Totally endorse the issue of a medal for the RAF Bombing Campaign, 1939-45. Harris wanted it for the groundcrew too, a desire echoed by many of his aircrew who relied on the groundcrew's herculean efforts for their very lives. Whether that happens or not, it remains a blatant scandal that the Bomber Command aircrew had to make do with the Aircrew Europe Star, in common with all other air operations against occupied European countries up to the eve of D-Day, OR the France and Germany Star thereafter. The latter was issued to all involved within European Operations from D-Day, including those in the advancing rear echelons. Both were a deliberate slight against Bomber Command's uniquely prolonged and hazardous campaign which was the only way to take the war to the enemy's heartland for so many years.
Churchill's eventual and infamous distancing himself from a campaign that he had supported and encouraged for so long proved that, extraordinary as he was, he was in the end just a politician with an election to fight. Harris felt the slight and refused the ennoblement conferred upon his fellow Commanders in Chief of all three services at the time. The Army was appalled at the destruction wrought on each German city they advanced through and so the 'war crime' syndrome became empowered. What they didn't appreciate was that they had landed in France and advanced into Germany under total Allied Air Superiority because the Luftwaffe, its aircraft and AA artillery, was almost entirely within the Reich defending it against the Allied 24 hour Bombing Campaign. The Red Army certainly appreciated it, the USSR awarding him the Order of Suvorov, 1st Class.
The Allied European Bombing Campaign was a war winner, acknowledged by that suave noose dodging Nazi, Albert Speer, Reichsministerium für Rüstung und Kriegsproduktion, likening it to the opening of another front. Without it German war production might well have meant victory for them in Russia and the turning back of the Allied landings in France. Hitler's terror weapons would have done the rest...
Give them their medal!
Last edited by Chugalug2; 1st Apr 2024 at 10:49.