Originally Posted by
Chugalug2
EV, it's not lost on me. Harris certainly believed in what he was doing, how else could he go on sending his crews out night after night not doing so? What alternative was there? The bombing accuracy was of the order of miles, though techniques and technical advances tightened it up gradually. Practically speaking though, night bombing meant area bombing which meant bombing cities. So Harris made a virtue of a necessity and made the blood curdling statements as quoted, even invoking the old testament to that effect. He was Bomber Command's Commander in Chief and had to put fire into the bellies of his old lags night after night despite their losses, because night after night they were laying waste to Germany's cities and killing the inhabitants in their tens of thousands. What was he supposed to say, "I deeply regret that so many civilians are dying as a result of our bombing but we will go on bombing anyway"?
That is the dilemma of war, the technology determines how it is fought. Invent the machine gun and accurate artillery, and you get the carnage of the Western Front. Invent the 4-engined bomber and you get cities reduced to rubble. That had to be countered by Germany, resulting in massive demands on man-power and munitions that were badly needed on the Eastern Front. Speer (if you believe that persuasive individual) thought the night bombing more damaging than the day, and that both combined to create a second front. Are you saying that all that should have been abandoned to avoid civilian deaths? To do what exactly? The idea was to win the war before Germany did. Some would say it was a close enough run thing as it was. Without Bomber Command my money would be on the latter outcome. The fact that Harris said that bombing alone could do it was sheer hyperbole. Did he really believe that? I've no idea, but anyway what difference did it make other than to ensure that you had an utterly determined man at the helm?
War is terrible and the only certain way to conduct it is with every means at hand, in order to achieve victory all the sooner. This seems to be lost on some here.
Thanks for your posts to this thread and to many over the years here on PPRuNe.
I think it is to Harris's credit that he asked his superiors to be crystal clear on what was being done and why it was being done. As they say the first casualty of war is the truth, and he was trying to avoid such a casualty. It seems his superiors pulled their punches to a significant degree. Consistently telling it like it was would make sure there was a social acceptance and shared responsibility of the policy, and would avoid a lot of second guessing like we now have.
I can't say I'd endorse or oppose the policy if I was there at the time. I have the benefit of lots of information stitched together after the fact. In general I try to stick to first hand references such as the RV Jones book I mentioned above. I did want to point out the ineffectiveness of strategic bombing was understood at the time yet met resistance from some in government for what seem to be political reasons.
I think the argument of keeping resources tied up in AA battalions is a strong one, yet you don't need to drop incendiaries on civilian areas to do that. What I've read of Speer he says the biggest issue for the Allies was they were not consistent. They'd knock down dams and then move on to other targets without maximizing the disruption they'd caused, the dams would be repaired in a few weeks. They'd do oil one raid, bearings the next, transportation a third, never focusing on one item enough to shut it down. Allied leaders probably didn't understand all this in real time, but probably should have understood that bombing didn't undermine morale, it strengthens resolve. 1944 was the peak of aircraft production, which says a lot.