RAF Bomber crews remembered. Better late than never.

[Sternjaeger II]

Originally Posted by bongodriver

It would be interesting to hear a hypothesis on what might have been 'without' an allied bombing campaign.

@Stern, be carefull with waving that 'national bias' flag again, so far there has been no need to mention it.

I was not referring to anyone in particular here, but it happened in the past.

Anyway, the Allied bombing campaign was made of two specific aspects: the pinpoint (more or less accurately) attack of strategic targets from the 8th Air Force and the systematic carpet bombing (AKA "de-housing") done by the RAF.

It's interesting how the Americans were reluctant to take part to it in the ETO but had no problem whatsoever in doing it over Japan..

It has been argued and demonstrated that the de-housing was a counterproductive technique (like the dambusters raids), and it was also argued in 1945 in the British Cabinet that after the war was over, the Allied would have been left with a pile of rubble to fix, which would have proved itself being costly and very difficult.

It's tough to justify all of that bloodshed mainly for retaliation and propaganda, not to mention trying to keep Stalin happy, but unfortunately that's what happened.