About Dresner and allied bombing?

Question

I haven't read about this but it seems to be a big topic. Can you provide some insights?

Answer 1

The Allied bombing campaign in Germany was intended to disrupt and destroy the transport system, with the result that it became impossible to provide supplies to the Eastern Front. In this it was spectacularly successful. Bombing techniques (up until very recently) were not accurate enough to identify individual targets, but railway marshalling yards and docks were ideal for the purpose.
Historically Dresden had been the crossroads of invasion for Europe, and the famous 'ancient' town center had, in fact, been rebuilt many times. There was even a permanent fund set up by the cities 'porcelain magnates' for the purpose at one time.
In world war II it again became the transport hub for movements East, and partly because of this, many armaments factories were set up in the area.
Many of the stories about the results of the bombings are evil myths, spread by the communist goverment of East Germany and by Neo Nazis. The final death toll was accurately calculated by the city authorities at the time, and was in the region of 23,000. The often-quoted figure of 35,000 has no basis, although this was made up fairly shortly after the raid. The other, higher figures are all the result of lazy research, and (more frequently) holocaust revisionists such as David Irving.

Answer 2

It IS Dresden, Jason.
It's so huge because we have a conscience. Up until that point in the War we centered our air raids on military objectives. Sir Arthur Harris didn't like this much - but that's another story.
At Dresden, over the course of about 36 hours, there were three major drops. Two by the British and one by the USAAF. It was Terror Bombing targeting a civilian population. That's why it's so controversial.
We were constantly beating up on the Germans for their attacks on England and here we go and do it ourselves.
The three waves, which included conventional and incendiaries, resulted in a firestorm so horrific I don't think even good old Sir Arthur was comfortable with it. But I didn't live through the Blitz either.
There is merit in the point that we were also putting on a show for the Russians.

Answer 3

February 13 1945 . The city was bombed at night by the RAF and during the day by the USAAF using both high explosive and incendiary bombs which created a firestorm, killing an estimated 80,000 people. The city had no strategic value and was full of refugees, prisoners of war and other civilians.
Some people think it was done just to impress the approaching Soviet Army of the powerof the Western Allies.
If you want an account from a survivor read Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Answer 4

Along with the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it has become one of the favourite episodes in World War 2 on which to construct some dubious criticism of the Allied Powers, as if the Axis powers had not already committed far worse war crimes, for which we no longer criticise them because they were on the losing side.

Dresden was attacked with bombs and incendiaries so intensively on a single night that it created a "firestorm", a furnace-like blaze which fanned itself more and more by its own convection, and incinerated the entire city centre. Nobody had known about this effect before.

But if the Allied bombing of Dresden was wrong, then the Axis destruction of much of London in the 1940-41 Blitz was at least as wrong, their sinking in the Atlantic of many millions of tons of merchant shipping and tens of thousands of merchant seamen was even more wrong, and their callous and deliberate extermination of 6 million Jews was the worst wrong of all. Why should all the modern post-war criticism be directed at the Allies?

Answer 5

The bombing of Dresden, led by the Royal Air Force (RAF) and followed by the United States Army Air Force (USAAF) between February 13 and February 15, 1945, remains one of the more controversial Allied actions of World War II. The exact number of casualties is uncertain, but most historians agree that the firebombing resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of people. Historian Frederick Taylor says:

“ The destruction of Dresden has an epically tragic quality to it. It was a wonderfully beautiful city and a symbol of Baroque humanism and all that was best in Germany. It also contained all of the worst from Germany during the Nazi period. In that sense it is an absolutely exemplary tragedy for the horrors of 20th century warfare Early in 1945, the Allies' political-military leadership started to consider how they might aid the Soviets with the use of the strategic bomber force. The plan was to bomb Berlin and several other eastern cities in conjunction with the Soviet advance. In the summer of 1944, plans for a large and intense offensive targeting these cities had been discussed under the code name Operation Thunderclap, but then shelved on August 16.[2] These were re-examined, but the decision was made to draw up a more limited plan. Sir Charles Portal, the Chief of the Air Staff, noted on January 26, 1945, that "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".[3] However, he mentioned that aircraft diverted to such raids should not be taken away from the current primary tasks of destroying oil production facilities, jet aircraft factories, and submarine yards. Sir Norman Bottomley, the Deputy Chief of the Air Staff, requested Arthur "Bomber" Harris, Commander-in-Chief of RAF Bomber Command and an ardent supporter of area bombing, to undertake attacks on Berlin, Dresden, Leipzig, and Chemnitz as soon as moon and weather conditions allowed, "with the particular object of exploiting the confused conditions which are likely to exist in the above mentioned cities during the successful Russian [sic] advance".[4]

On the same day, Winston Churchill pressed the Secretary of State for Air, Sir Archibald Sinclair: "I asked [last night] whether Berlin, and no doubt other large cities in east Germany, should not now be considered especially attractive targets. …Pray report to me tomorrow what is going to be done". On January 27 Sinclair replied:

Answer 6

Sure you don't mean Dresden?

Answer 7

i don't really know