Feb 13-15, 1945: Bombers dropped 3,900 tons on Dresden

[He219]

Feb. 13th, 1945: In a raid that has been controversial ever since, 805 aircraft of RAF Bomber Command dropped 2,600 tons of bombs on Dresden, an important transport centre for the German army on the Eastern Front, generating a firestorm which left an estimated 50,000 dead. - MoD

The Bombing of Dresden in World War II by the Allies remains controversial after more than 50 years. Dresden, the capital of the German state of Saxony, was fire-bombed by Allied air forces (the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and the United States Army Air Force (USAAF) over three days (February 13-15, 1945) near the end of World War II. Air Marshall Arthur Harris, inventor of area bombing, ordered the action. He was never held accountable for breaches of Geneva convention or war crimes.

Dresden was widely considered a city of little war-related industrial or strategic importance. Dresden itself was most noted as a cultural centre, with noted architecture in the Zwinger Palace, the Dresden State Opera House and its historic churches. It has been claimed that the bombing was at the request of Russia, to attack a German armoured division in transit through the city. However, RAF briefing notes indicate that one of the motives was to show "the Russians when they arrive, what Bomber Command can do" (that is, to intimidate the Russians).

At the time, town was full of refugees fleeing from the advancing Red Army. Bomber Command was ordered to attack Berlin, Dresden, Leipzig and other east German cities to "cause confusion in the evacuation from the east" and "hamper the movements of troops from the west". This directive led to the raid on Dresden and marked the erosion of one last moral restriction in the bombing war: the term "evacuation from the east" did not refer to retreating troops but to the civilian refugees fleeing from the advancing Russians. Although these refugees clearly did not contribute to the German war effort, they were considered legitimate targets simply because the chaos caused by attacks on them might obstruct German troop reinforcements to the Eastern Front. There are reports that even civilians fleeing the firestorm engulfing Dresden in February 1945 were strafed by British and American aircraft.



The fire-bombing consisted of dropping large amounts of high-explosive to expose the timbers within buildings, followed by incendiary devices (fire-sticks) to ignite them and then more high-explosives to hamper the efforts of the fire services. This eventually created a self-sustaining 'fire storm' with temperatures peaking at over 1500 degrees C. After the area caught fire, the air above the bombed area, become extremely hot and rose rapidly. Cold air then rushed in at ground level from the outside and people were sucked into the fire.

3,900 tonnes of bombs were dropped. Out of 28,410 houses in the inner city of Dresden, 24,866 were destroyed. An area of 15 square kilometers was totally destroyed, among that: 14,000 homes, 72 schools, 22 hospitals, 19 churches, 5 theaters, 50 bank and insurance companies, 31 department stores, 31 large hotels, and 62 administration buildings.

The precise number of dead is difficult to ascertain and is not known. Numbers vary from 85,000 to 335,000 dead. (In comparison, some 100,000 died in the bombing of Hiroshima, about 50,000 in the bombing of Nagasaki and 100,000 in the bombing of Tokyo and 200,000 were killed in Warsaw during the Warsaw uprising 1944.) There have been larger estimates for the number of dead, ranging as high as a quarter of a million, but they are from disputed sources, primarily the Nazi Propaganda Ministry and holocaust denier David Irving. The Nazis made use of Dresden in their propaganda and promised swift retaliation.





The Dresden bombing is a strongly debated decision, and the action is still widely perceived as lacking military justification, even within the context of the controversial area bombing policy pursued against Germany by Britain's Bomber Command in 1942-1945. The city has never regained its pre-war population of 630,000.

There are anecdotes of the pilots and crew having problems years later. Some had nightmares, some thought they would go to hell as war criminals, some had unshakable visions of the fires and the burning cities.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing...n_World_War_II
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/2WWdresden.htm
http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-vetscor/911999/posts

[mustamato]

Originally Posted by He219

"There are anecdotes of the pilots and crew having problems years later. Some had nightmares, some thought they would go to hell as war criminals, some had unshakable visions of the fires and the burning cities."

Well, they were just doing their "duty", and would probably have been shot
or ended up in jail if they had refused to. But I hope that those that took
the decision are burning in hell now and will keep doing so.

And I hope that in 100 years or so when the historians will get more objective,
this will definitively be described as the war crime it was. Just as the US
conventional bombings of Tokyo that killed 200.000 and so forth, the atomic
bombings later on and so forth.

[Uninen]

One ****ed up world it was, and still is.. RIP.

[hedgehog]

http://www.frauenkirche-dresden.org/


Check out that link. It describes the reconstruction of one of the main churches that was destroyed in the raid which should be completed next year (60 years after the war finished)

http://212.227.220.31/fkdd/hoffnung....pp=000015&l=en

is a webcam... you can see the difference between the original (black stone) and newly made stones (sand colour)

Apparetnly the new cross that will crown the top was made by the son of guy who particpated in the raid. Pretty ironic but a nice touch

[Tengu]

It would be funny to see how a german would accuse Air Marshall Arthur Harris of a war crime. Especially at that time.

[fantassin]

Yesterday the Sächsiche Staastskapelle played Mozart's Requiem K626 in Dresden in memory of all the victims of this horrible war crime.

This German orchestra was conducted by Sir Colin Davis who has been a member of the Sächsiche Staastskapelle for over a decade.

Let the victims rest in peace.

[oldsoak]

I could never understand the Dresden raid and I not sure there is an explanation why we would risk bomber crews on a target of little military worth to achieve little more than destruction of refugees and a particularly fine town of great culture. I'm afraid risks to civilian lives were not on anyones agenda in those times, simply because an enemy's capability to wage war depended partly on civilian workers who worked in the factories producing weapons. That attitude is not one we have now - thankfully. Nowadays precision weaponry enables us to minimise collateral damage and real time intelligence enables us to target effectively. I think it a great thing that the son of one who took part should make the cross on the cathedral - these acts promote healing of old wounds which can only be a good thing.

[Tengu]

Originally Posted by oldsoak

I could never understand the Dresden raid and I not sure there is an explanation why we would risk bomber crews on a target of little military worth to achieve little more than destruction of refugees and a particularly fine town of great culture. I'm afraid risks to civilian lives were not on anyones agenda in those times, simply because an enemy's capability to wage war depended partly on civilian workers who worked in the factories producing weapons. That attitude is not one we have now - thankfully. Nowadays precision weaponry enables us to minimise collateral damage and real time intelligence enables us to target effectively. I think it a great thing that the son of one who took part should make the cross on the cathedral - these acts promote healing of old wounds which can only be a good thing.

precision weapons are very good. But there are regimes who take advantage of western compasion and place there AA-guns next to schools etc.

[Red]

BS,if you start a war,you should be able to take whatever comes to you.The Germans started that **** storm they were fair game.I find nothing wrong with the dresden bombing

[squarehead]

Originally Posted by benibo

BS,if you start a war,you should be able to take whatever comes to you.The Germans started that **** storm they were fair game.I find nothing wrong with the dresden bombing

So according to your views, it would be perfectly ok if some iraqis came over and killed 50,000 americans? Your government started the war with them so it should be fair game to kill american civilians.

[Fenna]

I find it astonishing that people can call this a war crime.
It was a war, sadly there weren't any LGBs for the allies to use, so carpet bombing was the option. I wonder if Dresden would have been bombed if Germany hadn't started the war in the first place?

Also funny how the people calling the allied bombing of Germany can call this a war crime, while forgetting the whole extermination of the Jews thing

[Ian H]

I don't think anyone's forgetting that. It is possible, you realise, (though obviously regrettable) for a conflict to contain more than one war crime, and for either side to be responsible for committing them. Just because the Holocaust was a war crime doesn't mean Dresden or Katyn Wood (for example) weren't.

[Haiw]

Originally Posted by Fenna

I find it astonishing that people can call this a war crime.
It was a war, sadly there weren't any LGBs for the allies to use, so carpet bombing was the option.

What you're forgetting is that they in this case they didn't use carpet bombing to hit a military target. The target was a civilian target, the city of Dresden, and the sole intent was to bomb it into rubble and kill as much of the civilians as possible. This happened quite often actually, and the worst thing is that it later proved that those deliberate bombings of civilian targets had practically no effect on the German war effort.

[Fenna]

Originally Posted by Haiw

What you're forgetting is that they in this case they didn't use carpet bombing to hit a military target. The target was a civilian target, the city of Dresden, and the sole intent was to bomb it into rubble and kill as much of the civilians as possible. This happened quite often actually, and the worst thing is that it later proved that those deliberate bombings of civilian targets had practically no effect on the German war effort.

Yeah happened all the time, but Dresden wouldn't have occurred if it wasn't for Rotterdam, London, Coventry.

[Red]

who is going to talk for the victims of the V-2 attacks on london,the extermination of african-germans,the sacking of stalingrad?who talks for them?germany deserved what they got and that is what i believe.I guess if Germany won the war we would all be talking about something else wont we?what the heck am i saying,i wont even be here.