Allied Morality Questioned in Bombing of German Cities

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Ozz
No retaliation, true, No resistance false. Wars don't
slow down cause the enemy is down,

Which means nothing regarding Dresden, as Dresden was not in anyway a strategic target or part of the German war effort. It offered nothing to the Allies in terms of stopping German military resistance, which was already crumbling left and right.

Munich 1938, appleasement.

Huh? What does this have to do with anything? Do you like not massacring 200,000 people to being appeasement of some kind?

Wrong, Churchill didn't want to have to quarter his
occupation forces in a wasteland and it was getting
to be a waste of effort "to bomb piles of brick". it
was time to go to Japan.

Even if true, that speaks nothing to it being morally ok to do the bombings. And you have to say that Churchill was insincere in his expression of regret over Dresden, which I don't think is the case. And bombing Dresden was a waste of effort in itself.

[Ozz]

Originally posted by Ned
SD, Yes, the US should apologize for its role.

No they shouldn't. The US did what it thought it had
to do at the time. The US didn't start the war, it just
finished it.

[Darius871]

I didn't say that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were moral, I just said that they can be justified (note the words can be justified, I didn't say they are justified) while Dresden cannot be justified because due to a bad toss of the die its political objective was not achieved.

[Vanguard]

High altitude bombing over Europe was far more accurate than bombing over Japan, due to wind velocity at altitude.

True, but European high altitude bombing was still usually incapable of knocking out anything as small as a factory or a bridge. If it wasn't a 50 hectare rail marshalling yard or a city, a B-17 wasn't much of a threat.

Except, of course, in the case of carpet bombing, which was a very definite threat to anything in the target area. Or nearby. One of the funniest tragedies of WW2 is the fact that Bomber Command's attempts to destroy the U-boot pens in Brest resulted in the complete destruction of the city--------except for the U-boot pens.

To support their point of view, they have studiously avoided recognition of how much higher the production levels would have been without strategic bombing, and the manpower, equipment, and materiel drain required for air defense against strategic bombing. How much longer would it have taken the allies on either front to break through into Germany if the Germans had been able to transfer 3,000 FlaK 36/37, 1500-2000 FW-190 and Me-109K aircraft, and 200,000 luftwaffe air defense personnel into army control?

Sure, but so what? It also ignores the effect that not pursuing a strategic bombing offensive would have had on the Allied war effort. Think how much better the drive across France would have gone if we had used our air capability to deliver fuel and supplies to front line troops. Or how many men and how much materiel would have been saved if heavy aircraft had been used against submarines in the Battle of the Atlantic. Or how we could have invaded France in 1943 if we hadn't been wasting a third of our war production on heavy bombers.

It is true that bombing is a very convenient weapon for countries that would otherwise have to amphibiously invade to get into contact with the enemy.

But convenience isn't good enough. The goal is to force the enemy to surender, not merely to hurt him. Applying a large amount of effort to an attack that weakens your enemy only slightly is stupid. Especially when you are simultaneously undertaking a decisive attempt to destroy him elsewhere.

In any event, I doubt that German production could have gotten much higher (in 1944 anyway) regardless of bombing. The main limiting factor in German war potential was manpower. Bombing did not greatly affect manpower availability or hours worked, although it did divert some hours into repair and (as you state) did tie up manpower that could have been used elsewhere.

Allied effectiveness, on the other hand, was limited by the amount of troops they could supply in Europe. Attempting to undertake an expensive bombing campaign from an island besieged by submarines is doubly stupid. The supplying ships first have to run a gauntlet of submarines that attrition 30+% of materiel off before it even reachs Britain. Then, you burn huge amounts of fuel flying bombs to Germany, 95% of which do absolutely nothing. You also lose 8% of the planes on each mission in exchange for less than one cheap fighter for each expensive bomber.

If Britain had, instead, used those bombers to attack submarines, she would halve losses to subs and bombers and have more supplies and force for the decisive attack.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Darius871
I didn't say that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were moral, I just said that they can be justified (note the words can be justified, I didn't say they are justified) while Dresden cannot be justified because due to a bad toss of the die its political objective was not achieved.

I see the point, but this takes the limits of justification almost to absurdity. In this logic, one could justify anything done in war that may have some sort of effect on war aims. We run into the ends justifying the means mentality. I'm sure the IJA could use similar justification for Nanjing. By terrorizing the population, they may have induced a quicker capitulation of opposing forces, and word of their tactics would make other areas less likely to resist them or else they would get similar punishment.

Very slippery slope.

[Capt Dizle]

The American public is so adverse to American casualties that I find it hard to see Bush allowing American ground forces to get involved in street fighting in Bagdad.

OTOH, international reaction to the indiscriminate bombing of Bagdad would be extreme.

You can be sure the volunteer troops expect Bagdad to be leveled before they go in.

Best solution is to use anti-Saddam indigious ground troops and limited air support.

But Saddam is getting far to much time to prepare.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by DanS
While true (there was enough war fever to go around), Germany provided the trigger, and German troops were the first ones to cross borders. So it's their fault.

Forgive me if this has already been dealt with but if Germany had wanted war to the extent that you seem to claim they would have provoked a conflict in 1905. Russia was still reeling from its defeat in the Far East and was in no position to defend itself from German attack. The UK had also not allied with France and Russia during this time which left France standing alone against Germany.

Now on to the main topic: The strategic bombing campaign of only started in earnest in 1944 when the allies finally achieved air superiority over Germany, well after it was clear that Germany was going to loose the war. Given that fact it is quite reasonable to question both its morality and military utility.

[Ozz]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov As incongruous a statement as I can think of. The morality of Dresden has nothing to do with it being a "shade of things to come

It was for the Japanese, that is exactly what happened
to thier cities

[Sikander]

I have and do criticize the Allied Strategic Bombing Campaign for falling so short both morally and effectively. I think the moral question finds everyone lacking, but the temper of the times (Totalitarianism and Uncoditional Surrender) made this question easier to ignore. Look at the doctrines of Massive Retaliation and Mutual Assured Destruction which respectively went in to place fairly shortly after WWII for the continuation of this trend toward the extremes of Total War Doctrine. So WWII is really another (arguably large) step along the line from limited to Total Warfare. WWI decimated a generation of young men for nothing. At least WWII had to do in part with big ideas. So while I wouldn't support this sort of indiscriminate bombing today, I don't think that the people who thought up, carried out, supported or allowed the bombing to happen deserve to be severely castigated as a group. The important question is can and will we do better.

As to the efficacy of the campaign, that is a tough question, or certainly a complex one. You have to make a lot of assumptions about what would have been done with the resources freed up on both sides. IMO the largest positive effect of the bombing was that it gave the Western Allies air superiority at precisely the time that they really needed it, just prior to the invasion.

Max Hastings in his book about the Normandy Campaign makes some very interesting points regarding the way manpower was managed by the Allies. His most salient point in regard to this issue is that a lot of the men who would have been good solid small unit leaders were reduced to taking incredible risks as simple AA machine gunners on heavy bombers, where their chances of directly doing any damage to the enemy was negligible. This was because the Army Air Corps usually got its pick of personnel ahead of the ground pounders. There were very serious leadership problems in the American Army at many levels, but those at the small unit level really had a large effect on its morale and tactical capabilities.

The lack of accuracy point has been made already, I'd like to add one more stat. IIRC the USAAF got only one bomb in 5 within 5 miles of its target during the Strategic Bombing Campaign. This includes plenty of scratched missions which dropped their bombs in the Channel, or more or less randomly over Europe when they realized that they couldn't see / get to their target, but also a lot of lost formations, bad intelligence, and not an inconsiderable amount of refusing to fly over the target area due to the very high likelihood that you would be shot down.

[Vanguard]

Forgive me if this has already been dealt with but if Germany had wanted war to the extent that you seem to claim they would have provoked a conflict in 1905.

Sounds logical, but logical or not, the fact remains that diplomatic and state papers of the Great Powers in 1914 show fairly clearly that Germany choose to start the war. Russia did mobilize first, but mobilization is not the same thing as war.

IMO the largest positive effect of the bombing was that it gave the Western Allies air superiority at precisely the time that they really needed it, just prior to the invasion.

One thing WW2 proves is that bombers are not the best way to destroy fighters. The opposite is true. By engaging the Luftwaffe in this manner, we probably reduced our air superiority instead of increased it. All we did, after all, was allow the Germans to shoot down large numbers of bombers in exchange for a relatively few fighters and a lot of flak shells.

Max Hastings in his book about the Normandy Campaign makes some very interesting points regarding the way manpower was managed by the Allies. His most salient point in regard to this issue is that a lot of the men who would have been good solid small unit leaders were reduced to taking incredible risks as simple AA machine gunners on heavy bombers, where their chances of directly doing any damage to the enemy was negligible. This was because the Army Air Corps usually got its pick of personnel ahead of the ground pounders. There were very serious leadership problems in the American Army at many levels, but those at the small unit level really had a large effect on its morale and tactical capabilities.

Yeah, iirc the replacement crisis eventually forced the Army to send everyone, regardless of school, out as infantry. Annoyed a lot of people who were expecting to be engineers.

[Col Bigspear]

The Germans did something along the lines of provoking the Entante Cordial. They sent a gunboat called the Panther into Tangiers. The French were trying to make Algeria a colony at this time, so they sent an ultimatum to the Germans. The Germans had tested the Alliance between Great Britain and France and they discovered Britain was going to stand by france.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Vanguard

One thing WW2 proves is that bombers are not the best way to destroy fighters. The opposite is true. By engaging the Luftwaffe in this manner, we probably reduced our air superiority instead of increased it. All we did, after all, was allow the Germans to shoot down large numbers of bombers in exchange for a relatively few fighters and a lot of flak shells.

This was true until January 1944 when Allied long range fighters started to destroy the defending German fighters en masse. The bombers forced the action in this situation, if they weren't there the Germans could have simply transferred those fighters out of range and kept their ability to deploy serious fighter strength for a lot longer than was actually case.

And much worse than losing that expensive bomber was losing the irreplaceable (and large) crew. The Germans were on the right track in forsaking Strategic Bombing for unmanned rocket attacks late in the war, it was much more economical in terms of human capital.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov


Bull****. Dresden was bombed in February 1945, well after the Germans had been defeated in the Battle of Britain and were incapable of bombing British cities.

V1 and V2 rockets were still hitting Britain's towns and cities at that time.

[Ned]

Sikander, I don't think that the United States ignored the morality of bombing civilians. Look at what we did in Japan where we dropped leaflets on the intended target cities days prior to their being bombed so that they might be evacuated. Why this wasn't done in the case of Germany I don't know, but it clearly indicates a double standard. In this case double standard worked in favor the Japanese as opposed to the Germans.

One possible explanation for the double standard is that we had a partner named Britain who did not want to give the Germans prior warning.

[Vanguard]

I wouldn't overstate the mercy of dropping leaflets before destroying an entire city. Where exactly were the inhabitants supposed to go? To live in the woods?