Aerial bombing of cities: Encyclopedia II - Aerial bombing of cities - World War II

Aerial bombing of cities - World War II

During the World War II, the bombing of cities became a normal practice of the German Luftwaffe. It usually had little military purpose and was used mainly as a form of psychological warfare, in order to weaken morale of civilians. In the first stage of war, the Germans carried out bombing of most towns and cities in Poland (1939), the first of the destroyed cities being Wieluń. Later the tactics was used against Rotterdam in the Netherlands in 1940. The Luftwaffe also carried out intensive bombing of cities in Britain, including London and Coventry, in a bombing campaign known in Britain as "the Blitz", from September 1940 through to May 1941.

In response, the British started night air raids on Berlin and other cities. In 1943, Hamburg was heavily damaged by firebombing known as Operation Gomorrah. In the final stage of the war, the United Kingdom and the United States used fire-bomb attacks on Dresden during February 13-15, 1945, creating a firestorm which together with the bombing itself killed 35,000 citizens (although Nazi propaganda figures at the time, and sometimes still quoted as correct, were as high as 250,000^[1]). The US bombing of Tokyo killed 83,000 citizens, bombing of Kobe killed another 8,800 and the nuclear weapon attacks on Hiroshima killed 70,000 citizens and Nagasaki killed 36,000 citizens during World War II.

Aerial bombing had the practical effect of equating the citizens of a country with those who made the decision to take that country to war. However, it is clear that not all citizens of Germany were Nazis; in fact there was an active German resistance which, with the help of the Abwehr, Germany's intelligence organization, carried out several attempts on Hitler's life. Similarly in Japan, although allegiance to the emperor was strong, even within the ranks of the military there were many who strongly objected to an attack on Pearl Harbor and to war with America in general.

The widespread use of the tactic of bombing civilian populations in World War II is a major reason that historians consider it a total war.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "World War II", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki