Posted on 01/23/2006 9:52:21 PM PST by doug from upland
Just when you thought the president could not get into any more trouble, there is a major scandal brewing. It has been revealed that he authorized a bombing raid, conducted by both Americans and Brits, using incendiary bombs that targeted civilians. There were no military targets. I guess if anything should lead to impeachment, this is it. The liberals are going to be going nuts. Here is the story.
=======================================================================
In 1941 Charles Portal of the British Air Staff advocated that entire cities and towns should be bombed. Portal claimed that this would quickly bring about the collapse of civilian morale in Germany. Air Marshall Arthur Harris agreed and when he became head of RAF Bomber Command in February 1942, he introduced a policy of area bombing (known in Germany as terror bombing) where entire cities and towns were targeted.
One tactic used by the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Force was the creation of firestorms. This was achieved by dropping incendiary bombs, filled with highly combustible chemicals such as magnesium, phosphorus or petroleum jelly (napalm), in clusters over a specific target. 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.
In 1945, Arthur Harris decided to create a firestorm in the medieval city of Dresden. He considered it a good target as it had not been attacked during the war and was virtually undefended by anti-aircraft guns. The population of the city was now far greater than the normal 650,000 due to the large numbers of refugees fleeing from the advancing Red Army.
On the 13th February 1945, 773 Avro Lancasters bombed Dresden. During the next two days the USAAF sent over 527 heavy bombers to follow up the RAF attack. Dresden was nearly totally destroyed. As a result of the firestorm it was afterwards impossible to count the number of victims. Recent research suggest that 35,000 were killed but some German sources have argued that it was over 100,000.
bump for later
For a second there I thought I had in IBTZ on DFU.
/heresy
in = an
That's what Americans like Mildred Gillars (aka Axis Sally) and William Joyce (aka Lord Haw Haw) said.
Axis Sally even gave a "don't say 'my country right or wrong'" speech to her American listeners.
Apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
Socialists suck.
;^)
Yep. Heard very similar stories from the Tokyo in-laws. But we're allies, friends, and family now.
It is now 012406, and it's still here- But it will still be here 012506, I promise!
I am of the feeling that Doug from upland might be stating an applicable historical fact from another war, as a response to some of the idiot protestations of the traitorous Democratic ravings and screechings over some of Mr. Bush's actions to protect our nation. I did look at your homepage, and urge all respondants to this thread to do so. Form your own opinions.
Thanks. We already traded posts and got it sorted out.
Anyone interested in a very wrenching story about Dresden should read "Slaughterhouse-Five" by Kurt Vonnegut. Mostly it is about American prisoners of war in Dresden at the time of the bombing.
There is a technical quote that may interest you. It is from the introduction to "The Destruction of Dresden" by David Irving and was written by an American and a British air officer. "I deeply regret that British and U.S. bombers killed 135,000 people in the attack on Dresden, but I remember who started the last war and I regret even more the loss of more than 5,000,000 Allied lives in the necessary effort to completely defeat and utterly destroy nazism." "On the night of March 9th, 1945, and air attack on Tokyo by American heavy bombers, using incendiary and high explosive bombs, caused the death of 83,793 people. The atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima killed 71,379 people."
If you think that photo was bad, you should see the photos that I unfortunately saw of the firestorm our bombing caused in Hamburg, Germany. Then, of course, there were the ghastly photos of the huge mass graves of dead jews at the freshly liberated concentration camps that were still open. Saw those at age 8, and the memory still has a deep impact.
I think it was General Patton who said something like "It is good that war is so horrible or else we would come to love it too much."
"I think it was General Patton who said something like "It is good that war is so horrible or else we would come to love it too much.""
Actually it was Robert E. Lee. An excellent quote though.
The lesson is clear enough. When you are in a war, each side will do what it needs to do to win. Even the noblest countries will resort to brutal methods, if that is what is required.
The NAZIs tried to do the same in London, but were not able to. The Islamakazis will do the same in New York, given the chance. So let's make sure they never get the chance.
For the record, I don't give a tinker's d*mn what you believe. Anything you care to, fine with me.
Impose my views on you? As noted before, you aren't worth the trouble.
Ta-ta.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.