RAF Bomber crews remembered. Better late than never.

[arthursmedley]

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

Let's keep this civil guys.

I think these guys were neither 100% heroes nor 100% murderers, both terms get tossed around with too much ease nowadays. They were soldiers whose capabilities were used in a totally wrong and inefficient way by their commanders. Essentially, that is where the blame should go.

I once read a very interesting article on a quarterly aviation magazine (international air power review) about the Lancaster bomber. It concluded that post-war studies showed the bomber command campaign to be largely ineffective due to wrong priorities and assumptions.

It turned out that targeting civilians didn't really harm morale any more than it solidified their willpower to stand against what they perceived as a direct threat to their lives at any cost (the "rally around the flag" effect, if you are personally targeted you don't care that much about who runs your country but about surviving). It also resulted in loads of casualties (civilians and aircrews alike) for very small gains in terms of real operational factors. For example, German industrial production actually improved at some point during 43 or 44, in the midst of heavy bombings.

The article then described that bomber command's mistake was essentially using the right tools for the job, but a wrong job. Expensive 4-engined heavy bombers with crews of 7-10 men, who were vulnerable to flak and night fighters while lacking both the ability for precision night bombing and the defensive armament and durability for daylight raids (not to mention the lack of long range RAF escorts).

The final conclusion got me thinking, because it was a very obvious one but i hadn't really thought of it until that point. The RAF had a perfectly capable and highly versatile bomber that was precise (especially when using radio navigation equipment), fast, had long range and was much cheaper than the heavies, because it only had two engines and a crew of 2-3. The Mosquito which, along with the Ju88, probably ranks as the most versatile aircraft of WWII and one of the first truly multi-role designs.

If the industrial and human resources went towards building a fleet of Mosquitoes (it could carry as much as a B-17 by the way, so nothing to scoff at), the RAF would have probably twice or more the number of bombers than it actually had. Most of all, these bombers would be capable of accurately hitting industrial and military targets instead of leveling towns and killing civilians en masse, while at the same time if one went down the RAF was only 2 engines, some balsa wood and 2 men short, probably captured instead of dead thanks to it's docile handling.

In contrast, the Lancaster was designed with the sole aim of carrying as much as possible and was notorious for its abysmal crew survivability rates in the event of an emergency landing.

In the closing statement of the article, it was stated that the Lancaster was an indiscriminate bludgeon, while the Mosquito was a precision fencing sword.
It sure was one of the most interesting articles i've read in a while, i might go dig it up and reread it

Very good post Blackdog with some very interesting points. I think this is a topic worth debating especially at a time when this memorial has been unveiled and I fail to see why this can't be done here with civility.
From my personal point of view, as a Briton, I think the two major blots on Great Britains conduct during WW2 were the strategic bombing campaign and the Bengal famine of '43/44.

Today, with the benefit of hindsight, it's hard not to come to the conclusion that all those fifty-five thousand young men, the cream of Britain and it's Commonwealth's youth were our blood sacrifice in a horrible total war during which to obtain victory over Nazi Germany the Russians died by their millions, the Americans paid by the $billion and Britain was a very handy unsinkable aircraft carrier off the coast of north-west Europe.

I see someone has brought up the figure of six-hundred thousand civilian casualties and has been condemned for it. Unfortunately this is an inescapable truth. When broken down, the remarkable thing about the casualty statistics for these raids were their consistency. Approximately twenty per cent would be women, twenty per cent would be children, twenty per cent would be pensioners, twenty per cent would be PoW's and slave labourers. The remaining twenty per cent would be made up of slightly varying proportions of industrial workers, soldiers, schoolboys manning anti-aircraft batteries, etc.

Certainly Germany was forced to allocate a great deal of industrial production of ammunition, heavy artillery, advanced optics, electronics and fighter aircraft to resist these attacks but the German wartime economy was on a rising scale throughout the war as it started from such a low base.

Even if you think the cost of these civilian casualties was a price worth paying in order to divert this production it must be worth considering the effect of bomber command on Britains own war economy. Did bomber command do more harm to Britain than to Germany? Did the strategic bombing campaign help shorten the war or prolong it? At it's height, during the winter of '44/45 when bomber command was at it's most destructive - and it's contribution strategically irrelevant - the strategic bomber offensive consumed around twenty per cent of Britains war economy including nearly a million of it's most skilled engineers, scientists and the flower of our youth.

On the ground in Europe our armies were equipped with a good but Edwardian vintage rifle and the Sherman tank. A fighting vehicle inferior in almost every way bar the sheer numbers we deployed to anything the Germans had. Our armies were chronically short of infantrymen and skilled junior officers and NCO's too. The Americans suffered just the same short comings in this respect and were very aware of it too.

How did we get to this position? For the answer to that we must try and cast off the advantages of hindsight and return to the summer and autumn of 1940 when Britain did stand truly alone against a victorious German army that had now conquered western and central Europe.

The logic of our position then would have been to make terms with Hitler but we fought on and the only potential weapon available to us whilst we waited upon events was the aeroplane. I still find it remarkable that the tactical and strategic lessons we learned from winning the battle of Britain in the summer were promptly ignored in the following spring. The short range, single engined interceptor fighter was at a huge disadvantage after crossing over water into enemy territory and the civilian population could withstand concentrated bombing of urban areas without descending into social unrest that would force the politicians to call a halt to the war. Most importantly, we learned that aerial bombing was capable of damaging and destroying industrial buildings but it required a destructive force and an accuracy of a whole different magnitude to destroy the machine tools and equipment wherein and disrupt production in the face of a determined and organised workforce.

We seem to have cast these lessons aside and proceeded straight down the same road we had just defeated the Germans on!

[Sternjaeger II]

thank you for your wonderful post, it's good to see that there is other people here that can be objective about history without national bias.

[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.

[arthursmedley]

Originally Posted by bongodriver

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

I think there would always have been an allied bombing campaign. Aerial bombing has proved a most potent weapon of war. Not a war-winning weapon however. For that there is still no substitute for boots on the ground. We have seen that repeated over and over since the end of WW2.

What kind of campaign though? I think that is why Blackdogs post is so interesting. Remember, the air chiefs really did have the ability to shorten the war - constant air attacks on Germany's oil production - but failed to understand this until the closing months of the campaign.

[bongodriver]

Attacks on Germany's oil production only became more feasible in the latter stages though didn't it?, the Allies had gained enough ground from which to launch these campaigns by then, whereas a general bombing campaign of the German mainland was always possible as it was within range from the UK, the way I see it, and which helps rationalise it for me (because even I agree it all seemed like a waste) is that despite say only 20% of the damage inflicted by the bombing was effective against genuine German production it was really also about tying the Germans up in a defensive role, had the Germans not been forced into self defense they would have much more resource to pour into their offensive campaigns, I didn't get to watch the Stephen Fry documentary...not all of it anyway, but I think recall a mention that much of the bombing campaign was 'requested' by the Russians? for pretty much those reasons.

[arthursmedley]

Originally Posted by bongodriver

Attacks on Germany's oil production only became more feasible in the latter stages though didn't it?, the Allies had gained enough ground from which to launch these campaigns by then, whereas a general bombing campaign of the German mainland was always possible as it was within range from the UK, the way I see it, and which helps rationalise it for me (because even I agree it all seemed like a waste) is that despite say only 20% of the damage inflicted by the bombing was effective against genuine German production it was really also about tying the Germans up in a defensive role, had the Germans not been forced into self defense they would have much more resource to pour into their offensive campaigns, I didn't get to watch the Stephen Fry documentary...not all of it anyway, but I think recall a mention that much of the bombing campaign was 'requested' by the Russians? for pretty much those reasons.

Attacks on Germanys oil production were feasible from 1st. September 1939. It is true that Germanys only source of natural crude oil lay in Rumania, out of the range of bombers for the early years of the war but the large refining and synthetic oil plants were within our range. What we really lacked was any real understanding of the German war economy. In later 1941 and early 1942 it became apparent to the war cabinet that our bomber offensive was failing. The decision was taken, with a good deal of secrecy, to abandon 'precision' attacks on individual industrial targets and go for the area campaign where the targets were the civilian workers of these industrial areas and any actual damage to the industries themselves were seen as a useful by product of the campaign. It must also be remembered that Bomber Harris was not a party to these decisions but was brought in to implement them and to his credit constantly urged the politicians to tell the British public the unabashed truth behind the strategic bombing campaign.

The Russians constantly demanded a second front in Western Europe. Whilst Stalin seems to have enjoyed the books of allied photo-recon of bomb damaged German cities that Churchill constantly sent him he was well aware that only armies on the ground could defeat Germany.
Churchill used the SBC as a way of delaying a second front in western Europe for as long as he possibly could in the face of Russian and American demands to get on with an amphibious invasion of France. Both Churchill and his Chief of the Imperial General Staff Alanbrooke had a very healthy respect for the fighting power and tenacity of the Wermacht born from their experiences of the first world war. They were much more content (luckily for us) to let the Germans and Russians bleed themselves dry on the eastern front before committing our scant resources of men and material to an all out assualt on the European mainland once more.

[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.

[arthursmedley]

Originally Posted by Sternjaeger II

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..

Hmmm...not quite true but the perceived truth. An important difference, no?
Again, what we do know now is that by early 1945 the British night bomber offensive had reached a pitch of precision where our raids were actually
more accurate than the daylight campaign of the eighth airforce where overcast conditions meant that much of their bomb aiming was done by H2S through cloud with the same erratic results the RAF was getting at night in '41/42. The American command fully understood this too but to admit that would mean they could no longer state that "the strategic bomber was not being thrown at the (German) man in the street."

[bongodriver]

Originally Posted by arthursmedley

Hmmm...not quite true but the perceived truth. An important difference, no?
Again, what we do know now is that by early 1945 the British night bomber offensive had reached a pitch of precision where our raids were actually
more accurate than the daylight campaign of the eighth airforce where overcast conditions meant that much of their bomb aiming was done by H2S through cloud with the same erratic results the RAF was getting at night in '41/42. The American command fully understood this too but to admit that would mean they could no longer state that "the strategic bomber was not being thrown at the (German) man in the street."

I think the main point Stern was trying to emphasise is the British campaign was immoral and murderous, the RAF wasn't going after strategic targets but more after women and children and babies and family pets.

[Sternjaeger II]

Originally Posted by bongodriver

I think the main point Stern was trying to emphasise is the British campaign was immoral and murderous, the RAF wasn't going after strategic targets but more after women and children and babies and family pets.

Yep, it's the deliberate decision to attack civilian targets,not hitting them as collateral damage from pinpoint bombing that makes quite the difference.. but again it was done by the Americans as well. I find it somehow grotesque and really difficult to justify, condemning the Nazis for war crimes against civilians and then doing exactly the same thing..

And as usual the eloquence of Bewolf is spotless: it should be looked as a memorial about the casualties of that foolish campaign,not a "feel good" big monument.