Arthur'Bomber'Harris.

Redbeard - Britain was on the ragged edge so far as the creation of new infantry units was concerned, the population was not large enough. Anyway, Montgomery was continually using his elite divisions as spearheads, because the new divisions weren't reliable.

As for TAC, I agree the logical aircraft was the Mosquito. Problem is this plane was a private venture the RAF didn't want. By the time it was available and proved successful, the heavy bomber production lines were up and running.

So there was nothing but the heavy bombers and the only question was, how to use them. The only other option than attack Germany was to use them as flying artillery to break a front line. I suspect this idea became unpopular because of the proportion of "blue on blue" when they were so used.

Incidentally, there's another argument against using low level strikes, and this is the German AA. They would simply have sited lots of 20mm & 35mm and moved all the 88mm & 105mm (of use only against high-level) to the front, where the tanks would suffer.
 

Redbeard

Banned
Not true - RAF tactical support in North Africa was good. And an efficient system was in place for Europe in time for when it was really needed - summer 1944. However, I agree with you that it should have been given even more priority, particularly in terms of developing more suitable aircraft.


The problem was - how to aim those resources against Germany before summer 1944? It was vital to support the Russians as much as possible while they were really suffering in 1941-43. The Italian campaign helped, but was only a side-show. The only way to strike directly at Germany was from the air, which is why so many resources were given to Bomber Command during this period.

It is neither easy nor quick to redirect resources from one area to another. You have factories churning out bombers plus the bombs for them, huge training and support organisations for the aircrew, plus the development of doctrine and tactics through experience. These factors gained a huge momentum for Bomber Command, which couldn't just be switched off in 1944 - there wouldn't have been time for any redirection of resources to have any significant effect before the end of the war.

I do agree, though, that diverting more bombers to maritime patrol would have been a good idea, as would accelerating the development and production of the Mosquito to use for more precise bombing. Indeed, that is exactly what I included in my alt WW2 novel The Foresight War :) . However, even in this story, circumstances forced the British into strategic bombing.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum

The Desert Airforce indeed did develop some sound ground support tactics, but it is my firm impression that this was in contrast to official policy and only tolerated because Desert Airforce was so small (less than 500 front line aircraft in early 1942). Anyway they for most of the time had to rely on planes found too lame for "real" airforce duties.

By 1939 Bombercommand had 37 out of 139 combat squadrons in RAF and in 1945 96 out of 408. Although a 1939 bombersquadron relatively was less heavy than one in 1945 it shows that the RAF from the start was focussed on bombing. Considdering the interwar scare about the bomber always getting through and exagerated effects at Guernica, Antwerp etc. you might explain some, but I wonder why the British by 1941/42 had so much trust in the bomber. After all they had just themselves fought off a bombing offensive, they had themselves seen, that even if hit a factory or railway line would often only need a few hours to be back in business again. And they had seen how the Blitz far from demoralised the population but rather created a sense of common fate that probably never before or after have existed in that strength in UK.

I agree that the bomber offensive couldn't just be switched off and the efforts directed elsewhere. By 1944 it certainly was too late, but the decision to set up the massive production lines for the Halifax and the Lancaster should never have been taken (1942?). In some ways I guess it goes back to the high casualties when strafing trenches in WWI and the creation of RAF. And then of course pressure from the Soviets to do something. Apparently Churchill was both humiliated and intimidated by Stalin at their meeting in August 1942 over the absense of British wareffort (and absense of success - Tobruk had fallen shortly before). AFAIK it was after this that the decision to seriously increase bombing was taken and confirmed at Cassablanca in January 1943. But as the effects would wait until 1944 and the Soviets needed help here and now I will claim that the bombing offensive until 1944 was mainly spin. You could have helped the Soviets at least as much by showing pictures of training camps and tank factories in 1942, and by 1943 and 1944 the extra omph of the allied ground forces might have ended the war a year earlier.

Or a favourite ATL: Some trivial political PoD having the creation of RAF fail. So by 1939 there are only 10 Bombercommand squadrons but 20 tactical support squadrons with armoured attack aircraft (and 7 Coastal Command under RN). In May 1940 they in contrast to the unarmoured Battles force the AAA barrage and destroy the immensely critical German bridge across the Meuse as well as harras the German collumns in the Ardennes - the German offensive bogs down...

At sea the FAA since the late 30s has had modern monoplanes, incl. a folding wing Hurricane called the Hawker Blizzard. Hawker already have the next generations on the drawing board.

Regards

Steffen Redbeard
 

Redbeard

Banned
Redbeard - Britain was on the ragged edge so far as the creation of new infantry units was concerned, the population was not large enough. Anyway, Montgomery was continually using his elite divisions as spearheads, because the new divisions weren't reliable.

As for TAC, I agree the logical aircraft was the Mosquito. Problem is this plane was a private venture the RAF didn't want. By the time it was available and proved successful, the heavy bomber production lines were up and running.

So there was nothing but the heavy bombers and the only question was, how to use them. The only other option than attack Germany was to use them as flying artillery to break a front line. I suspect this idea became unpopular because of the proportion of "blue on blue" when they were so used.

Incidentally, there's another argument against using low level strikes, and this is the German AA. They would simply have sited lots of 20mm & 35mm and moved all the 88mm & 105mm (of use only against high-level) to the front, where the tanks would suffer.

The British in WWI maintained a much larger field army from a smaller population base and a main factor in explaining this was the extra strain on manpower and logistics from the very much increased RAF, not at least Bombercommand. For Bombercommands KIA/MIA of 60.000 you could man an entire armycorps, but more important would be the reduced strain on training effort and logistics.

The story about the RAF not really wanting the Mosquito (I've heard it befiore too) IMHO really points to how much this was politics and how little it was sound judgement of how best to wage war.

The 88mm and 105mm Flak guns would be of very limited use at the front, too cumbersome and with too high silhuette. The 20mm OTOH was widely distributed to frontline units and was a highly appreciated weapon in late war platoon and company dug-ins, as it was invaluable in breaking up infantry attacks. Panzerfaust and Panzerschreck were the main infantry weapons vs. tanks. If the allied bomberoffensive from the start is done at low altitude the Germans will of course not waste production on a huge number of heavy Flak guns, but concentrate on 20mm and the like. The demand will be huge as a 20mm battery can only cover a relatively small area vs. low altitude aircraft compared to a heavy battery vs. high or medium altitude.

Anyway the OTL Flak batteries were manned mainly by old men and boys, and being stationary a Flak battey in general consumed only a fraction of the logistics etc. of a field battery. In other words 1000 flak batteries could not be transformed into 1000 field batteries and considdering their consumation of ammo, AFAIK the main problem for the Germans was not the number of shells produced, but getting them out to the frontline units. To a degree the same would go for flying units.

In many ways it resembles the late Napoleonic wars. In 1812/13 Napoleon left a great number of relatively well trained troops in fortresses in Eastern and Central Europe to tie down allied troops. So they did indeed, but mainly ill-trained Landwehr troops who were not really fit to march and fight with the field armies, but could be utilised in static siege operations. The allies in WWII could afford this waste, Napoleon couldn't, but both wars only ended when one part had its armies beaten and territory taken.

Regards

Steffen Redbeard
 
My suspicion is that the best chance of Britain having a different strategy would be Political.

I know that many Americans were, rightly, morally horrified at terror bombing.

I wonder what might have happened had there been some awful tragedy seen by US reporters as a result of the token bombing of Berlin in the fall of 1940. Perhaps we hit an orphanage or a hospital.

(By the way assuming such a POD had there been a more intelligent approach to air power - especially the value of the fighter the tactical aircraft could Britain have had triumphs both in Crete and North Africa in the Spring of 1941?)
 
According to Ellis (WWII Data book), who I rarely catch in errors, the Germans in the spring of 1943 had 2400 operational fighters of which approxiamately half were allocated for home defence. In spring 1942 they had 1500 operational fighters of which appr. 600 were allocated for home defence. So the Germans actually succeeded in increasing the number of fighters allocated for the fronts from appr. 900 to 1200! The increase in total number of operational fighters could at a much lower cost have been countered by investing in single engine (and single crew) fighters instead of four engine and multi-crew bombers. The disruption of German production would have been achieved with far less cost with low altitude fast bombers like the Mosquito - which even consumed very little aluminium and productionwise could utilise the otherwise idle furniture industry.

And concerning the argument about bombing being the only way to engage Germany I don't buy it - the Bombing offensive did not seriously bother Germany was defeated anyway (by armies). Bombercommand dropped 46.000 tons of bombs in 1942, 157.000 tons in 1943 and 525.000 tons in 1944. The equivalent numbers for US 8th Airforce was 1.400, 44.000 and 389.000 tons respectively. 15th US Airforce added 13.000 tons in 1943 and 240.000 tons in 1944 (from Ellis).

In the two years needed to have the bombing offensive gain momentum a huge number of Divisions and tactical squadrons could have been trained and equipped; I would even think that a main invasion could have been succesful by 1943. It must be remembered that building and running the planes themselves was only part of the cost. The huge infrastructure needed and intense logistics was a huge strain on allied wareffort where tonnage to the last was in short supply. Short of the 60.000 KIA/MIA of Bombercommand the British effort on land in 1944 might have been quite different. Like Churchill not demanding cautious advance in Market Garden.

The development in German traning was I believe as much an effect of the Germans preferring to let veterans stay at the front line units istead of being withdrawn to train new pilots. Pilots were expected to gain their advanced training at the front, and those who had it in them would survive, those not wouldn't.

Regards

Steffen Redbeard

Let's assume the World War II Data Book is right. That still means the Germans would've had roughly twice as many fighters on the eastern front as they did. Russia would've fallen. The Mosquito didn't have a big enough bomb load to do the necessary damage. It wasn't like today with JDAM's destroying a target with one bomb. Back then, you needed to drop huge bomb tonnages to have an impact. Without strategic bombing, D-Day would've been impossible before the development of the A-bomb. It was thanks to strategic bombing that the Allies obtained air supremacy over western Europe. Allied planes shot down 1,115 German fighters in January, 1944, 1,118 in February and 1,217 in March. And with the fall of Russia, the Germans would've been able to move all their planes to western Europe, not to mention most of their ground forces. Fortress Europe would've become Ultra-Fortress Europe.
 
Last edited:

Redbeard

Banned
Let's assume the World War II Data Book is right. That still means the Germans would've had roughly twice as many fighters on the eastern front as they did. Russia would've fallen. The Mosquito didn't have a big enough bomb load to do the necessary damage. It wasn't like today with JDAM's destroying a target with one bomb. Back then, you needed to drop huge bomb tonnages to have an impact. Without strategic bombing, D-Day would've been impossible before the development of the A-bomb. It was thanks to strategic bombing that the Allies obtained air supremacy over western Europe. Allied planes shot down 1,115 German fighters in January, 1944, 1,118 in February and 1,217 in March. And with the fall of Russia, the Germans would've been able to move all their planes to western Europe, not to mention most of their ground forces. Fortress Europe would've become Ultra-Fortress Europe.

I don't see how you arrive at those numbers. If they hadn't increased the home defence effort from spring 42 to spring 43 they would have had 1800 operational fighters instead of 1200, which even preconditions that keeping one fighter operational at the front did not require more effort than keeping one fighter operational at home. I actually doubt if the Germans had been able to keep many more planes operational at the east front even if they had been available from the factories.

1941-1944 the western allies contributed only a minor part of the effort to defeat Germany, although these were the years when WWII was decided. Going for a bombing offensive from 1942 didn't change that at all, as the bombing offensive didn't start weighing in until 1944, when the war was decided anyway, and the question of when it would end was much more dependent on the advance pace of armies than hitrates of bombers.

Had the Mosquito been used as a traditional level bomber its 4000 lbs. payload certainly would have been too little, even the Lancaster's payload was too little. But with the hitrates seen in the OTL Mosquito raids 4000 lbs. were more than enough.

In the critical years until 1944 a focus on long range maritime patrol aircraft would have been much sounder, if not for other reasons then to keep up the pace of the Murmansk convoys, the war was decided on the East Front. A dedicated tactical airforce earlier would perhaps have given the allies a real option for invading France in 1943. At that time the German defence relied on being able to counterattack, and here a strong tactical airforce (incl. anti-tank planes) would be the perfect countermeassure.

Regards

Steffen Redbeard
 
My suspicion is that the best chance of Britain having a different strategy would be Political.

I know that many Americans were, rightly, morally horrified at terror bombing.

I wonder what might have happened had there been some awful tragedy seen by US reporters as a result of the token bombing of Berlin in the fall of 1940. Perhaps we hit an orphanage or a hospital.

(By the way assuming such a POD had there been a more intelligent approach to air power - especially the value of the fighter the tactical aircraft could Britain have had triumphs both in Crete and North Africa in the Spring of 1941?)

Derek

I agree. If for some reason the RAF had never been formed. From what I have read part of the reason for the priority on Bomber Command was because, to fight its corner and win resources the RAF had to have a field in which the other services couldn't compete. The bomber strategy and the suggestion that wars could be won by bombing alone, without costly ground fighting was very attractive after WWI but ultimately flawed.

If different approaches had been adopted earlier, while they would probably have been hampered by conservatism in the older services and limited forces I think both the FAA and the ground support of the army would have been in markedly better condition. If not up to the level of the Germans, who had the stimuli of defeat in WWI and a very weak military position to motivate them at least they would have been in a better position both materially and psychologically to adjust after early defeats.

With even minimally more forces Crete could have been help and probably more importantly N Africa won earlier. More importantly it would have been much easier to defend Malaya and the Far East. This would have saved a massive amount of lives, both military and civilian and also material wealth, giving better prospects for both Britain and the people of that region after the war. Most of all the Atlantic battles could have been won much earlier and a lot of lives and resources saved there, further increasing the productive capacity of Britain and the allies for crushing the Axis.

Steve
 
I don't see how you arrive at those numbers. If they hadn't increased the home defence effort from spring 42 to spring 43 they would have had 1800 operational fighters instead of 1200, which even preconditions that keeping one fighter operational at the front did not require more effort than keeping one fighter operational at home. I actually doubt if the Germans had been able to keep many more planes operational at the east front even if they had been available from the factories.

1941-1944 the western allies contributed only a minor part of the effort to defeat Germany, although these were the years when WWII was decided. Going for a bombing offensive from 1942 didn't change that at all, as the bombing offensive didn't start weighing in until 1944, when the war was decided anyway, and the question of when it would end was much more dependent on the advance pace of armies than hitrates of bombers.

Had the Mosquito been used as a traditional level bomber its 4000 lbs. payload certainly would have been too little, even the Lancaster's payload was too little. But with the hitrates seen in the OTL Mosquito raids 4000 lbs. were more than enough.

In the critical years until 1944 a focus on long range maritime patrol aircraft would have been much sounder, if not for other reasons then to keep up the pace of the Murmansk convoys, the war was decided on the East Front. A dedicated tactical airforce earlier would perhaps have given the allies a real option for invading France in 1943. At that time the German defence relied on being able to counterattack, and here a strong tactical airforce (incl. anti-tank planes) would be the perfect countermeassure.

Regards

Steffen Redbeard

If half the German fighters were defending Germany against bombers, that means there would've been almost twice as many fighters available for all the other theaters if there had been no strategic bombing because the Germans wouldn't have been keeping any more than a token force of fighters defending Germany against bombers if there were no bombers bombing Germany. I don't know why you doubt the Germans would've been able to keep many more planes operational on the eastern front if they'd been available. If you're thinking fuel, remember without strategic bombing the Germans wouldn't have had a fuel shortage. With twice as many German fighters on the eastern front, Russia would've fallen regardless of whether or not the Murmansk convoys were getting through. Whether or not bombing is strategic has nothing to do with the type of plane being used. If the Allies had used Mosquitos to bomb German factories, that still would've been strategic bombing.
 
Last edited:
What military targets were in Dresden that warrented Fire Bombing of the Resedential Ares ?

Among other things, factories producing optical devices and cigarettes. Not that it matters - in February 1945 the Combined Bomber Offensives No 1 targes were oil and transportation, and Dresden had both a refinery and a marshalling yard that was key to the German rail network in the East. Dresden was a perfectly legitimate target, and the outcry it has produced is largely because of inflated casualties figure from the likes of David Irving and a continual repetition of myths such as the 'no industry!11' one.
 

backstab

Banned
Among other things, factories producing optical devices and cigarettes. Not that it matters - in February 1945 the Combined Bomber Offensives No 1 targes were oil and transportation, and Dresden had both a refinery and a marshalling yard that was key to the German rail network in the East. Dresden was a perfectly legitimate target, and the outcry it has produced is largely because of inflated casualties figure from the likes of David Irving and a continual repetition of myths such as the 'no industry!11' one.
You still don't get it. MOST of the industries were way outside the residential areas (Exept the marshalling yards). THERE WAS NO REASON to fire bomb the residential areas. And if you start with this 'Its all revisionist Crap' I'll reach through the computer and STRANGLE you:mad:
 
You still don't get it. MOST of the industries were way outside the residential areas (Exept the marshalling yards). THERE WAS NO REASON to fire bomb the residential areas. And if you start with this 'Its all revisionist Crap' I'll reach through the computer and STRANGLE you:mad:

*smacks head* Did you miss the part where I said that marshalling yards were the primary target of the CBO? The two raids by Bomber Command on the night of the 13/14th targeted the city centre and created the firestorm with the intention of eliminating Dresden's yards. Follow up raids by the USAAF hit the marshalling yards repeatedley. The whole point of the attack was to end destroy Dresden as a communication/transportation hub, not kill Germans.

EDIT: And BTW, Neillands states that factories in the city suburbs included those for producing cigarettes, Junkers engines, cockpit parts of the 109 and gas masks.
 

backstab

Banned
*smacks head* Did you miss the part where I said that marshalling yards were the primary target of the CBO? The two raids by Bomber Command on the night of the 13/14th targeted the city centre and created the firestorm with the intention of eliminating Dresden's yards. Follow up raids by the USAAF hit the marshalling yards repeatedley. The whole point of the attack was to end destroy Dresden as a communication/transportation hub, not kill Germans.

Which could have been accomplished with 1/4 of the numbers and without fire bombs........ The point of the attack was to destroy the moral of the german people.
This arguement is going in circles.... Unless we find someone who was in Dresden at the time or who was flying a Bomber and dropped their load , there will be a claim and counter claim to every point made
 
Concern about Dresden is not revisionist - it was expressed at the time, in Parliament IIRC. However, I have to point out that the main motivation for the concern appeared to be "it was a beautiful old city" rather than "lots of civilians got killed".

Bomber Command was not capable of picking out individual factories and carefully avoiding any surrounding residential areas (for that matter, neither was the 8th Air Force, whatever they might have claimed). If a city contained valid targets, they hit the city. In any case, the Allies knew that many factories were hard to knock out for long, so "dehousing" the workers so that they fled to the country and couldn't work any more was regarded as a valid aim. The factory workers were valid targets as much as the factories, and they lived in those residential areas.

There was nothing particularly special about the attack on Dresden in moral terms - BC (and the 8th AF) had been doing this sort of thing for many months. It has been taken as a symbol by those opposed to the principle of strategic bombing.

The argument that "the war was almost over, so why bother" doesn't hold up either. Thousands of Allied troops were still being killed in the fighting, so the Allies (rightly IMO) kept on throwing everything they had at Germany until the fighting stopped. If the German leadership wanted to stop the carnage, they could have done so by surrendering once their position became hopeless, but Hitler refused and no-one else dared argue.

What happened at Dresden (and in scores of other places) offends our modern liberal sensibilities, but that ignores the fact that WW2 was a brutal, hate-filled, total war between cultures. By 1945 the Allies were sick of it and just wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible. So they carried on hammering away until Germany finally collapsed. And I for one don't blame them.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum
 

backstab

Banned
Concern about Dresden is not revisionist - it was expressed at the time, in Parliament IIRC. However, I have to point out that the main motivation for the concern appeared to be "it was a beautiful old city" rather than "lots of civilians got killed".

Bomber Command was not capable of picking out individual factories and carefully avoiding any surrounding residential areas (for that matter, neither was the 8th Air Force, whatever they might have claimed). If a city contained valid targets, they hit the city. In any case, the Allies knew that many factories were hard to knock out for long, so "dehousing" the workers so that they fled to the country and couldn't work any more was regarded as a valid aim. The factory workers were valid targets as much as the factories, and they lived in those residential areas.

There was nothing particularly special about the attack on Dresden in moral terms - BC (and the 8th AF) had been doing this sort of thing for many months. It has been taken as a symbol by those opposed to the principle of strategic bombing.

The argument that "the war was almost over, so why bother" doesn't hold up either. Thousands of Allied troops were still being killed in the fighting, so the Allies (rightly IMO) kept on throwing everything they had at Germany until the fighting stopped. If the German leadership wanted to stop the carnage, they could have done so by surrendering once their position became hopeless, but Hitler refused and no-one else dared argue.

What happened at Dresden (and in scores of other places) offends our modern liberal sensibilities, but that ignores the fact that WW2 was a brutal, hate-filled, total war between cultures. By 1945 the Allies were sick of it and just wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible. So they carried on hammering away until Germany finally collapsed. And I for one don't blame them.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum

The big problem is that we are quick to label the Germans with heaps of war crimes but when it comes to our side well.... we dont do 'em because we are the good guys.
 
Which could have been accomplished with 1/4 of the numbers and without fire bombs........ The point of the attack was to destroy the moral of the german people.
This arguement is going in circles.... Unless we find someone who was in Dresden at the time or who was flying a Bomber and dropped their load , there will be a claim and counter claim to every point made

No, it wasn't. I can't be bothered typing it all out at the moment, but Neillands in The Bomber War covers this extensively, and as well as developing the history of the Dresden attack (and the only way it can be considered to have been an attack designed to destroy the morale of the German people is if Harris' personal belief that the destruction of the remaining large German cities would force the German leadership to surrender) he does have text from bomber pilots making it clear they felt Dresden was a legitimate military target.
 
The argument that "the war was almost over, so why bother" doesn't hold up either. Thousands of Allied troops were still being killed in the fighting, so the Allies (rightly IMO) kept on throwing everything they had at Germany until the fighting stopped. If the German leadership wanted to stop the carnage, they could have done so by surrendering once their position became hopeless, but Hitler refused and no-one else dared argue.

On top of that, the war had already been almost over in September 1944 - and then came Warsaw and Market-Garden, followed by Allied failures all along the Siegfried line and finally the Ardennes offensive. With the benefit of hindsight we can see that yes, the war was over but the Allies could not; hell, just look at the fear of the 'Bavarian Redoubt'.
 
The big problem is that we are quick to label the Germans with heaps of war crimes but when it comes to our side well.... we dont do 'em because we are the good guys.

Harris acknowledged at the time that if the Nazis had won the war, they would have executed him as a war criminal. That doesn't mean that he believed that he was one.

In fighting such a war, the important thing is to win it, because the winners decided what was acceptable and what wasn't. Broadly speaking, the moral justification for Allied actions was that Nazi Germany represented such evil that almost anything to put an end to the regime was justified. Naturally, the Nazis didn't see it that way...

It may not often happen in wars, but if ever there was a case of one side being clearly and totally in the wrong, in terms of both starting the war and in their behaviour during it, the Nazis qualify. As indeed do the Japanese, but that's another argument - and no-one seems to get too fussed about the firebombing of Japanese cities.

Tony Williams: Military gun and ammunition website and discussion forum
 

backstab

Banned
. As indeed do the Japanese, but that's another argument - and no-one seems to get too fussed about the firebombing of Japanese cities.


Strange about that. Even with the horrors that the Nazis inflicted in their camps, a lot of the Americans considered the Japanese barbaric
 
Which could have been accomplished with 1/4 of the numbers and without fire bombs........ The point of the attack was to destroy the moral of the german people.
This arguement is going in circles.... Unless we find someone who was in Dresden at the time or who was flying a Bomber and dropped their load , there will be a claim and counter claim to every point made

Bombing was very inaccurate back then. They had to drop huge bomb tonnages to destroy targets. With incendiary bombs, you didn't have to hit a target to destroy it. Just set the city on fire and hope it burned down.
 
Top