military strategy
Military strategy is a set of ideas implemented by military organizations to pursue desired strategic goals. Derived from the Greek word '' strategos'', the term strategy, when it appeared in use during the 18th century, was seen in its narrow s ...
used in
total war
Total war is a type of warfare that includes any and all civilian-associated resources and infrastructure as legitimate military targets, mobilizes all of the resources of society to fight the war, and gives priority to warfare over non-combata ...
with the goal of defeating the enemy by destroying its morale, its economic ability to produce and transport
materiel
Materiel (; ) refers to supplies, equipment, and weapons in military supply-chain management, and typically supplies and equipment in a commercial supply chain context.
In a military context, the term ''materiel'' refers either to the specifi ...
to the theatres of military operations, or both. It is a systematically organized and executed attack from the air which can utilize
strategic bomber
A strategic bomber is a medium- to long-range penetration bomber aircraft designed to drop large amounts of air-to-ground weaponry onto a distant target for the purposes of debilitating the enemy's capacity to wage war. Unlike tactical bombers, ...
s, long- or medium-range
missile
In military terminology, a missile is a guided airborne ranged weapon capable of self-propelled flight usually by a jet engine or rocket motor. Missiles are thus also called guided missiles or guided rockets (when a previously unguided rocket i ...
s, or nuclear-armed
fighter-bomber
A fighter-bomber is a fighter aircraft that has been modified, or used primarily, as a light bomber or attack aircraft. It differs from bomber and attack aircraft primarily in its origins, as a fighter that has been adapted into other roles, wh ...
aircraft to attack targets deemed vital to the enemy's war-making capability. The term terror bombing is used to describe the strategic bombing of civilian targets without military value, in the hope of damaging an enemy's morale.
One of the strategies of war is to demoralize the enemy so that peace or surrender becomes preferable to continuing the conflict. Strategic bombing has been used to this end. The phrase "terror bombing" entered the English lexicon towards the end of World War II and many strategic bombing campaigns and individual raids have been described as terror bombing by commentators and historians. Because the term has pejorative connotations, some, including the
Allies of World War II
The Allies, formally referred to as the United Nations from 1942, were an international military coalition formed during the Second World War (1939–1945) to oppose the Axis powers, led by Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy. ...
, have preferred to use
euphemisms
A euphemism () is an innocuous word or expression used in place of one that is deemed offensive or suggests something unpleasant. Some euphemisms are intended to amuse, while others use bland, inoffensive terms for concepts that the user wishes t ...
such as "will to resist" and "morale bombings".
The theoretical distinction between
tactical
Tactic(s) or Tactical may refer to:
* Tactic (method), a conceptual action implemented as one or more specific tasks
** Military tactics, the disposition and maneuver of units on a particular sea or battlefield
** Chess tactics
** Political tacti ...
and strategic
air warfare
Aerial warfare is the use of military aircraft and other flying machines in warfare. Aerial warfare includes bombers attacking enemy installations or a concentration of enemy troops or strategic targets; fighter aircraft battling for control o ...
was developed between the two world wars. Some leading theorists of strategic air warfare during this period were the Italian
Giulio Douhet
General Giulio Douhet (30 May 1869 – 15 February 1930) was an Italian general and air power theorist. He was a key proponent of strategic bombing in aerial warfare. He was a contemporary of the 1920s air warfare advocates Walther Wever, Billy ...
, the Trenchard school in the United Kingdom, and General
Billy Mitchell
William Lendrum Mitchell (December 29, 1879 – February 19, 1936) was a United States Army officer who is regarded as the father of the United States Air Force.
Mitchell served in France during World War I and, by the conflict's end, command ...
in the United States. These theorists were highly influential, both on the military justification for an independent air force (such as the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
) and in influencing political thoughts on a future war as exemplified by
Stanley Baldwin
Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, (3 August 186714 December 1947) was a British Conservative Party politician who dominated the government of the United Kingdom between the world wars, serving as prime minister on three occasions, ...
's 1932 comment that ''
the bomber will always get through
"The bomber will always get through" was a phrase used by Stanley Baldwin in a 1932 speech "A Fear for the Future" given to the British Parliament. His speech stated that contemporary bomber aircraft had the performance necessary to conduct a s ...
''.
Enemy morale
One of the aims of war is to demoralize the enemy; facing continual death and destruction may make the prospect of peace or surrender preferable. The proponents of strategic bombing between the world wars, such as General Douhet, expected that direct attacks upon an enemy country's cities by strategic bombers would lead to a rapid collapse of civilian morale so that political pressure to sue for peace would lead to a rapid conclusion. When such attacks were tried in the 1930s—in the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, lin ...
and the
Second Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) or War of Resistance (Chinese term) was a military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. The war made up the Chinese theater of the wider Pacific Th ...
—they were ineffective. Commentators observed the failures and some air forces, such as the
Luftwaffe
The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...
, concentrated their efforts upon direct support of the troops.
The term "terror bombing"
''Terror bombing'' is an emotive term used for aerial attacks planned to weaken or break enemy morale. Use of the term to refer to aerial attacks implies the attacks are criminal according to the
law of war
The law of war is the component of international law that regulates the conditions for initiating war (''jus ad bellum'') and the conduct of warring parties (''jus in bello''). Laws of war define sovereignty and nationhood, states and territor ...
, or if within the laws of war are nevertheless a moral crime. According to John Algeo in ''Fifty Years among the New Words: A Dictionary of Neologisms 1941–1991'', the first recorded usage of "Terror bombing" in a United States publication was in a ''
Reader's Digest
''Reader's Digest'' is an American general-interest family magazine, published ten times a year. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, it is now headquartered in midtown Manhattan. The magazine was founded in 1922 by DeWitt Wallace and his wi ...
'' article dated June 1941, a finding confirmed by the ''
Oxford English Dictionary
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a com ...
''.
Aerial attacks described as terror bombing are often long range strategic bombing raids, although attacks which result in the deaths of civilians may also be described as such, or if the attacks involve fighters
strafing
Strafing is the military practice of attacking ground targets from low-flying aircraft using aircraft-mounted automatic weapons.
Less commonly, the term is used by extension to describe high-speed firing runs by any land or naval craft such ...
they may be labelled "terror attacks".
German propaganda minister
Joseph Goebbels
Paul Joseph Goebbels (; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945) was a German Nazi politician who was the ''Gauleiter'' (district leader) of Berlin, chief propagandist for the Nazi Party, and then Reich Minister of Propaganda from 1933 to 19 ...
and other high-ranking officials of
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
frequently described attacks by the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
(RAF) and the
United States Army Air Forces
The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...
(USAAF) during their strategic bombing campaigns as ''Terrorangriffe''—terror attacks. Goebbels used several terms including
The Allied governments usually described their bombing of cities with other euphemisms such as
area bombing
In military aviation, area bombardment (or area bombing) is a type of aerial bombardment in which bombs are dropped over the general area of a target. The term "area bombing" came into prominence during World War II.
Area bombing is a form of str ...
(RAF) or
precision bombing
Precision bombing refers to the attempted aerial bombing of a target with some degree of accuracy, with the aim of maximising target damage or limiting collateral damage. An example would be destroying a single building in a built up area causing ...
(USAAF), and for most of World War II the Allied news media did the same. However, at a
SHAEF
Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF; ) was the headquarters of the Commander of Allied forces in north west Europe, from late 1943 until the end of World War II. U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower was the commander in SHAEF th ...
press conference on 16 February 1945, two days after the
bombing of Dresden
The bombing of Dresden was a joint British and American aerial bombing attack on the city of Dresden, the capital of the German state of Saxony, during World War II. In four raids between 13 and 15 February 1945, 772 heavy bombers of the Roya ...
, British Air Commodore
Colin McKay Grierson
Air Commodore Colin McKay Grierson CBE (16 June 19061991) was a senior officer in the Royal Air Force during and after World War II.
He joined the Royal Air Force (RAF) as an Aircraft Apprentice in 1921. In 1925 he became a Flight Cadet Sergean ...
replied to a question by one of the journalists that the primary target of the bombing had been on communications to prevent the Germans from moving military supplies and to stop movement in all directions if possible. He then added in an offhand remark that the raid also helped destroy "what is left of German morale." Howard Cowan, an
Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
war correspondent, filed a story about the Dresden raid. The military press censor at SHAEF made a mistake and allowed the Cowan cable to go out starting with "Allied air bosses have made the long awaited decision to adopt deliberate terror bombing of great German population centers as a ruthless expedient to hasten Hitler's doom." There were follow-up newspaper editorials on the issue and a longtime opponent of strategic bombing,
Richard Stokes Richard or Dick Stokes may refer to:
* Richard Stokes (politician), British soldier and politician
* Richard Stokes (producer), British television producer
* Richard Stokes (priest), English Anglican priest
* Dick Stokes (hurler), Irish hurler
* Dic ...
MP, asked questions in the House of Commons on 6 March.
The controversy stirred up by the Cowan news report reached the highest levels of the
British Government
ga, Rialtas a Shoilse gd, Riaghaltas a Mhòrachd
, image = HM Government logo.svg
, image_size = 220px
, image2 = Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom (HM Government).svg
, image_size2 = 180px
, caption = Royal Arms
, date_es ...
when on 28 March 1945 the Prime Minister,
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...
, sent a memo by telegram to General Ismay for the British Chiefs of Staff and the Chief of the Air Staff in which he started with the sentence "It seems to me that the moment has come when the question of bombing of German cities simply for the sake of increasing the terror, though under other pretexts, should be reviewed...."Siebert, Detlef "British Bombing Strategy in World War Two" 1 August 2001, BBC Under pressure from the Chiefs of Staff and in response to the views expressed by Chief of the Air Staff Sir
Charles Portal
Marshal of the Royal Air Force Charles Frederick Algernon Portal, 1st Viscount Portal of Hungerford, (21 May 1893 – 22 April 1971) was a senior Royal Air Force officer. He served as a bomber pilot in the First World War, and rose to become fi ...
, and the head of Bomber Command,
Arthur "Bomber" Harris
Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Arthur Travers Harris, 1st Baronet, (13 April 1892 – 5 April 1984), commonly known as "Bomber" Harris by the press and often within the RAF as "Butch" Harris, was Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief (AOC-in-C) ...
, among others, Churchill withdrew his memo and issued a new one. This was completed on 1 April 1945 and started instead with the usual euphemism used when referring to strategic bombing: "It seems to me that the moment has come when the question of the so called 'area-bombing' of German cities should be reviewed from the point of view of our own interests....".
Many strategic bombing campaigns and individual raids of
aerial warfare
Aerial warfare is the use of military aircraft and other flying machines in warfare. Aerial warfare includes bombers attacking enemy installations or a concentration of enemy troops or strategic targets; fighter aircraft battling for control o ...
have been described as "terror bombing" by commentators and historians since the end of World War II, but because the term has pejorative connotations, others have denied that such bombing campaigns and raids are examples of "terror bombing".
Defensive measures
Defensive measures against air raids include:
* attempting to shoot down attackers using
fighter aircraft
Fighter aircraft are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield ...
and
anti-aircraft guns
Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes surface based, ...
or
surface-to-air missiles
A surface-to-air missile (SAM), also known as a ground-to-air missile (GTAM) or surface-to-air guided weapon (SAGW), is a missile designed to be launched from the ground to destroy aircraft or other missiles. It is one type of anti-aircraft syst ...
* the use of
air raid shelter
Air raid shelters are structures for the protection of non-combatants as well as combatants against enemy attacks from the air. They are similar to bunkers in many regards, although they are not designed to defend against ground attack (but many ...
s to protect the population
*
air raid siren
A civil defense siren, also known as an air-raid siren or tornado siren, is a siren used to provide an emergency population warning to the general population of approaching danger. It is sometimes sounded again to indicate the danger has pas ...
s
* setting up civil defence organisations with air raid wardens, firewatchers, rescue and recovery personnel, firefighting crews, and demolition and repair teams to rectify damage
* Blackouts – extinguishing all lights at night to make bombing less accurate
* Dispersal of war-critical factories to areas difficult for bombers to reach
* Duplication of war-critical manufacturing to "shadow factories"
* Building factories in tunnels or other underground locations that are protected from bombs
* Setting up decoy targets in rural areas, mimicking an urban area with fires intended to look like the initial effects of a raid
History and origins
World War I
Strategic bombing was used in World War I, though it was not understood in its present form. The first aerial bombing of a city was on 6 August 1914 when the German Army Zeppelin Z VI bombed, with artillery shells, the Belgian city of
Liège
Liège ( , , ; wa, Lîdje ; nl, Luik ; german: Lüttich ) is a major city and municipality of Wallonia and the capital of the Belgian province of Liège.
The city is situated in the valley of the Meuse, in the east of Belgium, not far from b ...
, killing nine civilians. The second attack was on the night of 24–25 August 1914, when eight bombs were dropped from a German airship onto the Belgian city of
Antwerp
Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,
.
The first effective strategic bombing was pioneered by the
Royal Naval Air Service
The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) was the air arm of the Royal Navy, under the direction of the Admiralty's Air Department, and existed formally from 1 July 1914 to 1 April 1918, when it was merged with the British Army's Royal Flying Corps t ...
(RNAS) in 1914. The mission was to attack the
Zeppelin
A Zeppelin is a type of rigid airship named after the German inventor Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin () who pioneered rigid airship development at the beginning of the 20th century. Zeppelin's notions were first formulated in 1874Eckener 1938, pp ...
production lines and their
sheds
A shed is typically a simple, single-story roofed structure that is used for hobbies, or as a workshop in a back garden or on an allotment. Sheds vary considerably in their size and complexity of construction, from simple open-sided ones de ...
at
Cologne
Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...
(Köln) and
Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in th ...
. Led by
Charles Rumney Samson
Air Commodore Charles Rumney Samson, (8 July 1883 – 5 February 1931) was a British naval aviation pioneer. He was one of the first four officers selected for pilot training by the Royal Navy and was the first person to fly an aircraft fr ...
, the force of four aircraft inflicted minor damage on the sheds. The raid was repeated a month later with slightly more success. Within a year or so, specialized aircraft and dedicated
bomber
A bomber is a military combat aircraft designed to attack ground and naval targets by dropping air-to-ground weaponry (such as bombs), launching aerial torpedo, torpedoes, or deploying air-launched cruise missiles. The first use of bombs dropped ...
squadrons were in service on both sides. These were generally used for tactical bombing; the aim was that of directly harming enemy troops, strongpoints, or equipment, usually within a relatively small distance of the front line. Eventually, attention turned to the possibility of causing ''indirect'' harm to the enemy by systematically attacking vital rear-area resources.
The most well known attacks were those done by Zeppelins over England through the course of the war. The first aerial bombardment of English civilians was on January 19, 1915, when two Zeppelins dropped 24 fifty-kilogram (110-pound)
high-explosive
An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An expl ...
bombs and ineffective three-kilogram incendiaries on the Eastern England towns of
Great Yarmouth
Great Yarmouth (), often called Yarmouth, is a seaside town and unparished area in, and the main administrative centre of, the Borough of Great Yarmouth in Norfolk, England; it straddles the River Yare and is located east of Norwich. A pop ...
,
Sheringham
Sheringham (; population 7,367) is an English seaside town within the county of Norfolk, United Kingdom.Ordnance Survey (2002). ''OS Explorer Map 252 - Norfolk Coast East''. . The motto of the town, granted in 1953 to the Sheringham Urban Distr ...
,
King's Lynn
King's Lynn, known until 1537 as Bishop's Lynn and colloquially as Lynn, is a port and market town in the borough of King's Lynn and West Norfolk in the county of Norfolk, England. It is located north of London, north-east of Peterborough, no ...
, and the surrounding villages. In all, four people were killed and sixteen injured, and monetary damage was estimated at £7,740 (about US$36,000 at the time). German airships also bombed on other fronts, for example in January 1915 on
Liepāja
Liepāja (; liv, Līepõ; see #Names and toponymy, other names) is a state city in western Latvia, located on the Baltic Sea. It is the largest-city in the Kurzeme Planning Region, Kurzeme Region and the third-largest city in the country after R ...
in Latvia.
In 1915 there were 19 more raids, in which 37 tons of bombs were dropped, killing 181 people and injuring 455. Raids continued in 1916. London was accidentally bombed in May, and in July the Kaiser allowed directed raids against urban centers. There were 23 airship raids in 1916, in which 125 tons of ordnance were dropped, killing 293 people and injuring 691. Gradually British air defenses improved. In 1917 and 1918, there were only 11 Zeppelin raids against England, and the final raid occurred on August 5, 1918, which resulted in the death of KK
Peter Strasser
Peter Strasser (1 April 1876 – 5 August 1918) was chief commander of German Imperial Navy Zeppelins during World War I, the main force operating bombing campaigns from 1915 to 1917. He was killed when flying the German Empire's last airsh ...
, commander of the German Naval Airship Department.
By the end of the war, 51 raids had been undertaken, in which 5,806 bombs were dropped, killing 557 people and injuring 1,358. These raids caused only minor hampering of wartime production, by later standards. A much greater impact was the diversion of twelve aircraft squadrons, many guns, and over 10,000 men to air defenses. The raids generated a wave of hysteria, partially caused by media. This revealed the tactic's potential as a weapon that was of use for propagandists on both sides. The late Zeppelin raids were complemented by the
Gotha
Gotha () is the fifth-largest city in Thuringia, Germany, west of Erfurt and east of Eisenach with a population of 44,000. The city is the capital of the district of Gotha and was also a residence of the Ernestine Wettins from 1640 until the ...
bomber, which was the first
heavier-than-air
An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to fly by gaining support from the air. It counters the force of gravity by using either static lift or by using the dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in a few cases the downward thrust from jet engines. C ...
bomber to be used for strategic bombing.
The French army on June 15, 1915, attacked the German town of
Karlsruhe
Karlsruhe ( , , ; South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the third-largest city of the German state (''Land'') of Baden-Württemberg after its capital of Stuttgart and Mannheim, and the 22nd-largest city in the nation, with 308,436 inhabitants. ...
, killing 29 civilians and wounding 58. Further raids followed until the Armistice in 1918. In a raid in the afternoon of June 22, 1916, the pilots used outdated maps and bombed the location of the abandoned railway station, where a
circus
A circus is a company of performers who put on diverse entertainment shows that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, ventriloquists, and unicyclist ...
tent was placed, killing 120 persons, most of them children.
The British also stepped up their strategic bombing campaign. In late 1915, the order was given for attacks on German industrial targets, and the 41st Wing was formed from units of the RNAS and
Royal Flying Corps
"Through Adversity to the Stars"
, colors =
, colours_label =
, march =
, mascot =
, anniversaries =
, decorations ...
. The RNAS took to the strategic bombing in a bigger way than the RFC, who were focused on supporting the infantry actions of the Western Front. At first, the RNAS attacked the German submarines in their moorings and then steelworks further in targeting the origin of the submarines themselves.
In early 1918 they operated their "round the clock" bombing raid, with lighter bombers attacking the town of
Trier
Trier ( , ; lb, Tréier ), formerly known in English as Trèves ( ;) and Triers (see also names in other languages), is a city on the banks of the Moselle in Germany. It lies in a valley between low vine-covered hills of red sandstone in the ...
by day and large HP O/400s attacking by night. The
Independent Force
The Independent Air Force (IAF), also known as the Independent Force or the Independent Bombing Force and later known as the Inter-Allied Independent Air Force, was a First World War strategic bombing force which was part of Britain's Royal Air ...
, an expanded bombing group, and the first independent strategic bombing force, was created in April 1918. By the end of the war, the force had aircraft that could reach
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, but these were never used.
Interbellum
Following the war, the concept of strategic bombing developed. Calculations of the number of dead to the weight of bombs would have a profound effect on the attitudes of the British authorities and population in the interwar years. As bombers became larger, it was fully expected that deaths would dramatically increase. The fear of aerial attack on such a scale was one of the fundamental driving forces of the
appeasement
Appeasement in an international context is a diplomatic policy of making political, material, or territorial concessions to an aggressive power in order to avoid conflict. The term is most often applied to the foreign policy of the UK governm ...
of
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
in the 1930s.
These early developments of
aerial warfare
Aerial warfare is the use of military aircraft and other flying machines in warfare. Aerial warfare includes bombers attacking enemy installations or a concentration of enemy troops or strategic targets; fighter aircraft battling for control o ...
led to two distinct branches in the writings of air warfare theorists: tactical air warfare and strategic air warfare. Tactical air warfare was developed as part of a combined-arms attack which would be developed to a significant degree by
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
, and which contributed much to the success of the
Wehrmacht
The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previous ...
during the first four years (1939–42) of World War II. The
Luftwaffe
The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...
became a major element of the German
blitzkrieg
Blitzkrieg ( , ; from 'lightning' + 'war') is a word used to describe a surprise attack using a rapid, overwhelming force concentration that may consist of armored and motorized or mechanized infantry formations, together with close air su ...
.
Some leading theorists of strategic air warfare, namely strategic bombing during this period were the Italian
Giulio Douhet
General Giulio Douhet (30 May 1869 – 15 February 1930) was an Italian general and air power theorist. He was a key proponent of strategic bombing in aerial warfare. He was a contemporary of the 1920s air warfare advocates Walther Wever, Billy ...
, the Trenchard school in Great Britain, and General
Billy Mitchell
William Lendrum Mitchell (December 29, 1879 – February 19, 1936) was a United States Army officer who is regarded as the father of the United States Air Force.
Mitchell served in France during World War I and, by the conflict's end, command ...
in the United States. These theorists thought that aerial bombardment of the enemy's homeland would be an important part of future wars. Not only would such attacks weaken the enemy by destroying important military infrastructure, they would also break the morale of the civilian population, forcing their government to capitulate. Although area bombing theorists acknowledged that measures could be taken to defend against bombers—using
fighter plane
Fighter aircraft are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield p ...
s and
anti-aircraft artillery
Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes surface based, ...
—the maxim of the times remained "
the bomber will always get through
"The bomber will always get through" was a phrase used by Stanley Baldwin in a 1932 speech "A Fear for the Future" given to the British Parliament. His speech stated that contemporary bomber aircraft had the performance necessary to conduct a s ...
". These theorists for strategic bombing argued that it would be necessary to develop a fleet of
strategic bomber
A strategic bomber is a medium- to long-range penetration bomber aircraft designed to drop large amounts of air-to-ground weaponry onto a distant target for the purposes of debilitating the enemy's capacity to wage war. Unlike tactical bombers, ...
s during peacetime, both to deter any potential enemy, and also in the case of a war, to be able to deliver devastating attacks on the enemy industries and cities while suffering from relatively few friendly casualties before victory was achieved.
In the period between the two world wars, military thinkers from several nations advocated strategic bombing as the logical and obvious way to employ aircraft. Domestic political considerations saw to it that the British worked harder on the concept than most. The British
Royal Flying Corps
"Through Adversity to the Stars"
, colors =
, colours_label =
, march =
, mascot =
, anniversaries =
, decorations ...
and
Royal Naval Air Service
The Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) was the air arm of the Royal Navy, under the direction of the Admiralty's Air Department, and existed formally from 1 July 1914 to 1 April 1918, when it was merged with the British Army's Royal Flying Corps t ...
of the Great War had been merged in 1918 to create a separate air force, which spent much of the following two decades fighting for survival in an environment of severe government spending constraints.
In Italy, the airpower prophet General
Giulio Douhet
General Giulio Douhet (30 May 1869 – 15 February 1930) was an Italian general and air power theorist. He was a key proponent of strategic bombing in aerial warfare. He was a contemporary of the 1920s air warfare advocates Walther Wever, Billy ...
asserted the basic principle of strategic bombing was the offensive, and there was no defense against carpet bombing and
poison gas
Many gases have toxic properties, which are often assessed using the LC50 (median lethal dose) measure. In the United States, many of these gases have been assigned an NFPA 704 health rating of 4 (may be fatal) or 3 (may cause serious or perman ...
attacks. The seeds of Douhet's apocalyptic predictions found fertile soil in France, Germany, and the United States, where excerpts from his book ''The Command of the Air'' (1921) were published. These visions of cities laid waste by bombing also gripped the popular imagination and found expression in novels such as Douhet's ''
The War of 19--
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...
The Shape of Things to Come
''The Shape of Things to Come'' is a work of science fiction by British writer H. G. Wells, published in 1933. It takes the form of a future history which ends in 2106.
Synopsis
A long economic slump causes a major war that leaves Europe dev ...
'' (1933) (filmed by
Alexander Korda
Sir Alexander Korda (; born Sándor László Kellner; hu, Korda Sándor; 16 September 1893 – 23 January 1956)Things to Come'' (1936)).
Douhet's proposals were hugely influential among air force enthusiasts, arguing as they did that the bombing air arm was the most important, powerful, and invulnerable part of any military. He envisaged future wars as lasting a matter of a few weeks. While each opposing Army and Navy fought an inglorious holding campaign, the respective Air Forces would dismantle their enemies' country, and if one side did not rapidly surrender, both would be so weak after the first few days that the war would effectively cease. Fighter aircraft would be relegated to spotting patrols but would be essentially powerless to resist the mighty bombers. In support of this theory, he argued for targeting of the civilian population as much as any military target, since a nation's morale was as important a resource as its weapons. Paradoxically, he suggested that this would actually reduce total casualties, since "The time would soon come when to put an end to horror and suffering, the people themselves, driven by the instinct of self-preservation, would rise up and demand an end to the war...". As a result of Douhet's proposals,
air force
An air force – in the broadest sense – is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an a ...
s allocated greater resources to their bomber squadrons than to their fighters, and the 'dashing young pilots' promoted in the propaganda of the time were invariably bomber pilots.
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
leaders, in particular Air Chief Marshal
Hugh Trenchard
Marshal of the Royal Air Force Hugh Montague Trenchard, 1st Viscount Trenchard, (3 February 1873 – 10 February 1956) was a British officer who was instrumental in establishing the Royal Air Force. He has been described as the "Father of the ...
, believed the key to retaining their independence from the senior services was to lay stress on what they saw as the unique ability of a modern air force to win wars by unaided strategic bombing. As the speed and altitude of bombers increased in proportion to fighter aircraft, the prevailing strategic understanding became "the bomber will always get through". Although anti-aircraft guns and fighter aircraft had proved effective in the Great War, it was accepted there was little warring nations could do to prevent massive civilian casualties from strategic bombing. High civilian morale and retaliation in kind were seen as the only answers—a later generation would revisit this, as
Mutual Assured Destruction
Mutual assured destruction (MAD) is a doctrine of military strategy and national security policy which posits that a full-scale use of nuclear weapons by an attacker on a nuclear-armed defender with second-strike capabilities would cause the ...
.
During the interwar period (1919–1939), the use of
aerial bombing
An airstrike, air strike or air raid is an offensive operation carried out by aircraft. Air strikes are delivered from aircraft such as blimps, balloons, Fighter aircraft, fighters, bomber, heavy bombers, ground attack aircraft, attack helicopter ...
was developed as part of British foreign policy in its colonies, with
Hugh Trenchard
Marshal of the Royal Air Force Hugh Montague Trenchard, 1st Viscount Trenchard, (3 February 1873 – 10 February 1956) was a British officer who was instrumental in establishing the Royal Air Force. He has been described as the "Father of the ...
as its leading proponent,
Sir Charles Portal
Marshal of the Royal Air Force Charles Frederick Algernon Portal, 1st Viscount Portal of Hungerford, (21 May 1893 – 22 April 1971) was a senior Royal Air Force officer. He served as a bomber pilot in the First World War, and rose to become fi ...
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the F ...
(modern-day
Iraq
Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...
) where RAF bombers used high-explosive bombs and strafing runs against Arab forces. The techniques of so-called "Air Control" included also target marking and locating, as well as formation flying. Arthur Harris, a young RAF squadron commander (later nicknamed "Bomber"), reported after a mission in 1924, "The Arab and Kurd now know what real bombing means, in casualties and damage. They know that within 45 minutes a full-sized village can be practically wiped out and a third of its inhabitants killed or injured".
Despite such statements, in reality, RAF forces took great care when striking at targets. RAF directives stressed:
A statement clearly pointed out that the ability of aircraft to inflict punishment could be open to abuse:
In strikes over
Yemen
Yemen (; ar, ٱلْيَمَن, al-Yaman), officially the Republic of Yemen,, ) is a country in Western Asia. It is situated on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, and borders Saudi Arabia to the Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, north and ...
in over a six-month period, sixty tons of bombs were dropped in over 1,200 cumulative flying hours. By August 1928, total losses in ground fighting and air attack, on the Yemeni side, were 65 killed or wounded (one RAF pilot was killed and one airman wounded). Between the wars the RAF conducted 26 separate air operations within the Aden Protectorate. The majority were conducted in response to persistent banditry or to restore the Government's authority. Excluding operations against Yemeni forces—which had effectively ceased by 1934—a total of twelve deaths were attributed to air attacks conducted between 1919 and 1939. Bombing as a military strategy proved to be an effective and efficient way for the British to police their Middle East protectorates in the 1920s. Fewer men were required as compared to ground forces.
Pre-war planners, on the whole, vastly overestimated the damage bombers could do, and underestimated the resilience of civilian populations. Jingoistic national pride played a major role: for example, at a time when Germany was still disarmed and France was Britain's only European rival, Trenchard boasted, "the French in a bombing duel would probably squeal before we did".Johnson, ''History of Air Fighting''. At the time, the expectation was any new war would be brief and very brutal. A British Cabinet planning document in 1938 predicted that, if war with Germany broke out, 35% of British homes would be hit by bombs in the first three weeks. This type of expectation would justify the
appeasement
Appeasement in an international context is a diplomatic policy of making political, material, or territorial concessions to an aggressive power in order to avoid conflict. The term is most often applied to the foreign policy of the UK governm ...
of
Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...
in the late 1930s.
During the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, lin ...
, the
bombing of Guernica
On 26 April 1937, the Basque town of Guernica (''Gernika'' in Basque) was aerial bombed during the Spanish Civil War. It was carried out at the behest of Francisco Franco's rebel Nationalist faction by its allies, the Nazi German Luftwaffe's ...
by German aviators including the
Condor Legion
The Condor Legion (german: Legion Condor) was a unit composed of military personnel from the air force and army of Nazi Germany, which served with the Nationalist faction during the Spanish Civil War of July 1936 to March 1939. The Condor Legio ...
, under Nationalist command, resulted in its near destruction. Casualties were estimated to be between 500 and 1500. Though this figure was relatively small, aerial bombers and their weaponry were continually improving—already suggesting the devastation that was to come in the near future. Yet the theory that "
the bomber will always get through
"The bomber will always get through" was a phrase used by Stanley Baldwin in a 1932 speech "A Fear for the Future" given to the British Parliament. His speech stated that contemporary bomber aircraft had the performance necessary to conduct a s ...
" started to appear doubtful, as stated by the U.S. Attaché in 1937, "The peacetime theory of the complete invulnerability of the modern type of bombardment airplane no longer holds. The increased speeds of both the bombardment and pursuit plane have worked in favor of the pursuit ... The flying fortress died in Spain."
Large scale bombing of the civilian population, thought to be demoralizing to the enemy, seemed to have the opposite effect. Dr. E. B. Strauss surmised, "Observers state that one of the most remarkable effects of the bombing of open towns in Government Spain had been the welding together into a formidable fighting force of groups of political factions who were previously at each other's throats...", a sentiment with which
Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...
's
Luftwaffe
The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...
, supporting the Spanish Nationalists, generally agreed.
World War II
The strategic bombing conducted in World War II was unlike any before. The campaigns conducted in Europe and Asia could involve aircraft dropping thousands of tons of conventional bombs or a
nuclear weapon
A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions ( thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bom ...
over a single city.
Area bombardment came to prominence during World War II with the use of large numbers of unguided
gravity bomb
An unguided bomb, also known as a free-fall bomb, gravity bomb, dumb bomb, or iron bomb, is a conventional or nuclear aircraft-delivered bomb that does not contain a guidance system and hence simply follows a ballistic trajectory. This described ...
s, often with a high proportion of
incendiary device
Incendiary weapons, incendiary devices, incendiary munitions, or incendiary bombs are weapons designed to start fires or destroy sensitive equipment using fire (and sometimes used as anti-personnel weaponry), that use materials such as napalm, th ...
s, to bomb the target region indiscriminately—to kill war workers, destroy
materiel
Materiel (; ) refers to supplies, equipment, and weapons in military supply-chain management, and typically supplies and equipment in a commercial supply chain context.
In a military context, the term ''materiel'' refers either to the specifi ...
, and demoralize the enemy. In high enough concentration, it was capable of producing a
firestorm
A firestorm is a conflagration which attains such intensity that it creates and sustains its own wind system. It is most commonly a natural phenomenon, created during some of the largest bushfires and wildfires. Although the term has been used ...
. The high explosives were often
delay-action bomb A delay-action bomb is an aerial bomb designed to explode some time after impact, with the bomb's fuzes set to delay the explosion for times ranging from very brief to several weeks. Short delays are used to allow the bomb to penetrate before explod ...
s intended to kill or intimidate those fighting the fires caused by incendiaries.
At first this required multiple aircraft, often returning to the target in waves. Nowadays, a large bomber or missile can be used to the same effect on a small area (an airfield, for example) by releasing a relatively large number of smaller bombs.
Strategic bombing campaigns were conducted in Europe and Asia. The Germans and Japanese made use of mostly twin-engined bombers with a payload generally less than , and never produced larger craft to any great extent. By comparison, the British and Americans (who started the war with predominantly similarly sized bombers) developed their strategic force based upon much larger four-engined bombers for their strategic campaigns. The payload carried by these planes ranged from for the
B-17 Flying Fortress
The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress is a four-engined heavy bomber developed in the 1930s for the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC). Relatively fast and high-flying for a bomber of its era, the B-17 was used primarily in the European Theater ...
on long-range missions, to for the
B-24 Liberator
The Consolidated B-24 Liberator is an American heavy bomber, designed by Consolidated Aircraft of San Diego, California. It was known within the company as the Model 32, and some initial production aircraft were laid down as export models des ...
, for the
Avro Lancaster
The Avro Lancaster is a British Second World War heavy bomber. It was designed and manufactured by Avro as a contemporary of the Handley Page Halifax, both bombers having been developed to the same specification, as well as the Short Stirlin ...
, and
B-29 Superfortress
The Boeing B-29 Superfortress is an American four-engined propeller-driven heavy bomber, designed by Boeing and flown primarily by the United States during World War II and the Korean War. Named in allusion to its predecessor, the B-17 Fl ...
, with some specialized aircraft, such as the 'Special B' Avro Lancaster carrying the
Grand Slam
Grand Slam most often refers to:
* Grand Slam (tennis), one player or pair winning all four major annual tournaments, or the tournaments themselves
Grand Slam or Grand slam may also refer to:
Games and sports
* Grand slam, winning category te ...
.
During the first year of the war in Europe, strategic bombing was developed through trial and error. The
Luftwaffe
The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...
had been attacking both civilian and military targets from the very first day of the war, when Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939. A strategic-bombing campaign was launched by the Germans as a precursor to the invasion of the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
to force the
RAF
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
to engage the Luftwaffe and so be destroyed either on the ground or in the air. That tactic failed, and the RAF began bombing German cities on 11 May 1940. After the
Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain, also known as the Air Battle for England (german: die Luftschlacht um England), was a military campaign of the Second World War, in which the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the Fleet Air Arm (FAA) of the Royal Navy defende ...
, the Germans launched their night time
Blitz
Blitz, German for "lightning", may refer to:
Military uses
*Blitzkrieg, blitz campaign, or blitz, a type of military campaign
*The Blitz, the German aerial campaign against Britain in the Second World War
*, an Imperial German Navy light cruiser b ...
hoping to break British morale and to have the British be cowed into making peace.
At first the Luftwaffe raids took place in daylight, but changed to night bombing attacks when losses became unsustainable. The RAF, who had preferred precision bombing, also switched to night bombing, also due to excessive losses. Before the
Rotterdam Blitz
Rotterdam was subjected to heavy aerial bombardment by the ''Luftwaffe'' during the German invasion of the Netherlands in World War II. The objective was to support the German troops fighting in the city, break Dutch resistance and force the Du ...
on 14 May 1940 the British restricted themselves to tactical bombing west of the Rhine and naval installations. The day after the Rotterdam Blitz a new directive was issued to the RAF to attack targets in the
Ruhr
The Ruhr ( ; german: Ruhrgebiet , also ''Ruhrpott'' ), also referred to as the Ruhr area, sometimes Ruhr district, Ruhr region, or Ruhr valley, is a polycentric urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With a population density of 2,800/km ...
, including oil plants and other civilian
industrial
Industrial may refer to:
Industry
* Industrial archaeology, the study of the history of the industry
* Industrial engineering, engineering dealing with the optimization of complex industrial processes or systems
* Industrial city, a city dominate ...
targets which aided the German war effort, such as
blast furnace
A blast furnace is a type of metallurgical furnace used for smelting to produce industrial metals, generally pig iron, but also others such as lead or copper. ''Blast'' refers to the combustion air being "forced" or supplied above atmospheric ...
s that at night were self-illuminating. After the
Butt Report
The Butt Report, released on 18 August 1941, was a report prepared during World War II, revealing the widespread failure of RAF Bomber Command aircraft to hit their targets.
At the start of the war, Bomber Command had no real means of determini ...
(released in September 1941) proved the inadequacy of
RAF Bomber Command
RAF Bomber Command controlled the Royal Air Force's bomber forces from 1936 to 1968. Along with the United States Army Air Forces, it played the central role in the strategic bombing of Germany in World War II. From 1942 onward, the British bo ...
training methods and equipment, the RAF adopted an area-attack strategy, by which it hoped to impede Germany's war production, her powers of resistance (by destroying resources and forcing Germany to divert resources from her front lines to defend her air space), and her morale. The RAF dramatically improved its navigation so that on average its bombs hit closer to target. Accuracy never exceeded a radius from point of aim in any case.Hastings, ''Bomber Command''
The
United States Army Air Forces
The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...
adopted a policy of daylight
precision bombing
Precision bombing refers to the attempted aerial bombing of a target with some degree of accuracy, with the aim of maximising target damage or limiting collateral damage. An example would be destroying a single building in a built up area causing ...
for greater accuracy as, for example, during the
Schweinfurt
Schweinfurt ( , ; ) is a city in the district of Lower Franconia in Bavaria, Germany. It is the administrative centre of the surrounding district (''Landkreis'') of Schweinfurt and a major industrial, cultural and educational hub. The urban agg ...
raids. That doctrine, based on the erroneous supposition that bombers could adequately defend themselves against air attack, entailed much higher American losses until long-range fighter escorts (e.g. the
Mustang
The mustang is a free-roaming horse of the Western United States, descended from horses brought to the Americas by the Spanish. Mustangs are often referred to as wild horses, but because they are descended from once-domesticated animals, they ...
) became available. Conditions in the European theatre made it very difficult to achieve the accuracy achieved using the exceptional and top-secret Norden optical bombsight in the clear skies over the desert bombing ranges of Nevada and California. Raids over Europe commonly took place in conditions of very poor visibility, with targets partly or wholly obscured by thick cloud, smokescreens, or smoke from fires started by previous raids. As a result, bomb loads were regularly dropped "blind" using dead-reckoning methods little different from those used by the RAF night bombers. In addition, only the leading bomber in a formation actually utilized the Norden sight, the rest of the formation dropping their bombs only when they saw the lead aircraft's bombload falling away. Since even a very tight bomber formation could cover a vast area, the scatter of bombs was likely to be considerable. Add to these difficulties the disruptive effects of increasingly accurate anti-aircraft fire and head-on attacks by fighter aircraft and the theoretical accuracy of daylight bombing was often hard to achieve. Accuracy, described as "pinpoint", never exceeded the best British average of about a radius from point of aim in any case. Postwar German engineers considered the bombing of railways, trains, canals, and roads more harmful to production than attacks on factories themselves, Sir
Roy Fedden
Sir Alfred Hubert Roy Fedden MBE, FRAeS (6 June 1885 – 21 November 1973) was an engineer who designed most of Bristol Engine Company's successful piston aircraft engine designs.
Early life
Fedden was born in the Bristol area to fairly wealthy ...
(in his report on a postwar British scientific intelligence mission) calling it "fatal" and saying it reduced aero-engine production by two thirds (from a maximum output of 5,000 to 7,000 a month).
Strategic bombing was a way of taking the war into Europe while Allied ground forces were unable to do so. Between them, Allied air forces claimed to be able to bomb "around the clock". In fact, few targets were ever hit by British and American forces the same day, the strategic isolation of Normandy on
D-Day
The Normandy landings were the landing operations and associated airborne operations on Tuesday, 6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. Codenamed Operation Neptune and often referred to as D ...
and the bombing of Dresden in February 1945 being exceptions rather than the rule. There were generally no coordinated plans for the around-the-clock bombing of any target.
In some cases, single missions have been considered to constitute strategic bombing. The bombing of Peenemünde was such an event, as was the bombing of the Ruhr dams. The Peenemünde mission delayed Nazi Germany's
V-2
The V-2 (german: Vergeltungswaffe 2, lit=Retaliation Weapon 2), with the technical name ''Aggregat 4'' (A-4), was the world’s first long-range guided ballistic missile. The missile, powered by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, was developed ...
program enough that it did not become a major factor in the outcome of the war.
Strategic bombing in Europe never reached the decisive completeness the American campaign against Japan achieved, helped in part by the fragility of
Japanese housing
Housing in Japan includes modern and traditional styles. Two patterns of residences are predominant in contemporary Japan: the single-family detached house and the multiple-unit building, either owned by an individual or corporation and rente ...
, which was particularly vulnerable to
firebombing
Firebombing is a bombing technique designed to damage a target, generally an urban area, through the use of fire, caused by incendiary devices, rather than from the blast effect of large bombs.
In popular usage, any act in which an incendiary ...
through the use of
incendiary device
Incendiary weapons, incendiary devices, incendiary munitions, or incendiary bombs are weapons designed to start fires or destroy sensitive equipment using fire (and sometimes used as anti-personnel weaponry), that use materials such as napalm, th ...
s. The destruction of German infrastructure became apparent, but the Allied campaign against Germany only really succeeded when the Allies began targeting oil refineries and transportation in the last year of the war. At the same time, the strategic bombing of Germany was used as a morale booster for the Allies in the period before the land war resumed in Western Europe in June 1944.
In the
Asiatic-Pacific Theater
The Asiatic-Pacific Theater was the theater of operations of U.S. forces during World War II in the Pacific War during 1941–1945. From mid-1942 until the end of the war in 1945, two U.S. operational commands were in the Pacific. The Pacific O ...
, the
Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service
The was the Naval aviation, air arm of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN). The organization was responsible for the operation of naval aircraft and the conduct of aerial warfare in the Pacific War.
The Japanese military acquired their first air ...
and the
Imperial Japanese Army Air Service
The Imperial Japanese Army Air Service (IJAAS) or Imperial Japanese Army Air Force (IJAAF; ja, 大日本帝國陸軍航空部隊, Dainippon Teikoku Rikugun Kōkūbutai, lit=Greater Japan Empire Army Air Corps) was the aviation force of the Im ...
frequently used strategic bombing over Singaporean, Burmese, and Chinese cities such as
Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flow ...
,
Guangzhou
Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong Kon ...
,
Nanjing
Nanjing (; , Mandarin pronunciation: ), alternately romanized as Nanking, is the capital of Jiangsu province of the People's Republic of China. It is a sub-provincial city, a megacity, and the second largest city in the East China region. T ...
,
Chongqing
Chongqing ( or ; ; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), Postal Romanization, alternately romanized as Chungking (), is a Direct-administered municipalities of China, municipality in Southwes ...
,
Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...
, and
Rangoon
Yangon ( my, ရန်ကုန်; ; ), formerly spelled as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar (also known as Burma). Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government ...
. However, the Japanese military in most places advanced quickly enough that a strategic bombing campaign was unnecessary, and the Japanese aircraft industry was incapable of producing truly strategic bombers in any event. In those places where it was required, the smaller Japanese bombers (in comparison to British and American types) did not carry a bombload sufficient to inflict the sort of damage regularly occurring at that point in the war in Europe, or later in Japan.
The development of the B-29 gave the United States a bomber with sufficient range to reach the Japanese home islands from the safety of American bases in the Pacific or western China. The capture of the Japanese island of
Iwo Jima
Iwo Jima (, also ), known in Japan as , is one of the Japanese Volcano Islands and lies south of the Bonin Islands. Together with other islands, they form the Ogasawara Archipelago. The highest point of Iwo Jima is Mount Suribachi at high.
...
further enhanced the capabilities that the Americans possessed in their strategic bombing campaign. High-explosive and incendiary bombs were used against Japan to devastating effect, with greater indiscriminate loss of life in the
firebombing of Tokyo
The was a series of firebombing air raids by the United States Army Air Force during the Pacific campaigns of World War II. Operation Meetinghouse, which was conducted on the night of 9–10 March 1945, is the single most destructive bombing ...
on March 9/10, 1945 than was caused either by the Dresden mission, or the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Unlike the USAAF's strategic bombing campaign in Europe, with its avowed (if unachievable) objective of precision bombing of strategic targets, the bombing of Japanese cities involved the deliberate targeting of residential zones from the outset. Bomb loads included very high proportions of incendiaries, with the intention of igniting the highly combustible wooden houses common in Japanese cities and thereby generating firestorms.
The final development of strategic bombing in World War II was the use of nuclear weapons. On August 6 and 9, 1945, the United States exploded nuclear bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing 105,000 people and inflicting a psychological shock on the Japanese nation. On August 15, Emperor
Hirohito
Emperor , commonly known in English-speaking countries by his personal name , was the 124th emperor of Japan, ruling from 25 December 1926 until his death in 1989. Hirohito and his wife, Empress Kōjun, had two sons and five daughters; he was ...
announced the
surrender of Japan
The surrender of the Empire of Japan in World War II was announced by Emperor Hirohito on 15 August and formally signed on 2 September 1945, bringing the war's hostilities to a close. By the end of July 1945, the Imperial Japanese Navy ...
Moreover, the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the power of which to do damage is indeed incalculable, taking the toll of many innocent lives. Should We continue to fight, it would not only result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation but also it would lead to the total extinction of human civilization. Such being the case, how are We to save the millions of Our subjects; or to atone Ourselves before the hallowed spirits of Our Imperial Ancestors? This is the reason why We have ordered the acceptance of the provisions of the Joint Declaration of the Powers.
Cold War
Nuclear weapon
A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions ( thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bom ...
s defined strategic bombing during the
Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
. The age of the massive strategic bombing campaign had come to an end. It was replaced by more devastating attacks using improved targeting and weapons technology. Strategic bombing by the
Great Powers
A great power is a sovereign state that is recognized as having the ability and expertise to exert its influence on a global scale. Great powers characteristically possess military and economic strength, as well as diplomatic and soft power in ...
also became politically indefensible. The political fallout resulting from the destruction being broadcast on the evening news ended more than one strategic bombing campaign.
Korean War
Strategic bombing during the Korean war was a huge part of the aerial warfare for the United States. It was widely used at targeting infrastructure and economic targets forcing the USSR and China to leverage more economically and materially in the supporting North Korean efforts. It was also consistently reliable for the US even amongst Chinese and USSR interference throughout the war.
While nuclear weapons were never used, at the outset of the war the US Strategic Air Command was ready with 9 B-29s from the 9th Bomb Wing acting as an atomic task force which were sent to Guam on standby duty.
The
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...
(USAF) at first conducted only tactical attacks against strategic targets. Because it was widely considered a
limited war
A limited war is one in which the belligerents do not expend all of the resources at their disposal, whether human, industrial, agricultural, military, natural, technological, or otherwise in a specific conflict. This may be to preserve those res ...
, the
Truman Administration
Harry S. Truman's tenure as the 33rd president of the United States began on April 12, 1945, upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt, and ended on January 20, 1953. He had been vice president for only days. A Democrat from Missouri, he ran fo ...
prohibited the USAF to bomb near the borders of China and the Soviet Union in fear of provoking the countries to enter into the war. Common targets were railroad yards, bridges, and airfields, seeking to disrupt supply lines and ability to produce materials for the war. The first notable strategic bombing was a bombing consisting of nine B-29s which bombed the Rising Sun oil refinery at Wonsan on July 6th of 1950 followed by a bombing of a chemical plant at Hungnam. Later that month on July 30th a Chosen nitrogen explosives factory at Hungnam was bombed destroying the largest of the Konan Industrial-Chemical Complex.
The Chinese intervention in the war in November 1950 changed the aerial bombing policy dramatically. In response to the Chinese intervention, the USAF carried out an intensive bombing campaign against North Korea to demoralize the North Koreans and inflict as much economic cost to North Korea in order to reduce their ability to wage war. The largest incendiary raid of the war had 70 B-29s drop firebombs on the town of Sinuiju and was a representation for the change in aerial bombing policy. The extensive bombing raids on North Korea continued until the armistice agreement was signed between communist and UN forces on July 27, 1953.
Vietnam War
In the
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
, the strategic bombing of North Vietnam in
Operation Rolling Thunder
Operation Rolling Thunder was a gradual and sustained aerial bombardment campaign conducted by the United States (U.S.) 2nd Air Division (later Seventh Air Force), U.S. Navy, and Republic of Vietnam Air Force (RVNAF) against the Democratic Repub ...
could have been more extensive, but fear by the Johnson Administration of the entry of China into the war led to restrictions on the selection of targets, as well as only a gradual escalation of intensity.
The aim of the bombing campaign was to demoralize the North Vietnamese, damage their economy, and reduce their capacity to support the war in the hope that they would negotiate for peace, but it failed to have those effects. The
Nixon Administration
Richard Nixon's tenure as the List of presidents of the United States, 37th president of the United States began with First inauguration of Richard Nixon, his first inauguration on January 20, 1969, and ended when he resigned on August 9, 1974 ...
continued this sort of limited strategic bombing for most of the war but pivoted towards the ending of it.
Operation Linebacker
Operation Linebacker was the codename of a U.S. Seventh Air Force and U.S. Navy Task Force 77 air interdiction campaign conducted against North Vietnam from 9 May to 23 October 1972, during the Vietnam War.
Its purpose was to halt or slow the ...
campaigns were much heavier bombing campaigns taking off many of the restrictions that were placed initially and began flying B-52 bombers. Images such as that of
Kim Phuc Phan Thi
Phan Thị Kim Phúc (; born April 6, 1963), referred to informally as the girl in the picture and the Napalm girl, is a South Vietnamese-born Canadian woman best known as the nine-year-old child depicted in the Pulitzer Prize–winning photog ...
(although this incident was the result of
close air support
In military tactics, close air support (CAS) is defined as air action such as air strikes by fixed or rotary-winged aircraft against hostile targets near friendly forces and require detailed integration of each air mission with fire and moveme ...
rather than strategic bombing) disturbed the American public enough to demand a stop to the campaign.
Due to this, and the ineffectiveness of carpet bombing (partly because of a lack of identifiable targets), new precision weapons were developed. The new weapons allowed more effective and efficient bombing with reduced civilian casualties. High civilian casualties had always been the
hallmark
A hallmark is an official mark or series of marks struck on items made of metal, mostly to certify the content of noble metals—such as platinum, gold, silver and in some nations, palladium. In a more general sense, the term ''hallmark'' can al ...
of strategic bombing, but later in the Cold War, this began to change.
Laos was also bombed heavily during the Vietnam War. While originally denied by the US government Laos became the most heavily bombed country per capita as the result of more than 2 million bombs dropped. Laos contained heavy supply lines for communist troops and the US sought to destroy them safely before they could enter Vietnam and be used against American troops. The first of many targets within the country was the "Plain of Jars" which was known as a logistical center for military forces to gather and is the main air base in Urdon. While there were two different aerial operations held within Laos, Operation Steel Tiger is the one that focused on the Strategic Bombing of supporting civilian infrastructure that could aid in the up-and-coming communist regime and was assisting in getting rebels to aid the North Vietnamese military.
Strategic bombing was entering a new phase of high-intensity attacks, specifically targeting
factories
A factory, manufacturing plant or a production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. T ...
that take years to build and enormous investment capital. These new high-intensity and focused attacks made extra use of newer and modern fighter aircraft such as the F-4 enabling less reliance on heavy more vulnerable bombers.
Iran-Iraq War
After the fall of 1981, in the context of the Iranian ground counter-offensives, the USSR lifted their arms embargo and massively rearmed Iraq, including with 40 MiG-25s, which enabled the Iraqi air force to challenge Iran's F-14s in their air space. Iraq used
Tu-22 Blinder
The Tupolev Tu-22 (NATO reporting name: Blinder) was the first supersonic bomber to enter production in the Soviet Union. Manufactured by Tupolev, the Tu-22 entered service with the Soviet military in the 1960s.
The aircraft was a disappointme ...
and
Tu-16 Badger
The Tupolev Tu-16 (NATO reporting name: Badger) is a twin-engined jet strategic heavy bomber used by the Soviet Union. It has been flown for almost 70 years, and the Chinese license-built Xian H-6 remains in service with the People's Liberation ...
strategic bombers
A strategic bomber is a medium- to long-range penetration bomber aircraft designed to drop large amounts of air-to-ground weaponry onto a distant target for the purposes of debilitating the enemy's capacity to wage war. Unlike tactical bombers, ...
to carry out long-range high-speed raids on Iranian cities, including Tehran. Fighter-bombers such as the
MiG-25 Foxbat
The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 (russian: Микоян и Гуревич МиГ-25; NATO reporting name: Foxbat) is a supersonic interceptor and reconnaissance aircraft that is among the fastest military aircraft to enter service. Designed by the ...
and
Su-22 Fitter
The Sukhoi Su-17 (''izdeliye'' S-32) is a variable-sweep wing fighter-bomber developed for the Soviet military. Its NATO reporting name is "Fitter". Developed from the Sukhoi Su-7, the Su-17 was the first variable-sweep wing aircraft to enter ...
were used against smaller or shorter range targets, as well as escorting the strategic bombers. Civilian and industrial targets were hit by the raids, and each successful raid inflicted economic damage from regular strategic bombing. Iran also launched several retaliatory air raids on Iraq, while primarily shelling border cities such as Basra. Iran also bought some
Scud
A Scud missile is one of a series of tactical ballistic missiles developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It was exported widely to both Second World, Second and Third World, Third World countries. The term comes from the NATO reporti ...
missiles from
Libya
Libya (; ar, ليبيا, Lībiyā), officially the State of Libya ( ar, دولة ليبيا, Dawlat Lībiyā), is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to Egypt–Libya bo ...
and launched them against Baghdad. These too inflicted damage upon Iraq.
Post–Cold War
Strategic bombing in the post–Cold War era is defined by American advances in and the use of
smart munitions
A precision-guided munition (PGM, smart weapon, smart munition, smart bomb) is a guided munition intended to precisely hit a specific target, to minimize collateral damage and increase lethality against intended targets. During the First Gulf ...
. The developments in guided munitions meant that the Coalition forces in the
First Gulf War
The Gulf War was a 1990–1991 armed campaign waged by a 35-country military coalition in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Spearheaded by the United States, the coalition's efforts against Iraq were carried out in two key phases: ...
were able to use them, although the majority—93%Francisco Javier Guisández Gómez, a colonel of the Spanish Air Force ICRC: "The Law of Air Warfare" International Review of the Red Cross no 323, pp. 347–63—of bombs dropped in that conflict were still conventional, unguided bombs. More frequently in the
Kosovo War
The Kosovo War was an armed conflict in Kosovo that started 28 February 1998 and lasted until 11 June 1999. It was fought by the forces of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (i.e. Serbia and Montenegro), which controlled Kosovo before the war ...
, and the initial phases of
Operation Iraqi Freedom
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Iraq War {{Nobold, {{lang, ar, حرب العراق (Arabic) {{Nobold, {{lang, ku, شەڕی عێراق (Kurdish languages, Kurdish)
, partof = the Iraq conflict (2003–present), I ...
of 2003, strategic bombing campaigns were notable for the heavy use of precision weaponry by those countries that possessed them. Although bombing campaigns were still strategic in their aims, the widespread area bombing tactics of World War II had mostly disappeared. This led to significantly fewer civilian casualties associated with previous bombing campaigns, though it has not brought about a complete end to civilian deaths or collateral property damage.
Additionally, strategic bombing via smart munitions is now possible through the use of aircraft that have been considered traditionally tactical in nature such as the
F-16 Fighting Falcon
The General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon is a single-engine multirole fighter aircraft originally developed by General Dynamics for the United States Air Force (USAF). Designed as an air superiority day fighter, it evolved into a successful ...
or
F-15E Strike Eagle
The McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing) F-15E Strike Eagle is an American all-weather multirole strike fighter derived from the McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle. The F-15E was designed in the 1980s for long-range, high-speed interdiction without rely ...
, which had been used during
Operation Desert Storm
Operation or Operations may refer to:
Arts, entertainment and media
* ''Operation'' (game), a battery-operated board game that challenges dexterity
* Operation (music), a term used in musical set theory
* ''Operations'' (magazine), Multi-Man ...
,
Operation Enduring Freedom
Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) was the official name used synonymously by the U.S. government for both the War in Afghanistan (2001–2014) and the larger-scale Global War on Terrorism. On 7 October 2001, in response to the September 11 at ...
and
Operation Iraqi Freedom
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Iraq War {{Nobold, {{lang, ar, حرب العراق (Arabic) {{Nobold, {{lang, ku, شەڕی عێراق (Kurdish languages, Kurdish)
, partof = the Iraq conflict (2003–present), I ...
to destroy targets that would have required large formations of strategic bombers during World War II.
During the Kosovo campaign
NATO
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two No ...
forces bombed targets far from Kosovo like bridges in
Novi Sad
Novi Sad ( sr-Cyrl, Нови Сад, ; hu, Újvidék, ; german: Neusatz; see below for other names) is the second largest city in Serbia and the capital of the autonomous province of Vojvodina. It is located in the southern portion of the Pan ...
, power plants around Belgrade and flea market in Nis.
During the
2008 South Ossetia war
The 2008 Russo-Georgian WarThe war is known by a variety of other names, including Five-Day War, August War and Russian invasion of Georgia. was a war between Georgia, on one side, and Russia and the Russian-backed self-proclaimed republics of Sou ...
Russian aircraft attacked the shipbuilding center of
Poti
Poti ( ka, ფოთი ; Mingrelian: ფუთი; Laz: ჶაში/Faşi or ფაში/Paşi) is a port city in Georgia, located on the eastern Black Sea coast in the region of Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti in the west of the country. Built near t ...
.
2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine
As part of the
2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine
On 24 February 2022, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides. It has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. An ...
, several waves hit Ukraine infrastructure periodically, increasing damages, deaths, injured, and deeply affecting energy distribution across Ukraine and nearby countries. By late November 2022, nearly half of the country's energy systems had been destroyed, leaving millions of Ukrainians without power and Ukrainian energy workers rushing the restore services via various ways. The methodical attacks on
power stations
A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electrical grid.
Many pow ...
and electrical nodes imposed large economic and practical costs on Ukraine, with a severe impact for millions of civilians over the winter. It was assumed that Russia's strategic intention was to break the will of the Ukrainian population to continue the war.
Aerial bombardment and international law
Air warfare
Aerial warfare is the use of military aircraft and other flying machines in warfare. Aerial warfare includes bombers attacking enemy installations or a concentration of enemy troops or strategic targets; fighter aircraft battling for control o ...
must comply with
laws and customs of war
The law of war is the component of international law that regulates the conditions for initiating war (''jus ad bellum'') and the conduct of warring parties (''jus in bello''). Laws of war define sovereignty and nationhood, states and territor ...
, including
international humanitarian law
International humanitarian law (IHL), also referred to as the laws of armed conflict, is the law that regulates the conduct of war (''jus in bello''). It is a branch of international law that seeks to limit the effects of armed conflict by prot ...
by protecting the victims of the conflict and refraining from attacks on protected persons.
These restraints on aerial warfare are covered by the general laws of war, because unlike the war on land and at sea—which is specifically covered by rules such as the
1907 Hague Convention
The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 are a series of international treaty, treaties and declarations negotiated at two international peace conferences at The Hague in the Netherlands. Along with the Geneva Conventions, the Hague Conventions w ...
and
Protocol I
Protocol I (sometimes referred to as Additional Protocol I or AP 1) is a 1977 amendment protocol to the Geneva Conventions relating to the protection of victims of ''international conflicts'', extending to "armed conflicts in which peoples are ...
additional to the
Geneva Conventions
upright=1.15, Original document in single pages, 1864
The Geneva Conventions are four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment in war. The singular term ''Geneva Conven ...
, which contain pertinent restrictions, prohibitions and guidelines—there are no treaties specific to aerial warfare.
To be legal, aerial operations must comply with the principles of humanitarian law: ''
military necessity
Military necessity, along with distinction, and proportionality, are three important principles of international humanitarian law governing the legal use of force in an armed conflict.
Attacks
Military necessity is governed by several constra ...
'', '' distinction'', and '' proportionality'': An attack or action must be intended to help in the defeat of the enemy; it must be an attack on a legitimate military objective, and the harm caused to civilians or civilian property must be proportional and not excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.Gene Dannen. International Law on the Bombing of Civilians '
USAF
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Sign ...
*
Giulio Douhet
General Giulio Douhet (30 May 1869 – 15 February 1930) was an Italian general and air power theorist. He was a key proponent of strategic bombing in aerial warfare. He was a contemporary of the 1920s air warfare advocates Walther Wever, Billy ...
,
Regia Aeronautica
The Italian Royal Air Force (''Regia Aeronautica Italiana'') was the name of the air force of the Kingdom of Italy. It was established as a service independent of the Royal Italian Army from 1923 until 1946. In 1946, the monarchy was abolis ...
(Italy)
*
Arthur "Bomber" Harris
Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Arthur Travers Harris, 1st Baronet, (13 April 1892 – 5 April 1984), commonly known as "Bomber" Harris by the press and often within the RAF as "Butch" Harris, was Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief (AOC-in-C) ...
,
RAF
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
*
Curtis LeMay
Curtis Emerson LeMay (November 15, 1906 – October 1, 1990) was an American Air Force general who implemented a controversial strategic bombing campaign in the Pacific theater of World War II. He later served as Chief of Staff of the U.S. Air ...
,
USAF
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Sign ...
*
Billy Mitchell
William Lendrum Mitchell (December 29, 1879 – February 19, 1936) was a United States Army officer who is regarded as the father of the United States Air Force.
Mitchell served in France during World War I and, by the conflict's end, command ...
Alexander P. de Seversky
Alexander Nikolaievich Prokofiev de Seversky (russian: link=no, Алекса́ндр Никола́евич Проко́фьев-Се́верский) (June 7, 1894 – August 24, 1974) was a Russian-American aviation pioneer, inventor, and inf ...
in
Victory Through Air Power
''Victory Through Air Power'' is a 1942 non-fiction book by Alexander P. de Seversky. It was made into a 1943 The Walt Disney Company, Walt Disney Animation, animated Victory Through Air Power (film), feature film of the same name.
Theories
D ...
(1942 book and 1943 film)
*
Carl Spaatz
Carl Andrew Spaatz (born Spatz; June 28, 1891 – July 14, 1974), nicknamed "Tooey", was an American World War II general. As commander of Strategic Air Forces in Europe in 1944, he successfully pressed for the bombing of the enemy's oil product ...
,
USAF
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Sign ...
*
Hugh Trenchard
Marshal of the Royal Air Force Hugh Montague Trenchard, 1st Viscount Trenchard, (3 February 1873 – 10 February 1956) was a British officer who was instrumental in establishing the Royal Air Force. He has been described as the "Father of the ...
,
RAF
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
See also
*
Carpet bombing
Carpet bombing, also known as saturation bombing, is a large area bombardment done in a progressive manner to inflict damage in every part of a selected area of land. The phrase evokes the image of explosions completely covering an area, in th ...
*
Aerial bombing of cities
The aerial bombing of cities is an optional element of strategic bombing, which became widespread in warfare during World War I. The bombing of cities grew to a vast scale in World War II, and is still practiced today. The development of aeri ...
*
Civilian casualties of strategic bombing
Civilians under international humanitarian law are "persons who are not members of the armed forces" and they are not "combatants if they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war". It is slightly different from a non-combatant, b ...
References
Informational notes
Citations
Bibliography
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* Trimble, Michael M. "Air Force Strategic Bombing and Its Counterpoints from World War I to Vietnam." ''Joint Force Quarterly : JFQ'' 91 (2018): 82-89. Web.
* McCoy A. Reflections on History’s Largest Air War. ''Critical Asian Studies''. 2013;45(3):481-489. doi:10.1080/14672715.2013.829670
Further reading
* Biddle, Tami Davis. ''Rhetoric and Reality in Air Warfare: The Evolution of British and American Ideas about Strategic Bombing, 1914–1945'' (Princeton Studies in International History and Politics) (2004)
* Boog, Horst, ed. ''The Conduct of the Air War in the Second World War: An International Comparison'' (1992) 763 pp.; very important anthology by major researchers
* Boog, Horst, ed. ''Germany and the Second World War: Volume VII: The Strategic Air War in Europe and the War in the West and East Asia, 1943–1944/5'' (Oxford UP, 2006), 928pp official German history vol excerpt and text search online edition *
* Clodfelter, Mark. "Aiming to Break Will: America's World War II Bombing of German Morale and its Ramifications", ''
Journal of Strategic Studies
The ''Journal of Strategic Studies'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal covering military and diplomatic strategic studies. It was established in 1978 by Frank Cass & Co. with John Gooch (University of Leeds) as founding editor-in-chief. The c ...
'', June 2010, Vol. 33 Issue 3, pp. 401–35
* Clodfelter, Mark. ''Beneficial Bombing: The Progressive Foundations of American Air Power, 1917–1945'' (University of Nebraska Press; 2010) 347 pp.
* Craven, Wesley Frank, and James Lea Cate. ''The Army Air Forces in World War II'' (7 vols 1948–1958; rpr. 1985), official US Army Air Force history
* Davis, Richard G. "Bombing Strategy Shifts, 1944–45", ''Air Power History'' 39 (1989) 33–45
* Futrell, Robert Frank. ''Ideas, concepts, doctrine: A history of basic thinking in the United States Air Force, 1907–1964'' (2 vols 1974)
* Grayling, Anthony C. ''Among the dead cities: The history and moral legacy of the WWII bombing of civilians in Germany and Japan'' (Bloomsbury Publishing USA, 2009)
* Griffith, Charles. ''The quest: Haywood Hansell and American strategic bombing in World War II'' (1999 online edition * Hansell, Jr., Haywood S. ''Air Plan That Defeated Hitler'' (1980 online version * Kennett, Lee B. ''A History of Strategic Bombing'' (1982)
* Koch, H. W. "The Strategic Air Offensive against Germany: the Early Phase, May–September 1940." ''The Historical Journal'', 34 (March 1991) pp. 117–41 online at JSTOR * Levine, Alan J. ''The Strategic Bombing of Germany, 1940–1945'' (1992 online edition * MacIsaac, David. ''Strategic Bombing in World War Two'' (1976) story of the official American Strategic Bombing Survey
* Messenger, Charles. ''"Bomber" Harris and the Strategic Bombing Offensive, 1939–1945'' (1984), defends Harris
* Morris, Craig F. ''The Origins of American Strategic Bombing Theory'' (US Naval Institute Press, 2017), 272 pp.
* Neillands, Robin. ''The Bomber War: The Allied Air Offensive Against Nazi Germany'' (Overlook Press, 2001)
* Overy. Richard. "The Means to Victory: Bombs and Bombing" in Overy, ''Why the Allies Won'' (1995), pp. 101–33
* Overy. Richard. ''The Bombers and the Bombed: Allied Air War Over Europe 1940–1945'' (2014), 592 p excerpt and text search a longer version was published in UK as ''The Bombing War: Europe, 1939–1945'' (2013), 880 pp
*
*
* Sherry, Michael. ''The Rise of American Air Power: The Creation of Armageddon'' (1987), important study 1930s–1960s
* Smith, Malcolm. "The Allied Air Offensive", ''Journal of Strategic Studies'' (1990) 13#1 pp. 67–83
* Spaight. James M '"Bombing Vindicated"''] G. Bles, 1944. (Spaight was Principal Assistant Secretary of the Air Ministry) (UK)
* Verrier, Anthony. ''The Bomber Offensive'' (1968), British
* Webster, Charles and Noble Frankland, The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany, 1939–1945 (HMSO, 1961), 4 vols. Important critical official history of RAF Bomber Command effort
* Werrell, Kenneth P. "The Strategic Bombing of Germany in World War II: Costs and Accomplishments", ''Journal of American History'' 73 (1986) 702–13; in JSTOR * Werrell, Kenneth P. ''Death From the Heavens: A History of Strategic Bombing'' (2009) Good analysis
* Wetta, Frank J., and Martin A. Novelli. "Good Bombing, Bad Bombing: Hollywood, Air Warfare, and Morality in World War I and World War II." ''OAH Magazine of History'' 22.4 (2008): 25–29 online
{{DEFAULTSORT:Strategic Bombing
Strategic bombing, Aerial bombingMilitary strategyMilitary doctrinesAerial warfare strategyTargeting (warfare)