The Morality of Area Bombing On Germany By Bomber Command During World War Two
by LTA (NS) Wong Tze Yung

Area bombing is the practice of indiscriminately bombing cities with the intention not only of destroying military and industrial targets but also of killing civilians. In the documentary, Bomber Command : Death by Moonlight, written and directed by Brian McKenna and narrated by Terence McKenna, the morality of area bombing on Germany by Bomber Command during the Second World War was severely questioned. What exactly does being moral mean? For the sake of argument, I define being moral as believing and acting in a civilised and humanitarian way towards other human beings. Bomber Command : Death by Moonlight portrays the image that the aerial offensive against Germany was both immoral and unnecessary due to the heavy loss of human lives and massive destruction of property - all for no apparent military or strategic benefit. The whole issue of area bombing is highly controversial and requires some study in depth before a fair conclusion (if there ever could be one) can be made.

Let me begin my discussion by presenting the stands taken by the major participants in the air war over Germany; namely, the Royal Air Force (RAF) top brass, the RAF aircrew, the British government, the British public, the German civilians, the German fighter pilots and the German wartime leaders (e.g. Albert Speer). The concept of strategic area bombing which was adopted by the RAF in World War II was based upon the strategies and policies laid down and applied by the RAF (then known as the Independent Air Force [IAF]) in the last years of the First World War. Apparently, the then IAF chief General Sir Hugh Trenchard, also known as the 'father' of the Royal Air Force, authoritatively described the role that strategic bombers should play in war. In a study prepared for the Allied Supreme War Council in 1918, he specified two main objectives for the strategic bomber - to destroy the enemy both morally and materially.¹ In order to achieve this end, there is the need to attack the industrial centres where you (a) do military and vital damage by striking at the centres of war material - which entails precision bombing - and (b) achieve the maximum effect on the morale (of the enemy) by striking at the most sensitive part of the German population - namely, the working class - which entails area bombing.² Upsetting the proletariat and hence provoking them to revolt against their leaders was a widely held notion among the military circles of the time. Liddell Hart, writing in 1925, believed that bombing attacks would cause the slum districts to be "maddened into the impulse to break loose and maraud", thereby dramatising Trenchard's theory outlined in 1918.³ Trenchard's proposals were readily accepted and implemented by the British and French governments which began to regard area bombing as a necessary part of warfare, no matter how immoral it may appear to be.⁴

Trenchard's belief in the awesome power of strategic area bombing was elaborately substantiated by the Italian Air Force general and military philosopher, Giulio Douhet, who encapsulated strategic bombing into a coherent theory of air power in his earth-shattering book, The Command Of The Air, published in 1921.⁵ Douhet's theory also received support from the commander-in-chief of the USAAF, General Billy Mitchell. Trenchard, Douhet and Mitchell unanimously predicted that future wars could be won by airpower alone, and that "terror attacks on cities by independent air forces with high explosive, incendiary bombs and gas, could destroy a nation's will to resist".⁶ How could this be done? According to Geoffrey Best,"massive bombing of enemy cities" could "produce psychological collapse and political surrender" with the effect of destroying enemy morale.⁷ The general consensus that "the bomber would always get through" to the enemy country, no matter what arises, was expressed by Stanley Baldwin, then a prominent member of the British coalition government. It provided a boost to the air theorists'arguments that the bomber would win wars for whichever country that possessed them.⁸

Even before the outbreak of World War II, in the late 1930s, the RAF leadership's commitment to strategic bombing - in this case, both precision bombing (i.e. on specific military and industrial targets) and area bombing - were indomitable. RAF leaders were convinced that "attack was the best form of defence",⁹ as evidenced by the Air Staff Chief of Plans, Air Marshal John Slessor's arguments that "an offensive against enemy territory would have the immediate effect of forcing the enemy air force on to the defensive" and also gain the "decisive effect of crushing the enemy army's capacity to wage war."¹⁰ These well-argued convictions were adamantly adhered to by the RAF Bomber Command chief, Sir Arthur Harris, throughout the Second World War. They were also well entrenched and accepted within the minds of most other RAF leaders e.g. Sir Charles Portal - at least for the first few years of the war.

While the inter-war period yielded many legitimate reasons for the application of area bombing in the event of real war, the same predicament arose during the actual war period itself. Reasons for adopting this method of attack during the war were manifold; the traditional arguments for strategic area bombing remain, namely, to paralyse military targets such as railway installations, factories and shipyards as well as to demoralize the German population by terror bombing residential areas of cities.¹¹ But there were other salient reasons for the necessity of this type of bombardment. Political considerations played a key role in determining the Allied choice for area bombarding on Germany; from 22 June 1941, when the Soviet Union was invaded by Germany, until 6 June 1944 when the Allies finally invaded Continental Europe, Stalin was constantly putting pressure on Churchill and Roosevelt to open up a second front against Germany. The Russians were unfairly bearing the brunt of the war, so Stalin argued, and if the Allies did not help ease the burden directly by attempting to push the Germans back from Western Europe, Russia could possibly lose the war.¹²

Furthermore, the Allies did after all officially declare themselves at war with Germany and the only possible way of getting back at Germany, other than in North Africa and Italy, was through a massive bombing offensive over Germany.¹³ The reason for this delay in the assault on Fortress Europe was due to the fact that, from the outbreak of war in September 1939 until Operation Overlord in June 1944, the Allies did not have the military capability to wage an offensive land war against the Third Reich.

Moreover, the Allies especially the British, had to retaliate against the German bombing of major British cities in 1940-1941, also known as the "Blitz". Churchill and the British public viewed this as an unjust action for which the Germans have to be taught a lesson. For all these various reasons, RAF Bomber Command and the USAAF launched their task of area bombing of the German industrial cities.

How did the aircrew of Bomber Command view the whole issue of their area bombing campaign? To begin with, they never really had any alternative but to obey orders decreed by Bomber Command's top brass. This, however, did not imply that they were opposed to their mission. Most of them were rather enthusiastic about going off to war; they felt that they had a duty to defend Great Britain as well as to get rid of Hitler and his Nazi regime. Therefore, throughout the war, the majority of them thought they were performing their patriotic bit for their country, including those from the Dominion countries which supplied 37% of all Bomber Command aircrew.¹⁴ It was only after the war that some began to have misgivings about whether they had contributed - in a noble way - towards the defeat of the Germans. These feelings arose especially after sharp criticism from the media which commented that there had been deliberate killing of innocent German civilian lives - an act which was viewed as unnecessary and immoral.

In addition, the aircrew paid an exorbitant price for Harris' and Churchill's obsession with area bombing. In total, RAF Bomber Command lost 55 573 aircrew in the war.¹⁵ One in five airmen had been lost! But most of these sober facts had been kept from the aircrew circle, the top brass having accomplished so splendidly the task of keeping such statistics highly confidential so as not to demoralize this group.¹⁶ Indeed, the RAF senior officers and generals had been so conscious of this demoralisation factor that they had been prompt to label any sign of reluctance on the part of the aircrew as sheer cowardice- a 'Lack of Moral Fibre' (LMF) - and had been quick to ensure that such men were transferred out of their units and even jailed so as not to 'contaminate' the others.

The British government was largely in support of Sir Arthur Harris' and Bomber Command's policy of area bombing. Churchill was convinced that area bombing was "the only means of bringing the war directly to Hitler's doorstep." ¹⁷ On 8 July 1941, he wrote, "There is one thing that will bring Hitler down, and that is an absolutely devastating exterminating attack by very heavy bombers from this country upon the Nazi homeland."¹⁸ Under Churchill's direction and goading, the RAF committed itself to a programme of building up Bomber Command to a strength of 4000 heavy bombers.¹⁹ Churchill's original intention was to attack important industrial and military targets through precision bombing. However, two factors prevented this from happening: first, it was realized by Churchill that the goal of manufacturing 4000 heavy bombers was unattainable and thus the plan had to be scrapped²⁰. More importantly, the Butt Report which Churchill commissioned in August 1941 to investigate the accuracy of precision bombing unearthed dismal results:

"Of those aircraft attacking their targets, only one in three got within five miles. Over the French ports, the proportion was two in three. Over Germany as a whole, the proportion was one in four. Over the Ruhr (the industrial heartland of Germany) it was only one in ten."²¹

Thus, it was evident to Churchill and his war cabinet that since RAF bombers were missing their military and industrial targets by huge margins, they should resort to area bombing, with the primary intention of killing civilians, which would demoralize the German people and undermine their will to resist.²²

How did the British public perceive Bomber Command's area bombing offensive? The war cabinet takes much responsibility for concealing the inaccurate bombing as well as the deliberate intention to "dehouse" the German civilians from the British public.²³ Moreover, there was a desire for revenge in most Britons; many felt that since the Germans devastated British cities such as London and Coventry during the Blitz of 1940-1941, it was fair and just that they do the same to the German cities. Notice should be taken, however, of opposition to the RAF's area bombing policy; leading members of the public such as Labour Party Member of Parliament Richard Stokes from the House of Commons and Bishop Bell of Chichester from the House of Lords publicly questioned the morality of area bombing to kill civilians.²⁴ Also, in private correspondence, the Marquess of Salisbury pointed out that "of course the Germans began it, but we do not take the devil as our example,"²⁵ thereby condemning area bombing as an immoral evil which could have been avoided.

Still, it was only during the later stages of the war and in the aftermath of the war that there surfaced "a nagging self-reproach to the national conscience" towards Britain's involvement in area bombing.²⁶ The British public realized that they had probably "descended to the enemy's (moral) level,'²⁷ were somewhat ashamed of it, but were quick to push the blame on Harris and Bomber Command; they wanted to believe that they had believed in fair play from beginning to end, says renowned military historian John Keegan²⁸ in his book The Second World War.

Needless to say, the German civilians bore the brunt of casualties as a result of Bomber Command's area bombing strategy. An estimated 593,000 Germans died from air attacks, mostly through area bombing.²⁹ This toll accounts for much of the distaste with which the strategic bombing campaign was recalled after the war. There is no doubt that all the civilians in the German cities bombed were very resentful of the means by which the allies chose to wage war. Their personal witnessing of the horrific fires in Hamburg, bombed in July 1943 and Dresden, bombed in February 1945,³⁰ bore testimony to this resentment. According to witnesses in Hamburg, on the nights when their city was bombed, people were literally screaming, running around and burning in flames! Area bombing not only destroyed lives, it also claimed property. But the amazing thing in such a traumatic and chaotic predicament was that German civilian morale did not crack - contrary to the allies' hopes and expectations!³¹ For example, although the raid on Hamburg was considered a success in Harris' opinion, the Germans were quick to recuperate as they repaired their homes promptly, so much so that by 1943, Hamburg had "regained eighty percent of its former productivity."³² Throughout the tumultuous ordeal, the German people proved that "determined citizens can withstand the worst that non-nuclear bombing can deliver."³³ They decisively proved the air theorists, the RAF leaders and the leading politicians wrong in their conviction that the German working classes would be so demoralized by the bombing that they would revolt against their class enemies, namely the bourgeoisie and the aristocracy, or against the Nazi regime.³⁴ In fact, if anything, the German people's will to resist was strengthened as they united in their sufferings against the allies. Military historians Spencer Dunmore and William Carter attribute the Germans' resilience to "the stubborn pride that causes people of every nation to display astonishing endurance and quite magnificent courage when their city and their homes come under attack."³⁵

It was clear that the German fighter pilots of the Luftwaffe were aware that they were shooting down allied bombers in defence of their homeland. To them, they were doing a noble job in trying to prevent RAF Lancaster and Mosquito bombers from killing their own women and children in the industrial cities. The views of Freeman Dyson, an operational researcher with the British Air Ministry during the war, aptly and succinctly put the German night fighter pilots' position with regard to area bombing: "The German night fighters ended the war morally undefeated... We had given them, at the end of the war, the one thing they lacked at the beginning, a clean cause to fight for."³⁶

When speaking of German wartime leaders and their perspectives on area bombing, none is more important than Albert Speer, Hitler's Armaments Minister from early 1942 to the end of the war. Max Hastings, in Bomber Command, describes him as a man who had "a superb grasp of the German economy and a brilliant talent for improvising."³⁷ Speer cleverly concealed German industries from Allied bombers by dispersing their locations and functions. As it turned out, it was not until the allies began to adopt precision bombing on oil and transportation targets did the German economy come to a halt. Speer's genius effectively saved the German economy until late 1944.

Speer did feel that the allied bombing policy was a legitimate one for several reasons: one, it opened the second front in Europe which sought to wear down German strength in the West for the D-Day Normandy landings;³⁸ this strategy also worked to reduce German Wehrmacht strength on the Eastern front against the Red Army. Second, the unpredictability of the air attacks made this front gigantic as every square metre of German territory was a kind of front line; in Speer's own words:

"The defence against air attacks required the production of thousands of anti-aircraft guns, the stockpiling of tremendous quantities of ammunition all over the country, and holding in readiness hundreds of thousands of soldiers, who also have to stay by their guns, often totally inactive, for months at a time."³⁹

It was this "tying down" factor which was "the greatest lost battle on the German side."⁴⁰

What Speer opposed to was the area bombing practices of the RAF and favoured instead, the precision bombing of the USAAF. After Germany had surrendered in 1945, he remarked that the American attacks were much more dangerous than the British ones because the former aimed at specific industrial targets, causing the breakdown of the German armaments industry.⁴¹ The British night attacks, on the other hand, while aiming at residential areas, "did not succeed in breaking the will of the civilian population"⁴² and worse, throughout 1941, even incurred more losses in aircrew than they did in killing German civilians.43 To Speer, "the war could have been decided in 1943 if, instead of vast but pointless area bombing, the planes (British bombers) had concentrated on the centers of armaments production."⁴⁴

To sum up, we have two contradictory viewpoints on area bombing as held by the British and the Germans. The RAF top leaders laid down the cornerstone principles of area bombing; the RAF aircrew did not have much choice but to follow orders from the top brass lest they be incarcerated; the British wartime government under Churchill endorsed the area bombing package for want of a better alternative and the British public had very little or no idea that German civilians were deliberately being targeted. Although there had been opposition from among notable and respected members of the public against such indiscriminate bombing, their protests were, on the whole, given hardly any attention. In short, the British citizens were largely convinced that the attacks were justified in view of the circumstances then; in other words, from their perspective, area bombing was a moral and necessary move in times of war.

On the other hand, the Germans regarded area bombing as an immoral act of injustice and an unnecessary evil. The German civilians naturally loathed it as it incurred not only untold damage to their homes and property but also the loss of numerous lives. Their fighter pilots commended themselves on having executed a patriotic and morally justified job in shooting down RAF bombers because, if they did not do so, it would be their own German people who would be massacred by Bomber Command. Some German wartime leaders, especially Albert Speer, saw it not only as immoral but, more importantly, as a waste of aircrew and resources.

Thus with the British and Germans at loggerheads as to who was actually morally right during the aerial offensive over Germany, how do we reach a fair verdict? First, I should say that it is very difficult to judge as to which side was moral in this war. Both had their own perspectives which would seem to vindicate their actions. And these were both logical and seemingly legitimate! My personal comment would be that area bombing was legitimate Ñ but only up to a point. I believe that history must be interpreted according to the time in which the events took place; hence, one should not attempt to use present peacetime values on morality of war to judge the morality of the allied air offensive over Germany fifty years ago.

I believe that in the period 1940 to June 1944 area bombing was moral; however, from June 1944 to May 1945 I consider it immoral. There are three factors which legitimize my view that it was moral insofar as the earlier period was concerned. To begin with, it was the most feasible and effective means of attacking Germany. From the declaration of war in September 1939 until Operation Overlord in June 1944, Britain's strategic position was relatively weak compared to Germany's ⁴⁵ - she had no main forces on continental Europe except in mountainous Italy where it was believed to be a "side-show" to the decisive assault on Normandy. Hitler, on the other hand, had the whole of Europe in his hands and had more room to manoeuvre. In addition, from 1942 to 1944, the Americans had to mobilize their resources to prepare to liberate the oppressed countries of Western Europe and were in no position to invade German-controlled Europe before 'Overlord'.⁴⁶ Furthermore, the Soviets, especially between 1941 and 1943, seemed on the verge of defeat and placed intense pressure on the Allies to open up a second front.⁴⁷ Finally, aerial attacks directly on Germany would help to boost, or at least maintain, the morale of the British people.⁴⁸ What were the alternatives? With hindsight, it is easy to say that Bomber Command could have focused more on winning the Battle of the Atlantic and the Battle of North Africa, which in both cases, the Allies eventually won. But remember that in the early 1940s, Bomber Command's leaders, especially Harris, as well as the top politicians (like Churchill) were so convinced of the power of area bombardment that it was difficult to avoid the temptation to order it. In short, it was generally felt by Britain's military and political leaders that it would be most militarily advantageous to bomb Germany directly.

Another reason why area bombing was the correct choice from 1940 to 1942 is that between this period, there was a lack of technologically advanced navigational and bombing aids to conduct precision strikes on German military sites. As the Butt Report of August 1941 revealed, attempts at precision strikes were futile due to inferior navigational equipment. Not until the development of navigational and bombing devices such as Oboe, H2S radar, Gee and Pathfinder squadrons consisting of light Mosquito fighter-bombers could the RAF carry out precise bombing raids. ⁴⁹

Finally, not until the D-Day Normandy invasion were the Allies put on the threshold of victory. It was then, I feel, that area bombing could have ceased. Any more bombing beyond that point was rather unnecessary and unwarranted. I am of the view that there should be at least some basic humanitarian principles which RAF Bomber Command should have adhered to when victory was imminent for the Allies - and intentionally killing German women and children was certainly not one of them!

Endnotes

1. Keegan, John. The Second World War, p. 418 Penguin, 1993

2. Ibid p. 418

3. Ibid p. 421

4. Ibid p. 418

5. Macksey, Kenneth and Woodhouse, William. The Penguin Encyclopedia of Modern Warfare: From the Crimean War to the Present Day, p. 102, Penguin Books, 1993.

6. ibid p. 53

7. Best, Geoffrey. Humanity in Warfare: The Modern History of International Law of Armed Conflict, p. 272 Weidenfeld and Nicholson (London, 1990)

8. Keegan, John. The Second World War, p. 418

9. Keegan, John. The Second World War, p. 418

10. Keegan, John. The Second World War, p. 418

11. Best, Geoffrey. Humanity in Warfare: The Modern History of International Law of Armed Conflict, p. 278

12. ibid, p. 279

13. ibid, pp. 278-279

14. Young, Peter & Everett, Susanne. The Two World Wars p. 405 Bison (London, 1980)

15. Young, Peter & Everett, Susanne. The Two World Wars p. 408

16. Veterans' Affairs, Proceedings On: The CBC Series: The Valour and the Horror, Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, 4 Feb 1993 9A:30, Issue No. 10

17. Keegan, John. The Second World War p.420

18. ibid, p. 420

19. ibid, p. 420

20. ibid, p. 420

21. Veterans' Affairs, Proceedings On: The CBC Series: The Valour and the Horror, Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, 4 Feb 1993 9A:22, Issue No. 10

22. ibid, p. 9A:30

23. ibid, p. 9A:30

24. Keegan, John. The Second World War p.433

25. ibid, p. 433

26. ibid, p. 433

27. ibid, p. 433

28. ibid, p. 433.

29. Levine, Alan J. The Strategic Bombing of Germany, 1940 - 1945 p.190 Praeger (Connecticut, 1992)

30. Holmes, Richard. The World Atlas of Warfare: Military Innovations that Change the course of History p.242. Viking Studio Books (1988)

31. Dunmore, Spencer and Carter, William. Reap the Whirlwind: The Untold Story of 6 Group, Canada's Bombing Force of World War II p.141 M & S Ltd (1991)

32. ibid, p. 141

33. ibid, p. 142

34. ibid, p. 143

35. ibid, p. 142

36. Veterans' Affairs, Proceedings On: The CBC Series: The Valour and the Horror, Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, 4 Feb 1993 10:22

37. Hastings, Max. Bomber Command p. 223, Michael Joseph (London, 1979)

38. ibid, p. 241

39. Veterans' Affairs, Proceedings on: The CBC Series: The Valour and the Horror, Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, 4 Feb 1993 issue No. 10

40. ibid, 9A.27

41. ibid, 9A.27

42. ibid, 9A.27

43. Keegan, John. The Second World War p.420

44. Veterans Affairs, Proceedings On: The CBC Series: The Valour and the Horror, Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, 4 Feb 1993 10:24

45. ibid, 10:19

46. ibid, 10:19

47. ibid, 10:19

48. ibid, 10:19

49. ibid, 10:19

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Best, Geoffrey. Humanity in Warfare: The Modern History of International Law of Armed Conflict. London Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980.

2. Dunmore, Spencer and Carter, William. Reap The Whirlwind: The Untold Story of 6 Group, Canada's Bombing Force of World War II. M&S Ltd, 1991.

3. Hastings, Max. Bomber Command. London: Michael Joseph, 1979.

4. Holmes, Richard. The World Atlas of Warfare: Military Innovations that Change the Course of History. Viking Studio Books, 1988.

5. Keegan, John. The Second World War. Penguin Books Ltd, 1990.

6. Levine, Alan J. The Strategic Bombing of Germany, 1940-1945. Westport, Connecticut:Praeger, 1992.

7. Macksey, Kenneth and Woodhouse, William. The Penguin Encyclopaedia of Modern Warfare: From the Crimean War to the Present Day. Penguin Books, 1993.

8. Veterans' Affairs, Proceedings on: The CBC Series: The Valour and the Horror. Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology. 4 Feb 1993, Issue No. 10.

9. Young, Peter & Everett, Susanne. The Two World Wars. Bison Books, 1980.

LTA (NS) WONG TZE YUNG graduated from Simon Fraser University, Canada, with a BA degree in History & Political Science. He is currently at the National Institute of Education pursuing a Postgraduate Diploma in Education. LTA (NS) Wong served his National Service with the Singapore Combat Engineers.