On a sidenote it is darkly amusing to see the attempts of the nations between the wars to ban deliberate attacks on the civilian population ... and to see which nations deliberately torpedoed any such attempts. Can you guess? Yes, the USA (which at the time of the last attempt was about to roll out the prototype of the B-17) and the United Kingdom (which had used aerial attacks on civilian settlements in "colonial warfare" already). But all of that is history now ...
Hello Thor. What is perhaps even more 'darkly amusing' is to hear Germans waxing lyrical about the 'morality' or otherwise of deliberately and knowingly bombing civilians, a field of endevour that a certain country were quite the originators of and 'experten' in.....dating back to the Zeppelin terror raids of WWI. Thor, 'can you guess' who this country was?
British towns and cities, including areas as diverse as Liverpool, the Midlands, my very own Tyneside and nearby Sunderland and even Edinburgh were attacked* with fragmentation bombs and incendiary devices, burning women and children alive and injuring many more. Zeppelin bombing was of course effectively indiscriminate by its very nature.
Perhaps then, it is no surprise when British people are quite dismissive of German lectures on 'morality', seeing them as at best frankly risible.
Murdering and burning UK civilians alive with incendiary's tends to make people a wee bit angry, this tends to result in a
desire for retribution. 'An eye for an eye', and all that.
These quotes are all primary sources from the Imperial War Museum and National Archives.
'
‘When [the Germans] injure innocent… people they… proclaim it as a great victory and that they have struck terror into the English people in London… Well I can only say this, that it has had the effect of making the Londoners… more determined than ever that the GermHun power shall not only be beaten but ABSOLUTELY CRUSHED out of existence.’ [1]
‘
We saw a Zepp the other night… To see the blasted bombs being dropped on helpless civilians and on peaceable houses made the blood go to fever heat and I felt absolutely mad.’ [1]
Journalist J. H. Stapley writing on 5 October 1915 to a friend at the Front
‘
Mourners tonight will leave the side of their dead to look into the sky fearfully.
Little children who have… gone to sleep will be awakened and rushed into cellars to save them from death.’
~American journalist William G. Shepherd’s account of London’s third airship raid
During the spring of 1915, Hauptmann Erich Linnarz, captain of Zeppelin LZ38, dropped on Southend (along with his bombs) a placard on which he had written a cryptic message:
'
You English. We have come, and will come again soon.
Kill or cure. German.'
These charming German 'love letters' forecasting the English peoples complete annihilation were commonplace. Terribly rum bunch these Huns, What?
Of course, later came the Gotha bomber formation raids en masse causing yet more death and destruction; strategic raids on central London and elsewhere, causing massive damage and killing and maiming many Civilians. Perhaps then, in this light it is understandable that
Britain might not have wanted to preclude the possibility of retaliatory strikes against the civilian population of an aggressor, in case it happened again.
Oh wait.....turns out* it actually did! As sure as night follows day. Good call! Didn't see that one coming. Can any member of the class remind me who it was again?
Guernica, the Condor Legion strafing and bombing refugee columns of women and children for 'target practice' for the upcoming war for more 'Lebensraum' and Teutonic world domination, starting the most destructive conflict the world has ever seen (even outdoing the previously gruesome effort) ; civilian bombing of Warsaw, threatening to wipe the cities of the Netherlands off the map unless they surrendered, the list goes on. Not a leg to stand on, sorry......In terms of 'morality', so leave it out please.
If Germany had the capability to erase every British City from the planet, they would have done so without a moments hesitation, or a seconds thought....with no remorse. Fact. So the tragic 'violin tune' doesn't really cut it, nor will it elicit too much (worldwide) sympathy, I'm afraid. Maybe they did not understand that their actions would have such terrible repercussions and that they were not 'invincible'.....and maybe they should have 'thought things through' before embarking on their world domination 'jolly'.
What happened was terrible. War is terrible. That is all.