Bump for later.
Springtime for Hitler and Germany...
Germany wanted Total War and the Allies obliged.
No, he was investigating the Holocaust crematoriums to debunk the stories on how many people could be cremated at one time.
Dresden is also the setting for the greatest novella in history, “The Golden Pot” by E.T.A. Hoffmann.
After the war there was a story about this German woman who accosted a GI and yelled at him that if the Allies would have given up sooner none of this would have happened.
Malmady.
5.56mm
But I understand the Dresden firebombing was in retaliation for the Luftwaffe's bombing of Coventry, an English city with no military significance whatsoever.
And then there was that "Blitz" thing ...
There was no point in further bombing of cities to degrade German "morale." The people had no stomach for the war by this time. But, since the plot to kill Hitler was botched, the Hitlerite dictatorship ruthlessly enforced discipline and the people had no say whether to lay down arms. Hitler, Himmler, Goebbels and the rest knew if they were ever captured alive they would be executed, so they were determined to fight to the last.
Yes, the Germans started the area bombing and "asked for it." We repaid them in full and with considerable interest.
"This suffering affects us directly in a globalized world," he added, placing a white rose on a memorial of the controversial attack.
If Herr Hilbert has any roses left, he can take them to Auschwitz or Belsen, Oradour-sur-Glane or Lidice, Baugnetz or Wormhoudt… lots of human rights were getting trampled on in a warlike manner back then, with the most direct kind of globalized suffering.
In his diary, Joseph Goebbels said there were 250,000 deaths, but I don’t know whether that estimate was a private figure or one conjured up for public consumption. At the time though the population would have been unusually large, because of people fleeing the Russian advance. The 25,000 figure may not take that fact into account.
An estimate was the only possibility for a firebombing raid, because even those in basements were burned into dust, or an unrecognizable slush if water had put out the fire there. The leadership who advocated total war hid out in bunkers neither heat nor explosives could penetrate.
The British bomber streams at night were lucky to hit a city. The American bombers during the day could do better with the Norden sight. It would have probably made more sense for Dresden to have been a daylight target, because north and west of the central area were the industrial locations.
With a special appearance by Montana Wildhack...!!
Blame is on Hitler...not the Allies.
Cry me a river.
A British friend of mine noted that the British never show postcards of bombed out London to tourists, but the Germans keep doing it. It is like there is a Nazi socialist undercurrent of anger about losing the war.
Perhaps they could gather in remembrance of the destruction by Merkel.
Controversial? Dresden was a transportation hub for equipment heading east and was bombed at Stalin’s request.
It’s always struck me as unfair that Harris never got the honours accorded to so many Generals etc.
They wanted total war, the Allies obliged.
I remember from the star trek episode “A taste of armageddon” where there was a very sanitary war being conducted between two planets.
All battles were fought by computer simulation. When casualties were calculated, people would line up to voluntarily be killed in disintegration machines. Failure to comply means real missiles start arriving.
The theory was this would preserve the cities and cultures of the two species.
However, the war had been in effect for hundreds of years.
Kirk shows up and says “Screw this! War should be messy, if it isn’t, there’s no reason to end it, is there?!”
He prevents people from entering disintegration chambers on one of the planets. The other planet freaks out and calls. They quickly end the war because neither side, as it turns out, wants “real” damage.
Only a sci-fi story, but an interesting concept.
WWI & II were comparitively short to our extended conflicts of today, with all their UN approvals and ROE.
I keep hearing 25,00 dead and other much higher numbers. But statistics show that six Lancasters and one B-17 were lost. A Lancaster carried 7 and a Fortress carried 10-11. So the number should be somewhere around 60 depending on how many successfully bailed out. This is well below the hundreds of thousands often claimed. I hope this helps.
“considered one of the Allied forces more controversial acts during the war. “
Yeah... I’ll be sure to feel really guilty about that when I go to sleep.
In other news I love going down to Dresden on my drive down to Prague. (I live south of Berlin half the year). The Elbe river drive to the Czech border is spectacular. I love staying in the little B&Bs there on a long weekend.