i refer you to Adolf Galland's The First and the Last. The conditions for the precision of the bombing could not have been better. Fifty percent of bombs within five miles of the target is a mean statement for all daylight raids throughout the war, and doesn't take into account the optimal conditions for that raid, the lack of effective combat air patrol by the Germans, and the nature of the targets to which you refer--for which the particular method of bombing was inappropriate[/i]. Standard incendaries were followed by block busters to severe watermains, gas mains and break the electrical grid, as well as to create the firestorm effect. That is not how one takes out canals, bridges, railyards and roads--it is how one takes out population. I suggest to you that your sources are engaging in self-justification after the fact, and that the means employed were not the best means for achieving the desired results. Your Air Force Historical Office references suggest that the bombing methods were "normal"--but ignore their own report that the English attacked the built up city areas, and that normal practice for the English had been to used those techniques in area bombing which specifically targeted the civilian population, as opposed to[/i] infrastructure with military significance. The American part of the raid, as described in that source, was the railway yards, and rail marshalling yards, and their bombing was very much more accurate than would have been the case years earlier, and in any situation in which the Germans could have mounted a credible combat air patrol. The English simply indulged in the indiscriminate area bombing of "built-up city area." The destruction of physical communications systems is not most effectively acheived with an area bombing of combined incendiary and high-explosive ordnance.

Having read your sources, i remain unconvinced of the justification for the destruction of the "old city" area of Dresden, and continue to consider it to have been a spiteful attack, something the English specialized in by that stage of the war.

I would also refer you to Robert MacNamara's statement that he was told by Curtis Le May (regarding the incendiary area attacks against more than 60 cities in Japan) that had we lost that war, we would have been easily convicted of war crimes. I believe the same could have been said of the preferred area bombing techniques of the English.

Quoted form p43 of Overloard, written by Max Hastings.

Well, timber - I really agree that war sucks.

But since I've read in archives (in original and in copies) pilot's manuals that pointed exactly at hospitals, monasteries, churches, refugee camps etc as targets, war sucks more.

You prolly oughtta be sittin' down, Set, 'cause I'm gonna concede a few points to you. The 50% within 5 miles accuracy indeed encompassed the entire war, and includes the Brits. By mid-to-late '44, the 8th Airforce, with its high-level daylight t was regularly achieving 50% within one mile accuracy, with better than 10% within 1000 feet of the aiming point.

The Brits, though, aimed not at points but at cities. And frankly, I don't defend that at all. Harris bought fully into Lindeman's theory of "De-housing" the German workforce through carpet bombing residential districts and city centers. Tedder went along willingly, and I don't doubt some spite was involved.

To be fair to Bomber Command, they did get their nose bloodied earlier in the war when they tried daylight precision bombing, thanks to inadequate equipment, inadequate trainining, and woefully inadequate tactics. They more or less were forced into night bombing if they were to do any strategic bombing at all. However, by late '44, they had in the Lancaster a bomber fully the equal of the B-17s and B-24s deployed by the 8th Airforce. They even successfully carried out some high-level daylight raids, without sustaining unacceptable own-force casualties. Advances in aircraft, crew training, navigation, and bomb-aiming made them just as capable of precision as were the Americans of the time. They just preferred night area bombing to daylight precision bombing.

A minor point of correction is in order though, having to do with the tactics of firebombing a city. In British practice, the first planes in were Pathfinders, radar-navigated twin-engined Mosquitos flown by superbly trained crews. These fast, agile, light bombers would come in at high speed and low level, to mark the target boundries and center with very bright, long-burning incindiaries of various colors, the colors referencing target parameters. The lumbering main bomber stream followed closely behind and at greater altitude. The first several loads of ordnance delivered consisted of very heavy high explosive, intendeded to unroof and smash buildings, cripple power and water in the target area, crater roads and demolish bridges and overpasses. Next the main payload would be delivered, mixed incindiaries, phosphorous and thermite. These would cause the firestorm. The last several loads delivered would be armor piercing, delayed-fuse high explosive bombs, which would burrow deeply into the wreckage of structures or embed themselves firmly in the ground whether paved or bare. These were intended, by their delayed action, to hamper damage control efforts. They would be fused to detonate anywhere from several minutes to many hours following impact, and there would be a lot of them scattered through the target area. Some would be fused to detonate only when disturbed. Very nasty. Effective as hell, but very nasty. Its not unheard of even today for a construction project to discover one of these, long dormant but still quite dangerous.

Anyhow, in general, I feel the Brits gave night bombing a lot of play mostly for the entertainment value of the practice, as opposed to any militarily real benefit.

Walter, you may find this interesting: Blitzed by Guidebook.

When I posed this question- was ALLIED bombing of Germany a war crime - I had not realised that it was only the RAF who indulged in criminal activity, and that the German population on the receiving end actually welcomed being blown to pieces by American bombs.