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History
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Title: Dresden A real Holocaust
Source: [None]
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Published: Jan 20, 2011
Author: Kevin Alfred Strom
Post Date: 2011-01-20 09:01:17 by Itistoolate
Keywords: None
Views: 496
Comments: 28


Watch this video at SolvoSermo.Com

Dresden: A Real Holocaust By Kevin Alfred Strom

Original Link http://www.christusrex.org/www1/war/dresden4.htm

The night of February 13th, and February 14th, Valentine's Day, mark an ominous anniversary in the history of Western Civilization. For beginning on the night of February 13th, 1945, occurred the destruction of Dresden.

On the eve of Valentine's Day, 1945, World War II in Europe was nearly over. For all practical purposes Germany was already defeated. Italy, and Germany's other European allies, had fallen by the wayside. The Red Army was rushing to occupy vast areas of what had been Germany in the East, while the allies of the Soviets, the British and Americans, were bombing what was left of Germany's defenses and food and transportation infrastructure into nonexistence.

And what was Dresden? Most of you have probably heard of Dresden China, and that delicately executed and meticulously detailed porcelain is really a perfect symbol for that city. For centuries Dresden had been a center of art and culture, and refined leisure and recreation. She was a city of art museums and theatres, circuses and sports stadia, a town of ancient half-timbered buildings looking for all the world like those of medieval England, with venerable churches and centuries-old cathedrals gracing her skyline. She was a city of artists and craftsmen, of actors and dancers, of tourists and the merchants and hotels that served them. Above all, what Dresden was, was defined during the war by what she was not. She had no significant military or industrial installations. Because of this, Dresden had become, above all other things that she was, a city of children, of women, of refugees, and of the injured and maimed who were recovering from their wounds in her many hospitals.

These women and children, these wounded soldiers, these infirm and elderly people, these refugees fleeing from the brutal onslaught of the Communist armies to the East, had come to Dresden because it was commonly believed at the time that Dresden would not be attacked. Its lack of strategic or military or industrial significance, and the well-known presence of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilian refugees and even Allied prisoners of war, seemed to guarantee safety to the city. Surely, it was thought, not even a the most powerful and determined enemy would be so depraved and sadistic, and so wasteful of that enemy's own resources, to attack such a city. But the people of Dresden, who were happily attending the cinema or eating dinner at home or watching the show-horses in the circus on that fateful night were wrong, wrong, wrong. And their leaders were also wrong, for the city was virtually open and undefended and only minimal civil defense preparations had been made.

Dresden's population had almost doubled in the months before the attack, mainly as a result of the influx of refugees from the Eastern Front, most of them women and young children. According to British historian David Irving, the briefings given to the British bomber squadrons before the attack on Dresden were curiously different. In one, the soldiers were told that their target was the railway center of Dresden. In another, they were told that the target was a poison-gas factory. In yet another, they were told that the target was a marshalling-grounds for troops in the city. Another was told that the target was a major arsenal. These were all lies.

The only marshalling-grounds for what few troops were in the area were located well outside the city. The arsenal had burned down in 1916. There were factories for toothpaste and baby-powder in Dresden, but none for poison gas. There were, in fact, no fewer than eighteen railway stations in Dresden, but only one was hit by the bombing, and that was barely touched and in fact was operating again just three days later.

According to copious documentation unearthed by David Irving from the archives of the American and British governments, the point of the attack was in fact to inflict the maximum loss of life on the civilian population and particularly to kill as many refugees as possible who were fleeing from the Red Army. In achieving these goals it was highly successful. It was thus planned and executed by those at the very highest levels of the British and American governments, who to attain their purposes even lied to their own soldiers and citizens, who to this day have never been told the full story by their leaders.

How was this devastating effect accomplished?

At 10:10 PM on February 13th, the first wave of the attack, consisting of the British Number 5 Bomber Group, began. The attacking force consisted of about 2,000 bombers with additional support craft, which dropped over 3,000 high explosive and 650,000 incendiary bombs (more commonly known as firebombs) on the center of the city. Incendiary bombs are not known for their efficiency per pound in destroying heavy equipment such as military hardware or railroad tracks, but are extremely effective in producing maximum loss of human life. The loads carried by the bombers were over 75 per cent incendiaries. In fact, the goal of the first wave of the attack was, according to British air commander Sir Arthur Bomber Harris, to set the city well on fire. That he did.

The lack of any effective anti-aircraft defenses allowed the bombers to drop to very low altitudes and thus a relatively high degree of precision and visual identification of targets was achieved. Despite the fact that they could clearly see that the marked target area contained hospitals and sports stadia and residential areas of center city Dresden, the bombers nevertheless obeyed orders and rained down a fiery death upon the unlucky inhabitants of that city on a scale which had never before been seen on planet Earth. Hundreds of thousands of innocents were literally consumed by fire, an actual holocaust by the true definition of the word: complete consumption by fire.

The incendiaries started thousands of fires and, aided by a stiff wind and the early-on destruction of the telephone exchanges that might have summoned firefighters from nearby towns, these fires soon coalesced into one unimaginably huge firestorm. Now such firestorms are not natural phenomena, and are seldom created by man, so few people have any idea of their nature. Basically, what happened was this: The intense heat caused by the huge column of smoke and flame, miles high and thousands of acres in area, created a terrific updraft of air in the center of the column. This created a very low pressure at the base of the column, and surrounding fresh air rushed inward at speeds estimated to be thirty times that of an ordinary tornado. An ordinary tornado wind-force is a result of temperature differences of perhaps 20 to 30 degrees centigrade. In this firestorm the temperature differences were on the order of 600 to 1,000 degrees centigrade. This inward-rushing air further fed the flames, creating a literal tornado of fire, with winds in the surrounding area of many hundreds of miles per hour--sweeping men, women, children, animals, vehicles and uprooted trees pell-mell into the glowing inferno.

But this was only the first stage of the plan.

Exactly on schedule, three hours after the first attack, a second massive armada of British bombers arrived, again loaded with high explosive and massive quantities of incendiary bombs. The residents of Dresden, their power systems destroyed by the first raid, had no warning of the second. Again the British bombers attacked the center city of Dresden, this time dividing their targets--one half of the bombs were to be dropped into the center of the conflagration, to keep it going, the other half around the edges of the firestorm. No pretense whatever was made of selecting military targets. The timing of the second armada was such as to ensure that a large quantity of the surviving civilians would have emerged from their shelters by that time, which was the case, and also in hopes that rescue and firefighting crews would have arrived from surrounding cities, which also proved to be true. The firefighters and medics thus incinerated hadn't needed the telephone exchange to know that they were needed--the firestorm was visible from a distance of 200 miles.

It is reported that body parts, pieces of clothing, tree branches, huge quantities of ashes, and miscellaneous debris from the firestorm fell for days on the surrounding countryside as far away as eighteen miles. After the attack finally subsided, rescue workers found nothing but liquefied remains of the inhabitants of some shelters, where even the metal kitchen utensils had melted from the intense heat.

The next day, Ash Wednesday and Valentine's Day, 1945, medical and other emergency personnel from all over central Germany had converged on Dresden. Little did they suspect that yet a third wave of bombers was on its way, this time American. This attack had been carefully coordinated with the previous raids. Four hundred fifty Flying Fortresses and a support contingent of fighters arrived to finish the job at noon. I quote from David Irving's The Destruction of Dresden:

"Just a few hours before Dresden had been a fairy-tale city of spires and cobbled streets .... now total war had put an end to all that. ...The ferocity of the US raid of 14th February had finally brought the people to their knees... but it was not the bombs which finally demoralised the people ... it was the Mustang fighters, which suddenly appeared low over the city, firing on everything that moved .... one section of the Mustangs concentrated on the river banks, where masses of bombed-out people had gathered. ... British prisoners who had been released from their burning camps were among the first to suffer the discomfort of machine-gunning attacks .... wherever columns of tramping people were marching in or out of the city they were pounced on by the fighters, and machine-gunned or raked with cannon fire."

Ladies and gentlemen, on this program I can only give you a bare glimpse of the inhuman horror of the holocaust of Dresden. In Dresden, no fewer than 135,000 innocent victims died, with some estimates as high as 300,000. More died in Dresden than died in the well-known attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. More destruction befell Dresden in one day than was inflicted on the whole of Britain during the entire war. And yet you haven't been told.

I urge every one of you to read The Destruction of Dresden by David Irving. I assure you, after reading Irving's book, you will never take seriously the Establishment's version of what happened in that war again.

What you ought to take seriously, though, is the fact that the same clique that controlled the traitorous Roosevelt and Churchill governments, whose hatred of our race and civilization and whose alliance with Communism were the real causes of the holocaust of Dresden, still controls our government and our media today. It is they who are pushing for a disarmed, racially mixed America. It is they who promote the teaching of sodomy to our young children. It is they who are destroying our industrial infrastructure in the name of a global economy. It is they who created the drug subculture and then also the police state agencies which pretend to fight it. The hour is very late for America and indeed for all of Western civilization. But if patriots will heed our call, then there is no reason for despair. For the enemies of our nation may have power, but their power is based on lies. Won't you help us cut through the chain of lies that holds our people in mental slavery?

Every year, families should commemorate the anniversary of the holocaust of Dresden on the eve of 13th February.

Once again, we pause to remember... DRESDEN, February 13th 1945

A Real Holocaust and Act of Terrorism

Fifty-seven years ago, on the evening of February 13, 1945, an orgy of genocide and barbarism began against a defenceless German city, one of the greatest cultural centres of northern Europe. Within less than 14 hours, not only was it reduced to flaming ruins, but an estimated one third of its inhabitants ­ possibly as many as half a million ­ had perished in what was the worst massacre of all time.

As Americans bemoan the loss of fewer than 3,000 at Larry Silverstein's World Trade Center and the Pentagon, few know - less care ­ about the campaign of cold-blooded TERRORISM conducted against German civilians during World War II, culminating in the extermination of over 300,000.

The following account, taken from the Feb. 1985 issue of the NS Bulletin, tells us what a REAL holocaust is like.

Toward the end of World War II, as Allied planes rained death and destruction over Germany, the old Saxon city of Dresden lay like an island of tranquility amid desolation. Famous as a cultural centre and possessing no military value, Dresden had been spared the terror that descended from the skies over the rest of the country.

In fact, little had been done to provide the ancient city of artists and craftsmen with anti-aircraft defences. One squadron of planes had been stationed in Dresden for awhile, but the Luftwaffe decided to move the aircraft to another area where they would be of use. A gentlemen's agreement seemed to prevail, designating Dresden an "open city."

On Shrove Tuesday, February 13, 1945, a flood of refugees fleeing the Red Army 60 miles away had swollen the city's population to well over a million. Each new refugee brought fearful accounts of Soviet atrocities. Little did those refugees retreating from the Red terror imagine that they were about to die in a horror worse than anything Stalin could devise.

Normally, a carnival atmosphere prevailed in Dresden on Shrove Tuesday. In 1945, however, the outlook was rather dismal. Houses everywhere overflowed with refugees, and thousands were forced to camp out in the streets shivering in the bitter cold.

However, the people felt relatively safe; and although the mood was grim, the circus played to a full house that night as thousands came to forget for a moment the horrors of war. Bands of little girls paraded about in carnival dress in an effort to bolster waning spirits. Half-sad smiles greeted the laughing girls, but spirits were lifted.

No one realized that in less than 24 hours those same innocent children would die screaming in Churchill's firestorms. But, of course, no one could know that then. The Russians, to be sure, were savages, but at least the Americans and British were "honourable."

So when those first alarms signaled the start of 14 hours of hell, Dresden's people streamed dutifully into their shelters. But they did so without much enthusiasm, believing the alarms to be false, since their city had never been threatened from the air. Many would never come out alive, for that "great democratic statesman," Winston Churchill ­ in collusion with that other "great democratic statesman," Franklin Delano Roosevelt ­ had decided that the city of Dresden was to be obliterated by saturation bombing.

What where Churchill's motives? They appear to have been political, rather than military. Historians unanimously agree that Dresden had no military value. What industry it did have produced only cigarettes and china.

But the Yalta Conference was coming up, in which the Soviets and their Western allies would sit down like ghouls to carve up the shattered corpse of Europe. Churchill wanted a trump card ­ a devastating "thunderclap of Anglo-American annihilation" ­ with which to "impress" Stalin.

That card, however, was never played at Yalta, because bad weather delayed the originally scheduled raid. Yet Churchill insisted that the raid be carried out to "disrupt and confuse" the German civilian population behind the lines.

Dresden's citizens barely had time to reach their shelters. The first bomb fell at 10:09 p.m. The attack lasted 24 minutes, leaving the inner city a raging sea of fire. "Precision saturation bombing" had created the desired firestorm.

A firestorm is caused when hundreds of smaller fires join in one vast conflagration. Huge masses of air are sucked in to feed the inferno, causing an artificial tornado. Those persons unlucky enough to be caught in the rush of wind are hurled down entire streets into the flames. Those who seek refuge underground often suffocate as oxygen is pulled from the air to feed the blaze, or they perish in a blast of white heat - heat intense enough to melt human flesh.

WOMEN AND CHILDREN TARGETED

One eyewitness who survived told of seeing "young women carrying babies running up and down the streets, their dresses and hair on fire, screaming until they fell down, or the collapsing buildings fell on top of them."

There was a three-hour pause between the first and second raids. The lull had been calculated to lure civilians from their shelters into the open again. To escape the flames, tens of thousands of civilians had crowded into the Grosser Garten, a magnificent park nearly one and a half miles square.

The second raid came at 1:22 a.m. with no warning. Twice as many bombers returned with a massive load of incendiary bombs. The second wave was designed to spread the raging firestorm into the Grosser Garten.

It was a complete "success." Within a few minutes a sheet of flame ripped across the grass, uprooting trees and littering the branches of others with everything from bicycles to human limbs. For days afterward, they remained bizarrely strewn about as grim reminders of Allied sadism.

At the start of the second air assault, many were still huddled in tunnels and cellars, waiting for the fires of the first attack to die down. At 1:30 a.m. an ominous rumble reached the ears of the commander of a Labour Service convoy sent into the city on a rescue mission. He described it this way: "The detonation shook the cellar walls. The sound of the explosions mingled with a new, stranger sound which seemed to come closer and closer, the sound of a thundering waterfall; it was the sound of the mighty tornado howling in the inner city."

MELTING HUMAN FLESH

Others hiding below ground died. But they died painlessly ­ they simply glowed bright orange and blue in the darkness. As the heat intensified, they either disintegrated into cinders or melted into a thick liquid­­often three or four feet deep in spots.

Shortly after 10:30 on the morning of February 14, the last raid swept over the city. American bombers pounded the rubble that had been Dresden for a steady 38 minutes. But this attack was not nearly as heavy as the first two.

However, what distinguished this raid was the cold-blooded ruthlessness with which it was carried out. U.S. Mustangs appeared low over the city, strafing anything that moved, including a column of rescue vehicles rushing to the city to evacuate survivors. One assault was aimed at the banks of the Elbe River, where refugees had huddled during the horrible night.

In the last year of the war, Dresden had become a hospital town. During the previous night's massacre, heroic nurses had dragged thousands of crippled patients to the Elbe. The low-flying Mustangs machine-gunned those helpless patients, as well as thousands of old men, women and children who had escaped the city.

When the last plane left the sky, Dresden was a scorched ruin, its blackened streets filled with corpses. The city was spared no horror. A flock of vultures escaped from the zoo and fattened on the carnage. Rats swarmed over the piles of corpses.

A Swiss citizen described his visit to Dresden two weeks after the raid: "I could see torn-off arms and legs, mutilated torsos and heads which had been wrenched from their bodies and rolled away. In places the corpses were still lying so densely that I had to clear a path through them in order not to tread on arms and legs."

The death toll was staggering. The full extent of the Dresden Holocaust can be more readily grasped if one considers that well over 250,000 - possibly as many as a half a million ­ persons died within a 14-hour period, whereas estimates of those who died at Hiroshima range from 90,000 to 140,000.*

Allied apologists for the massacre have often "twinned" Dresden with the English city of Coventry. But the 380 killed in Coventry during the entire war cannot begin to compare with over 1,000 times that number who were slaughtered in 14 hours at Dresden. Moreover, Coventry was a munitions centre, a legitimate military target. Dresden, on the other hand, produced only china - and cups and saucers can hardly be considered military hardware!

It is interesting to further compare the respective damage to London and Dresden, especially when we recall all the Hollywood schmaltz about the "London blitz." In one night, 16,000 acres of land were destroyed in the Dresden massacre. London escaped with damage to only 600 acres during the entire war.

In one ironic note, Dresden's only conceivable military target - its railroad yards ­ was ignored by Allied bombers. They were too busy concentrating on helpless old men, women and children.

If ever there was a war crime, then certainly the Dresden Holocaust ranks as the most sordid one of all time. Yet there are no movies made today condemning this fiendish slaughter; nor did any Allied airman ­ or Sir Winston ­ sit in the dock at Nuremberg. In fact, the Dresden airmen were actually awarded medals for their role in this mass murder. But, of course, they could not have been tried, because there were "only following orders."

This is not to say that the mountains of corpses left in Dresden were ignored by the Nuremberg Tribunal. In one final irony, the prosecution presented photographs of the Dresden dead as "evidence" of alleged National Socialist atrocities against Jewish concentration camp inmates!

Churchill, the monster who ordered the Dresden slaughter, was knighted, and the rest is history. The cold-blooded sadism of the massacre, however, is brushed aside by his biographers, who still cannot bring themselves to tell how the desire of one madman to "impress" another one led to the mass murder of up to a half million men, women and children.

NEVER SHALL WE FORGET THE VICTIMS OF THIS UNSPEAKABLE CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY!

© 1985 NEW ORDER PO Box 270486/Milwaukee WI 53227

Permission granted for unaltered reproduction and dissemination

*Although it will never be possible to obtain an exact count of the victims, a reasonable estimate can adduced by taking the number of registered inhabitants of the city, doubling it by a factor of 2+ to account for undocumented refugees in the city at the time, and then extrapolating the number of dead from analogous instances in other German cities subjected to saturation bombing and aerial atrocity during World War II, notably Hamburg, Darmstadt and Pforzheim, inter alia.

A Real Holocaust: Dresden, 13 February 1945 How approximately 500,000 Germans were "democratically" exterminated in one night

"The Germans would have to be angels and saints to forget and forgive all the injustices, atrocities and cruelties which they have suffered, twice in a generation, without any provocation, from the allies. Just imagine what would we, as Americans, do if we had been treated as we treated the Germans. Our cruelty would have no limits in revenging our suffering!" ~Reverend Ludwig A. Fritsch, Ph. D., D. D. emer., Chicago, 1948

by Thomas Brookes (exclusively translated from our German section for THE BARNES REVIEW)

Dresden Holocaust - The real one

The professional liars who act on behalf of the Holocaust Industry and the official historiography of the Federal Republic of Germany shamelessly reduce the death toll of the Dresden holocaust by several hundreds of thousands. On the other hand, nobody disputes that more than 12.000 houses in the center of the city were reduced to dust during the hellish firestorm. In view of the fact that, in addition to the 600.000 inhabitants of Dresden, another 600.000 people (refugees from Breslau) had found shelter in the overcrowded city, one can safely assume that each of these 12.000 houses contained no fewer than 50 people. But of these houses virtually nothing remained, and the people who had been dwelling in them were transformed into ashes due to a heat of 1600 degrees Celsius.

The deniers of the German Holocaust brazenly claim that only 35.000 persons perished in Dresden. Considering that a superficies of 7 x 4 kilometers, to wit 28 square kilometers, was completely destroyed, this "politically correct” figure would imply that less than 1, 5 persons died on each thousand square meters! In February 2005 a commission of "serious” historians further reduced this figure, claiming that only 24.000 Germans had been killed in Dresden. But anybody familiar with the character of the political system of Germany knows that these "serious historians” are nothing but vulgar falsifiers of history who are paid for preventing the breakthrough of the truth with more and more bare-faced lies.

The figure of 35.000 dead only represents the small part of the victims who could be fully identified. Erhard Mundra, a member of the "Bautzen committee” (an association of former political prisoners in the GDR), wrote in the daily newspaper Die Welt (12.2. 1995, page 8): "According to the former general staff officer of the military district of Dresden and retired lieutenant colonel of the Bundeswehr, D. Matthes, 35.000 victims were fully and another 50.000 partly identified, whereas further 168.000 could not be identified at all.” It goes without saying that the hapless children, women and old people whom the firestorm had transformed into a heap of ashes could not be identified either.

In 1955 former West German chancellor Konrad Adenauer stated: "On 13 February 1945, the attack on the city of Dresden, which was overcrowded with refugees, claimed about 250.000 victims.” (Deutschland heute, edited by the press and information service of the federal government, Wiesbaden 1955, page 154.)

In 1992, the city of Dresden gave the following answer to a citizen who had inquired about the death toll: "According to reliable information from the Dresden police, 202.040 dead, most of them women and children, were found until 20 March. Only about 30% of them could be identified. If we take into account those who are missing, a figure of 250.000 to 300.000 victims seems realistic.” (letter by Hitzscherlich, Sign: 0016/Mi, date: 31 - 7 - 1992.)

At the time of the attack, Dresden had no anti-aircraft guns and no military defense. It possessed no military industry at all. The city served as a shelter for refugees from the East. The roofs were marked with a red cross.

The German cities became huge crematoria

In that horrible night from 13 to 14 February 1945, the biggest war criminal of all time, Winston Churchill, had almost 700.000 incendiary bombs dropped on Dresden – in other words, one bomb for two inhabitants. On 3 March 1995, Die Welt commented this fact: "When the cities became crematoria… Professor Dietmar Hosser from the institute for construction material, massive construction and fire prevention deems it highly probable that the temperatures above ground reached up to 1600 degrees Celsius.”

The deadly "liberation” came from the skies

The genocide of the German nation destroyed "80% of all German cities with more than 100.000 inhabitants”. The air forces of the Allied war criminals dropped "40.000 tons of bombs in 1942, 120.000 tons in 1943, 650.000 tons in 1944 and another 500.000 tons in the four last months of the war in 1945” (Die Welt, 11 February 1995, page G1).

The Germans did not begin the bombing war!

Kurt Vonnegut was in Dresden when the city was destroyed in 1945. Based on his personal experience, he wrote his anti-war novel which brought him international fame.

Kurt Vonnegut: Independent-Interview:

In 1945, Kurt Vonnegut was witness to another pretty good imitation of Mount Vesuvius; the firembombing by allied forces of Dresden, the town in Eastern Germany, during the last months of the Second World War. More than 600.000 incendiary bombs later, the city looked more like the surface of the moon. Returning home to Indianapolis after the war, Vonnegut began writing short stories… Finally, in 1969, he tackled the subject of war, recounting his experience as a POW in Dresden forced to dig corpses from the rubble. [The book was] banned in several states, and branded as a tool of the devil in North Dakota… In Slaughter-house Five, he describes how he narrowly escaped death … in the firebombing of Dresden. "Yes, by our people [The British], I may say. You guys burnt the place down, turned it into a single column of flame. More people died there in the firestorm, in that one big flame, han died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.”

The Independent, London, 20.12. 2001, p. 19

It should be reminded that Great Britain and France declared war on the German Reich on 3 September 1939, and that England began the terror bombing against the German civilian population as early as two days after its declaration of war. On 5 September 1939 the first raids took place against Wilhelmshaven and Cuxhaven; on 12 January 1940, Westerland/Sylt was bombed. Two weeks later, on 25 January, the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht forbade air raids against Britain, including her ports, an exception being made for the docks of Rosyth. On 20 March, Kiel and Hörnum/Sylt were attacked with 110 explosive and incendiary bombs, which hit and destroyed a hospital. In April 1940, British bombers attacked further towns devoid of military importance. On 11 May 1940, one day after being named Prime Minister and Minister of Defence, Winston Churchill decided to order a massive air offensive against the German civilian population; however he did not inform his own people of his decision. On 18 May 1940, the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht reported more meaningless British attacks on non-military aims and warned Britain of the consequences.

Not before 14/15 November 1940 did the Luftwaffe first attack a British city – Coventry with its important military industry. This happened several months after the start of the British terror bombing against civilian targets in Germany. The raid claimed about 600 victims.

Air-warfare expert Sönke Neitzel concludes: "Indisputably during the first years of the war all heavy attacks of the German Luftwaffe against cities were planned as military blows and cannot be defined as terror raids.” (Darmstädter Echo, 25 – 9 – 2004, p. 4)

Historians: "The British and American peoples share the burden of guilt for the genocide of the Germans”

In September 1988, military historians from five countries met at a conference in Freiburg. The event had been organized by the Institute for Military Research of the Bundeswehr. During a week, American, British, German, French and Italian specialist discussed various aspects of air warfare in the Second World War. After the conference, the daily newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine published a detailed and highly interesting article. Under the headline "Bombing the Cities”, the author, Professor Günter Gillessen, wrote: "It is a remarkable fact that the Wehrmacht stuck to the traditional principles of moderate warfare until the very end, whereas the two Western democracies resorted to a revolutionary, radical and reckless type of air warfare.” Another interesting conclusion the historians arrived at was the following: "It cannot be disputed that the principles of international law forbade total carpeting bombing … The historians considered the indiscriminate bombing as an abomination, but refused to lay the whole guilt on Air Marshall Sir Arthur Harris or the Bomber Command. According to them, the entire staff of the RAF, but even more the political leaders, especially Churchill and Roosevelt, plus the majority of their peoples shared the burden of guilt.”

Churchill wanted to roast German refugees

On 13 February 1990, forty-five years after the destruction of Dresden, British historian David Irving spoke at the Dresden "Kulturpalast". In his speech, Irving quoted the war criminal Winston Churchill: "I don't want any suggestions how to destroy militarily important targets around Dresden. I want suggestions how we can roast the 600.000 refugees from Breslau in Dresden.” But for Churchill, roasting the Germans was not enough. On the morning after the firebombing, he ordered his "Tiefflieger" (strafers, low-flying planes) to machine-gun the survivors on the beaches of the river Elbe.

Churchill’s systematic war of extermination against the German people included plans for the destruction of every house in every German city. "’If it has to be, we hope to be able to destroy nearly every house in every German city.’… In March 1945 Churchill began to doubt the wisdom of bombing German cities ‘simply for the sake of increasing the terror’, but the terror continued.” (Die Welt, 11 February 2005, p. 27)

The German elite accuses the victims

Whereas the butcher Churchill actually felt some belated remorse for his war of extermination against the civilian population of Germany, the despicable German post-war elite awarded him the Karlspreis (Charlemagne prize) of Aachen. Churchill accepted this prize in Aachen, one of the countless cities his air-force had devastated, thereby burning alive countless human beings.

Since then, the elite of the German vassal state has not changed. They continue to praise the murderers and to revile the victims. On the eve of the fiftieth anniversary of the destruction of his city, the mayor of Dresden, Ingolf Rossberg, did not shrink from heaping abuse on the German holocaust victims; he practically justified the murder of hundreds of thousands (most of them women, children and wounded soldiers in the hospitals) plus the annihilation of irreplaceable cultural treasures: "60 years after the devastating bombing, which claimed tens of thousands of victims, mayor Ingolf Rossberg warned against misunderstanding Dresden as an ‘innocent city’.” (Die Welt, 12 February 2005, Internet version).

Thus spoke the mayor of a city which had received streams of people, animals and carriages like a caring mother. The streets and squares of Dresden were filled with refugees, the meadows and parks had been transformed into huge camps. When the fatal hour approached, about 1.130.000 people were living in Dresden. The result of the attacks was even more murderous than the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Only the German victims are guilty, not their murderers!

As American, British, German, French and Italian historians ascertained at the Freiburg conference in 1988, not only the main war criminals Churchill and Roosevelt bear the guilt for history’s worst atrocity. The majority of the British and the American population were not blameless either.

The German weekly Der Spiegel stated in its 1/1995 issue: "About six million Germans were killed." As a matter of fact, the actual figure was about fifteen million. But although even the anti-German Spiegel admits that six million Germans were put to death, the German elite only bemoans Jewish victims.

On 12 February 1995, Ernst Cramer wrote in Die Welt (page 12): "When commemorating the victims, we should stop asking about guilt.” And what had the politically super-correct former German president, Roman Herzog, to say about who was guilty of the German genocide? Speaking in Dresden on 13 February 1995, Herzog chose to insult the victims by stating: "It is meaningless to discuss if the bombing war, the inhumanity of which nobody disputes, was legally justified or not. What are such discussions good for, considering that fifty years have elapsed?” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 14 February 1995, p. 1)

But when it comes to monstrously exaggerating the Auschwitz death toll (according to the well-known journalist Fritjof Meyer, three and a half million Auschwitz victims were simply invented in order to denigrate the German people) the professional hypocrites and liars never say: "It is meaningless to discuss this… What are such discussions good for, considering that so and so many years have elapsed?” As a matter of fact, all leading German politicians claim that Germany is guilty in all eternity. Even the unborn Germans are guilty!

Two measures

Let us resume: Not even the responsible deny that the German cities were transformed into crematoria during World War Two. The total amounts of bombs dropped on the German cities has been confirmed by the criminals themselves and is therefore credible. That six million Germans were killed, was confirmed by the anti-German Spiegel and by official statistics, although the real figure is about 15 million. Nevertheless every liar under the sun apparently has the right to affirm that the allied terror bombings claimed only a handful of victims. These brazen falsifiers of history have nothing to fear from the German justice.

The biggest mass murder in history

The "democrats”, who claim to have "liberated” the German people from Hitler, brought nothing but terror and destruction. In Dresden, they murdered several hundreds of thousands people in one single hellish night and destroyed countless cultural treasures. Women who were giving birth to children in the delivery rooms of the burning hospitals jumped out of the windows, but within minutes, these mothers and their children, who were still hanging at the umbilical cords, were reduced to ashes too. Thousands of people whom the incendiary bombs had transformed into living torches jumped into the ponds, but phosphorus continues to burn even in the water. Even the animals from the zoo, elephants, lions and others, desperately headed for the water, together with the humans. But all of them, the new-born child, the mother, the old man, the wounded soldier and the innocent animal from the zoo and the stable, horribly perished in the name of "liberation". 5. February 1995 Welt am Sonntag page 23:

"The destruction of Dresden was the result of blind rage and hate! Bomber Harris said: 'Dresden? A place of such a name no longer exists'."

3 March.1995 Die Welt page 8:

In the firestorm people were transformed into ashes

In the center of the city, a densely populated area of 15 square kilometers, the firestorm did not spare a single house. The fire was brought about by 650.000 incendiary bombs and continued to rage for two days and two nights. In the center of the city, the asphalt was burning. On the following day, the hurricane was still so strong that a Turkish student felt its power even on a bridge over the river Elbe: "A gigantic hurricane caused by the fire raged over the Elbe. We had to creep over the bridge and cling to the railing in order to avoid being whirled away by the winds.” To avoid a general panic among the German population, Goebbels mentioned a death toll of 40.000, although he had got a report from the vice-chief of the propaganda office in Dresden according to which the real figure was 350.000 to 400.000…Even after the war political considerations prevented an objective evaluation of the number of victims. Too high figures spoilt the idea of reconciliation…. It would be very naïve to think that the Nazi propagandists were interested in exaggerating the death toll… As the allied bombing war had the declared purpose of breaking the morale of the civilian population, any propagandistic inflation of the real figures would only have increased this effect.

NJ commentary: The death toll of Dresden was so huge that Dr. Goebbels decided to downplay the extent of the massacre by 90%. He feared that publishing the real numbers would lead to chaos and a total breakdown of morale all over the Reich. The dimension of the slaughter simply defied imagination.

3 March 1995 Die Welt page 8:

The German cities became huge crematoria 500.000 murdered Germans in only one night of "liberation". Germans, reunited in death! Photo and caption are not part of this DIE WELT-article!

At the Altmarkt-Square of Dresden, three meters below street level, they excavated cellars in which the original sandstone layer had become translucent discolored from white-beige into red. Partly the stone had become 'glazed' ... Berlin archaeologist Uwe Müller said: ‘From that we can see that the temperatures must have ranged between 1300 to 1400 degrees celsius and the area lacked oxygen ... Above ground the temperatures must have been even much higher, as high as 1600 degrees celsius ... Human beings were transformed into ashes'.

Winston Churchill: "You must understand that this war is not against Hitler or National Socialism, but against the strength of the German people, which is to be smashed once and for all, regardless of whether it is in the hands of Hitler or a Jesuit priest."

Emrys Hughes, Winston Churchill - His Career in War and Peace, p. 145

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#1. To: Itistoolate (#0)

At the time of the Dresden bombing, German rockets were still falling on British cities, the Rhine had not yet been crossed by the Allies, and Dresden was a major industrial and communications center for the Reich. In fact, the inhabitants had been assured by the Nazi govt that the city would not be bombed because a cousin of Churchill was in the city (I have not found more detail about this claim but I think it referenced a relative who was a POW at Colditz). The Allied bombardment of Dresden established that no German city was safe, and it also served as a response to the German destruction of Coventry and a refutation about the claim regarding Churchill. The Dresden bombing was not so severe as, for example, the bombing of Hamburg. One reason for its notoriety was that the casualty figures had been exaggerated.

Shoonra  posted on  2011-01-20   9:43:44 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#2. To: Itistoolate (#0) (Edited)

As for Churchill's motives in RAF participation in bombing raids, one can hold various opinions.

As for the accusation that the Dresden bombing was a war crime, it is false. Under the Hague Convention (Hague IV, Laws of Land Warfare) of 1907 the bombing was completely legal and totally justified. The Convention makes it clear that any defended city is a legitimate and legal target. Dresden had AA defences and was, therefore, a defended city. When the Germans placed defenses there, they made it a legitimate target.

As for many of the claims of vast numbers of civilians killed, it is increasingly certain that the Russians, in their Cold War propaganda, did all they could to maximize these claims as anti-Western propaganda and to win over the loyalties of those in East Germany and those behind the Iron Curtain. It didn't really work but they did try. Ironically, Dresden was bombed in this way specifically at the request of the Soviet commanders as detailed in the following USAF document on the ongoing controversy over Dresden.

HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF THE 14-15 FEBRUARY 1945
BOMBINGS OF DRESDEN
Prepared by:
USAF Historical Division
Research Studies Institute
Air University

I. INTRODUCTION:

1. The reasons for and the nature and consequences of the bombing of Dresden, Germany, by Allied air forces on 14-15 February 1945 have repeatedly been the subject of official and semi-official inquiries and of rumor and exaggeration by uninformed or inadequately informed persons. Moreover, the Communists have with increasing frequency and by means of distortion and falsification used the February 1945 Allied bombings of Dresden as a basis for disseminating anti-Western and anti-American propaganda. From time to time there appears in letters of inquiry to the United States Air Force evidence that American nationals are themselves being taken in by the Communist propaganda line concerning the February 1945 bombings of Dresden.

2. The purpose of this historical analysis, based in its entirety on existing official documents and on standard reference sources, is to provide a more detailed and definitive account of the reasons for and the nature and consequences of the February 1945 Dresden bombings than has heretofore been available. The narrative portion of this historical analysis sets forth a framework for arriving at definitive answers to such recurring questions concerning the February 1945 bombings of Dresden as the following:

a. Was Dresden a legitimate military target?

b. What strategic objectives, of mutual importance to the Allies and to the Russians, underlay the bombings of Dresden?

c. Did the Russians request that Dresden be bombed by allied air forces?

d. On whose recommendation, whether by an individual or by a committee, and by what authority were Allied air forces ordered to bomb Dresden?

e. Were the Russians officially informed by the Allies concerning the intended date of and the forces to be committed to the bombing of Dresden?

f. With what forces and with what means did the Allied forces bomb Dresden?

g. What were the specific target objectives in the Dresden bombings?

h. What were the immediate and actual consequences of the Dresden bombings on the physical structure and the populace of the city?

i. Were the Dresden bombings in any way a deviation from established bombing policies set forth in official bombing directives?

j. Were the specific forces and means employed in the Dresden bombings similar to or different from the forces and means employed by the Allies in other aerial attacks on comparable targets in Germany?

k. In what specific ways and to what degree did the bombings of Dresden achieve or support the strategic objectives that underlay the attack and were of mutual importance to the Allies and the Russians?

3. Each statement of fact in the narrative portion of this analysis is, as indicated in the reference notes, a citation from a standard reference work or is authenticated or amplified in the supporting documents that are attached herewith. These latter comprise an official and definitive case history of the bombings of Dresden.

4. In as much as it is exclusively the 14-15 February 1945 bombings of Dresden that have repeatedly been the subject of inquiry and controversy and the basis of Communist propaganda, the subsequent historical analysis and the attached supporting documents are primarily concerned with and relevant to the February bombings only. Nevertheless, as a matter of record, the following is an authoritative tabulation of all Allied bombings of Dresden: 1

Date Target Area Force Acft High Explosive bombs on target (tons) Incediary bombs on target (tons) Total
7/10/44 Marshalling Yards 8th AF 30 72.5 72.5
16/1/45 Marshalling Yards 8th AF 133 279.8 41.6 321.4
14/2/45 City Area RAF BC 772 1477.7 1181.6 2659.3
14/2/45 Marshalling Yards 8th AF 316 487.7 294.3 782.0
15/2/45 Marshalling Yards 8th AF 211 465.6 465.6
2/3/45 Marshalling Yards 8th AF 406 940.3 140.5 1080.8
17/4/45 Marshalling Yards 8th AF 572 1526.4 164.5 1690.9
17/4/45 Industrial Area 8th AF 8 28.0 28.0

II. ANALYSIS: Dresden as a Military Target

5. At the outbreak of World War II, Dresden was the seventh largest city in Germany proper.2 With a population of 642,143 in 1939, Dresden was exceeded in size only by Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Leipzig, and Essen, in that order.3 The serial bombardments sustained during World War II by the seven largest cities of Germany are shown in Chart A.

6. Situated 71 miles E.S.E. from Leipzig and 111 miles S. of Berlin, by rail, Dresden was one of the greatest commercial and transportation centers of Germany and the historic capital of the important and populous state of Saxony.4 It was, however, because of its geographical location and topography and as a primary communications center that Dresden assumed major significance as a military target in February 1945, as the Allied ground forces moved eastward and the Russian armies moved westward in the great combined operations designed to entrap and crush the Germans into final defeat.

7. Geographically and topographically, Dresden commanded two great and historic traffic routes of primary military significance: north-south between Germany and Czechoslovakia through the valley and gorge of the Elbe river, and east-west along the foot of the central European uplands.5 The geographical and topographical importance of Dresden as the lower bastion in the vast Allied-Russian war of movement against the Germans in the closing months of the war in Europe.

8. As a primary communications center, Dresden was the junction of three great trunk routes in the German railway system: (1) Berlin-Prague-Vienna, (2) Munich-Breslau, and (3) Hamburg-Leipzig. As a key center in the dense Berlin-Leipzig railway complex, Dresden was connected to both cities by two main lines.6 The density, volume, and importance of the Dresden-Saxony railway system within the German geography and e economy is seen in the facts that in 1939 Saxony was seventh in area among the major German states, ranked seventh in its railway mileage, but ranked third in the total tonnage carried by rail.7

9. In addition to its geographical position and topography and its primary importance as a communications center, Dresden was, in February 1945, known to contain at least 110 factories and industrial enterprises that were legitimate military targets, and were reported to have employed 50,000 workers in arms plants alone.8 Among these were dispersed aircraft components factories; a poison gas factory (Chemische Fabric Goye and Company); an anti-aircraft and field gun factory (Lehman); the great Zeiss Ikon A.G., Germany’s most important optical goods manufactory; and, among others, factories engaged in the production of electrical and X-ray apparatus (Koch and Sterzel A.G.), gears and differentials (Saxoniswerke), and electric gauges (Gebruder Bassler).9

10. Specific military installations in Dresden in February 1945 included barracks and hutted camps and at least one munitions storage depot.10

11. Dresden was protected by antiaircraft defenses , antiaircraft guns and searchlights, in anticipation of Allied air raids against the city.11 The Dresden air defenses were under the Combined Dresden (Corps Area IV) and Berlin (Corps Area III) Luftwaffe Administration Commands.12
Strategic Objectives, of Mutual Importance to the Allies and the Russians:

12. As early as 1943, the Allies and Russians had begun high-level consultations for the conduct of the war against Germany; in essence, for combined operations designed to defeat Germany by Allied bombardment from the air, by Allied ground operations against Germany from the west, and by Russian operations against the Germans from the west, and by Russian operations against the Germans from the East. At the Tehran Conference (28 November-11 December 1943) between Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin, the grand strategy for these combined operations was outlined and agreed upon by the three powers.13 Details for executing the grand strategy were not considered at the conference, but were to be worked out by the individual forces in keeping with the fortunes and progress of the war.14

13. In the closing months of 1944, Allied land advances in the west and Russian advances from the east, coupled with the ever-growing devastation from aerial attacks by the Allied heavy bomber forces, made it apparent that early in 1945 Germany proper could be invaded from both fronts and that the Allied strategic air forces would be more and more called upon to give direct support to these vast land operations. In September and October 1944 the Allies and the Russians began the exchange of information on their specific plans for operations designed to bring the war to a close in 1945.15 Simultaneously, the Allies and the Russians laid the general groundwork for closer cooperation and assistance in their forthcoming operations.16

14. On 14 December 1944, the American Ambassador to Russia, Mr. Averill Harriman, personally stated to Marshal Stalin that General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Forces (SHAEF), “was very anxious to operate in concert with the Russians and to help the Russian armies whenever such support might be needed.”17 Ambassador Harriman specifically discussed with Stalin the use of Allied air forces in the Mediterranean in support of Russian land operations in the Balkans.18 While there was no direct mention, in the 14 December conversations between Stalin and Harriman, of the employment of the massive Allied strategic air forces operating from the west, it was to be assumed that these forces would be used to support Russians operations on the Eastern front.

15. On 23 December 1944, President Roosevelt informed Stalin that--given the Marshal’s permission General Eisenhower would be instructed to send a representative to Moscow to “discuss with you the situation in the west and its relation to the Russian front in order that information essential to our efforts may be available to all of us.”19 On 26 December Stalin stated his acceptance of President Roosevelt’s proposal.20 The officer designated to confer with Stalin was Marshal of the RAF, Sir Arthur Tedder, Deputy Supreme Commander, SHAEF, and immediately responsible to the Supreme Commander for all Allied air operations. Among the topics discussed by Stalin and Tedder at their meeting on 15 January 1945 was the employment of the Allied strategic air forces in the forthcoming combined operations. Tedder outlined to Stalin the “application of the Allied air effort with particular reference to strategic bombing of communications as represented by oil targets, railroads and waterways.”21 There was also specific discussion of the problem that would face the Russians if the Germans attempted to shift forces from the west to the east and of the necessity of preventing this possibility.22

16. Therefore, on 25 January 1945, the Joint Intelligence Sub-Committee of the British War Cabinet, which was responsible for preparing such analyses for the Allied air forces, presented to Marshal Tedder, through appropriate channels, a working paper entitled “Strategic Bombing in Relation to the Present Russian Offensive.23 The findings of this authoritative body were as follows:

The degree of success achieved by the present Russian offensive is likely to have a decisive effect on the length of the war. We consider, therefore, that the assistance which might be given to the Russians during the next few weeks by the British and American strategic bomber forces justifies an urgent review of their employment to this end.24

It is probable that the Germans will be compelled to withdraw forces, particularly panzer divisions, from the Western Front to reinforce the East . . . . To what extent air bombardment can delay the move eastwards of these or other divisions destined for the Eastern Front is . . . an operational matter. It is understood that far-reaching results have already been achieved in the West by disruptive effect of Allied air attacks on marshalling yards and communications generally. These have hitherto been aimed at assistance to the Western Front and should now be considered in relation to delaying the transfer of forces eastwards.25

For the next several days these recommendations were carefully studied and evaluated by the appropriate authorities in the Supreme Commander’s staff, particularly among those immediately responsible to him for planning and authorizing air operations. On 31 January, the decision was made by the Deputy Supreme Commander Tedder and his air staff that the second priority for the Allied strategic air forces should be the “attack of BERLIN, LEIPZIG, DRESDEN and associated cities where heavy attack will . . . hamper movement of reinforcements from other fronts.”26 As of 31 January 1945, the Allied decision to establish Dresden as a second priority target, because it was a primary communications center and in support of the Russian armies, was by no means unilateral.

The decision was founded on basic and explicit exchanges of information between the Allies and Russia and was clearly a strategic decision of mutual importance to the Allies and the Russians.27

The Russian Request for Allied Bombing of Communications in the Dresden Area:

17. The Allied-Russian interchanges that had begun in the closing months of 1944 and had become, with the passing of time, more frequent and more specific, culminated in the ARGONAUT Conferences of January-February 1945. On 4 February, President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill, and Marshal Stalin, together with their foreign secretaries and military advisors, assembled at Yalta to present definitive and specific plans, and requests, for bringing the war against Germany to a victorious conclusion, by the summer of 1945, if possible (Other considerations involved in the ARGONAUT deliberations are not pertinent or relevant here). At this meeting, Marshal Stalin asked Army General Antonov, Deputy Chief of the Russian General Staff, to outline to the Conference the situation existing on the Eastern Front and to describe Russia’s plans for subsequent operations. At the conclusion of his extended presentation, General Antonov made three specific requests for Allied assistance to the Russians: 27

Our wishes are:

a. To speed up the advance of the Allied troops on the Western Front, for which the present situation is very favorable: (1) To defeat the Germans on the Eastern Front. (2) To defeat the German groupings which have advanced into the Ardennes. (3) The weakening of the German forces in the West in connection with the shifting of their reserves to the East (It is desirable to begin the advance during the first half of February).

b. By air action on communications hinder the enemy from carrying out the shifting of his troops to the East from the Western Front, from Norway, and from Italy (In particular, to paralyze the junctions of Berlin and Leipzig).

c. Not permit the enemy to remove his forces from Italy.

18. It was the specific Russian request for bombing communications, coupled with the emphasis on forcing troops to shift from west to east through communications centers, that led to the Allied bombings of Dresden. The structure of the Berlin-Leipzig-Dresden railway complex, as outlined in paragraph 8 above, required that Dresden, as well as Berlin and Leipzig, be bombed. Therefore Allied air authorities concluded that the bombing of Dresden would have to be undertaken (1) in order to implement strategic objectives, of mutual importance to the Allies and the Russians, and now agreed upon at the highest levels of governmental authority, and (2) to respond to the specific Russian request presented to the Allies by General Antonov to “paralyze the junctions of Berlin and Leipzig.”

The Recommendation and Authority for the Allied Air Forces’ Bombing of Dresden:

19. On 8 February 1945 SHAEF (Air) informed the RAF Bomber Command and the United States Strategic Air Forces that Dresden was among a number of targets that had been selected for bombing because of their importance in relation to the movements of military forces to the Eastern Front.28 This action, based upon the authoritative recommendation of the Combined Strategic Targets Committee, SHAEF (Air), and in turn based upon the recommendations of the Joint Intelligence Committee (see paragraph 16 above), was in keeping with the procedural structure and authority set up in SHAEF for the conduct of aerial operations by Allied forces.29

20. Allied aerial operations were ultimately the responsibility of the Supreme Commander, General Eisenhower, though normally he delegated the immediate authority for employment of Allied air forces to his Deputy Supreme Commander, Marshal Tedder. The latter, in turn, relied upon the commanders of the RAF Bomber Command and the United States Strategic Air Forces (General Carl Spaatz, Commanding) for the actual conduct of specific strategic aerial operations. The top commanders of the Allied strategic bomber forces were required to conduct all of their operations within the framework of bombing directives laid down to them by the Combined Chiefs of Staff (the British Chiefs of Staff and the American Joint Chiefs of Staff). In February 1945, when SHAEF (Air) directed the bombing of Dresden in immediate support of the Russians and in keeping with strategic objectives of mutual interest to the Allies and the Russians, the strategic objectives of mutual interest o the Allies and the Russians, the strategic bomber forces were operating under the authority of the Combined Chiefs of Staff (CCS) “Directive No. 3 for the Strategic Air Forces in Europe,” dated 12 January 1945.30 The second priority, after bombing of the German petroleum industry for the Allied strategic air forces was, in that directive, listed as the bombing of “German lines of communications.”31 The authority for and the ordering of the bombing of Dresden by Allied strategic air forces and the steps taken to carry out these orders were therefore within the framework of the existing basic CCS Directive No. 3 governing the operations of the Allied strategic air forces in Europe.

Information Officially Given to the Russians by the Allies Concerning the Intended Date of and the Forces to be Committed to the Bombing of Dresden:

21. Although the exact procedures for maintaining day to day liaison between the Russians and the Allies on Allied bombing operations was for a long time the subject of negotiation between the Allies and the Russians, certain procedures for such liaison were nevertheless in effect prior to the Allied bombings of Dresden.32 Therefore, the following actions were taken by Allied authorities to notify the Russians that in accordance with their expressed wishes as to actions and timing, stated at the ARGONAUT Conference on 4 February 1945, Allied strategic air forces would bomb Dresden during the first half of February.33

22. On 7 February 1945, General Spaatz, Commanding General, United States Strategic Air Forces, informed Major General J. R. Deane, Chief of the United States Military Mission, Moscow, that the communications targets for strategic bombing by the Eighth Air Force were, in the order of their priority, Berlin, Leipzig, Dresden, Cheanitz (and others of lesser importance).34 On the same date, General Spaatz also notified General Deane that a 24-hour advance notice of the intention to conduct actual bombing operations against Dresden (and the other targets of mutual concern to the Russians and the Allies) would be forwarded in order that General Deane might so notify the Russians.35 Moscow notified the proper Russian authority that Dresden was among the targets selected for strategic bombing by the American Eighth Air Force.36 On February, General Spaatz informed the United States Military Mission that, weather permitting, the Eighth Air Force intended to attack the Dresden Marshalling Yards with a force of 1200 to 1400 bomber planes on 13 February.37 On 12 February, therefore, the Russians were informed of the Americans’ intention to bomb Dresden.38 Weather conditions did not permit the Eighth Air Force to carry out its attack against Dresden on 13 February.39 Accordingly, on 13 February by similar procedures the Americans informed the Russians, that the Eighth Air Force would attack the Dresden Marshalling Yards on the 14th.40 Subsequently, the Russians were informed by the Americans that Dresden, together with the other high priority communications centers targets, would be subject to attack whenever weather conditions permitted.41

The Forces and Means Employed by the Allies in the Bombing of Dresden:

23. In the Dresden bombing attacks of 14-15 February 1945 the American Eighth Air Force and the RAF Bomber Command together employed a total of 1299 bomber aircraft (527 from the Eighth Air Force, 722 from the RAF Bomber Command) for a total weight, on targets, of 3906.9 tons. Of this tonnage, 1247.6 tons were expanded by the Eighth Air Force, 2659.3 tons by the RAF Bomber Command. The Americans employed 953.3 tons of high explosive bombs and 294.3 tons of incendiary bombs--all aimed at the Dresden Marshalling Yards. The British employed 1477.7 tons of high explosive bombs and 1181.6 tons of incendiary bombs--all aimed against the Dresden city area.42 The American aircraft used H2X (radar) bombing method, with visual assists, and the British used the marker and visual method.43

Specific Target Objectives in the Dresden Area:

24. As related in paragraphs 5-11 above, Dresden became a military target as (1), and of overriding importance, a primary communications center in the Berlin-Leipzig-Dresden railway complex; (2) as an important industrial and manufacturing center directly associated with the production of aircraft components and other military items, including poison gas, anti-aircraft and field guns, and small guns; and (3) as an area containing specific military installations. The night raid by the RAF Bomber Command was intended to devastate the city area itself and thereby choke communications within the city and disrupt the normal civilian life upon which the larger communications activities and the manufacturing enterprises of the city depended. Further, the widespread area raid conducted by the British entailed bombing strikes against the many industrial plants throughout the city which were thus to be construed as specific targets within the larger pattern of the area raid.44

The Eighth Air Force raids, which were by daylight and followed, on the 14th and 15th February, the night raid of the British (13/14 February), were directed against rail activities in the city.45

The Immediate Consequences of the Dresden Bombings on the Physical Structure and Populace of the City:

25. The RAF Bomber Command’s are raid on Dresden, conducted on the night of 13/14 February 1945, resulted in fires that did great damage to the city proper, particularly in the older and more densely built up areas.46 Early official Allied post-strike reports estimated that 85 per cent of the fully built-up city area was destroyed, that the old part of the city, which comprised the greater portion of the built-up areas was largely wiped out, that the majority of buildings in the inner suburbs was gutted, and that in the outer suburbs, few buildings were effected by the area bombing attack. Virtually all major public buildings appeared heavily gutted or severely damaged. Public utilities, and facilities such as slaughter houses, warehouses, and distribution centers, were severely affected.47 A very large number of the city’s industrial facilities were destroyed or severely damaged,48 with perhaps a four-fifth’s reduction in the productive capacity of the arms plants.49 Later British assessments, which were more conservative, concluded that 23 per cent of the city’s industrial buildings were seriously damaged and that 56 per cent of the non-industrial buildings (exclusive of dwellings) had been heavily damaged. Of the total number of dwelling units in the city proper, 78,000 were regarded as demolished, 27,70 temporarily uninhabitable but ultimately repairable, and 64,500 readily repairable from minor damage. This later assessment indicated that 80 per cent of the city’s housing units had undergone some degree of damage and that 50 per cent of the dwellings had been demolished or seriously damaged.50

26. The Eighth Air Force raids against the city’s railway facilities on 14 and 15 February resulted in severe and extensive damage that entirely paralyzed communications. The city’s passenger terminals and major freight stations, warehouses, and storage sheds were, when not totally destroyed, so severely damaged that they were unusable. Roundhouses, railway repair and work shops, coal stations, and other operating facilities, were destroyed, gutted, or severely damaged. The railway bridges over the Elbe river--vital to incoming and outgoing traffic--were rendered unusable and remained closed to traffic for many weeks after the raids.51

27. Casualties among the Dresden populace were inevitably very heavy in consequence of the fires that swept over the city following the RAF area raid on the night of 13/14 February. In addition to its normal population, the city had experienced a heavy influx of refugees from the east and of evacuees from bombings in other areas, particularly from Berlin.52 The exact number of casualties from the Dresden bombings can never be firmly established.53 Contemporary British estimates were that from 8,200 to 16,400 persons were killed and that similar numbers of persons may have been seriously injured.54 Most of the latest German post-war estimates are that about 25,000 persons were killed and about 30,000 were wounded, virtually all of these being casualties from the RAF incendiary attack of 13/14 February.55 Although the latest available post-war accounts play up the “terroristic” aspects of the Dresden bombings, it is significant that they accept much lower casualty figures than those circulated by the Germans immediately after the raids and, from time to time, in the years immediately following the war.56 The most distorted account of the Dresden bombings--one that may have become the basis of Communist propaganda against the Allies, particularly against the Americans, in recent years--was prepared by two former German general officers for the Historical Division, European Command (U.S.A.) in 1948.57 In this account, the number of dead from the Dresden bombings was declared to be 250,000. That this figure may be the probable number of dead, multiplied by ten for the sake of exaggeration, becomes apparent by comparing the weight of the Dresden bombings of 14-15 February 1945 with the total tonnages expanded by the Allies against the six other largest German cities (see Chart A) and by comparing the various estimates of the Dresden casualties with the best estimate of the total casualties suffered by the Germans from all Allied bombings during World War II.

28. Shown in the following chart are the total tonnages of bombs that were expanded by the Allies against the six cities in Germany that were larger in population than Dresden:

City Population in 1939 Total Bomb Tonnages
Berlin 4,339,000 67,607.6
Hamberg 1,129,000 38,687.6
Munich 841,000 27,110.9
Cologne 772,000 44,923.2
Leipzig 707,000 11,616.4
Essen 667,000 37,938.0
Dresden 642,000 7,100.5

The United States Strategic Bombing Survey estimated that 305,000 persons were killed and 780,000 were wounded as the consequence of all Allied bombings against Germany in World War II,58 from a total Allied bomb expenditure of 3,697,473.59 It may therefore be presumed that the estimates of 25,000 dead and 30,000 wounded, as presented in most of the latest available German estimates of the Dresden bombings, are reasonable and acceptable.

29. Despite the lack of accurate statistics on the number of killed and wounded in the Dresden raid, as well as in other Allied bombings of German cities, it would appear from such estimates as are available that the casualties suffered in the Dresden bombings were not disproportionate to those suffered in area attacks on other German cities.

The reports of the United States Bombing Survey give specific estimates of the dead for only four of the German cities which were subject to fire raids during area attacks.60 Assuming that there may probably have been about 1,000,000 people in Dresden on the night the 13/14 February RAF attack,61 these are the comparative death rates in Dresden and the four cities for which the United States Strategic Bombing Survey has given estimates of moralities from incendiary area attacks:62

City Population Killed Percentage rate
Darmstadt 109,000 8,100 .075
Kassel 220,000 8,659 .039
Dresden 1,000,000 25,000 .025
Hamberg 1,738,000 41,800 .024
Wuppertal 400,000 5,219 .013

The Dresden Bombings Within the Framework of Established Policies Set Forth in Official Bombing Directives:

30. The original Combined Chiefs of Staff Directive governing employment of the British and American strategic air forces established the authoritative principle that the primary effort of the RAF Bomber Command should be the mass destruction of important German industrial areas and population centers by night area bombing and that the primary effort of the American Eighth Air Force should be daylight precision bombing of key installations within the larger industrial and population centers attacked by the RAF Bomber Command.63 (Area raids are defined and described in Section J, below). This joint and complementary effort of the British and American strategic air forces was authorized by the Combined Chiefs of Staff in order to accomplish “the German people to a point where their capacity for armed resistance is fatally weakened.”64 Approved in principle by the Combined Chiefs of Staff on 21 January 1943,65 and specifically inaugurated on 10 June 1943,66 the combined British and American strategic bomber offensive against Germany continued with ever-mounting power until 16 April 1945, when all strategic/air operations against Germany ceased.67 As the war progressed, there were certain alterations in the operational control of the Allied strategic air forces and in the order of priorities assigned to target systems and objectives. (See paragraphs 19-20 above.) By and large, however, there was no alteration in the fundamental principle that American strategic air forces in Europe would engage only in daylight precision raids against specific installations and that night area raids would be conducted by the British. Aside from technological differences in aircraft and equipment that justified the differences in American and British bombing methods, American authorities were, throughout the war in Europe, opposed to the use of American forces in area or “morals” bombings.68

31. Falling within the established pattern of combined British and American strategic air operations against Germany, the 14-15 February bombings of Dresden , particularly the RAF night area raid, were a shattering and devastating blow to the physical structure, the economy, and the life of the city. The achievement of such a blow was necessarily the purpose of the Allied bombings, in consequence of the fact that Dresden, like other great German cities, was a legitimate military target, and vulnerable to Allied air power. It is, however, understandable that the surviving Dresden populace should have regarded the bombings as even more devastating and death-dealing than they actually were,69 and that the bombings were seized upon by the German authorities as a means of conducting psychological warfare against the Allies in the closing months of the war. The distorted and highly exaggerated accounts of the admittedly grim casualties suffered in Dresden issued by German propaganda agencies immediately following the bombings,70 coupled with an inadvertent and misinformed Allied news release concerning the Dresden and other simultaneous bombings, let to an investigation by Headquarters, Army Air Forces, of the purpose and character of the current American strategic bombing operations in Europe.

32. At a meeting with Allied press correspondents on 16 February 1945 a member of the SHAEF public relations staff released inaccurate and misleading statements concerning the current Allied bombing operations against German cities, primarily against communications centers, among which Dresden was obviously included.71 American press accounts of the remarks made to newsmen at SHAEF implied that the American and British bombing forces had begun a deliberate campaign of indiscriminate terror bombing” against German cities, thereby deviating from long-established policies concerning the employment of Allied strategic air power.72 Confirmed with the sensational American news stories and the German propaganda “plants” in the foreign press, Headquarters, Army Air Forces, in Washington, at once demanded from American air authorities in Europe a full explanation of the basis of the lurid press accounts and insisted that American bombing forces must not deviate from official bombing policy, either as to objectives and priorities or as to bombing methods.73

33. Headquarters, United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe, strongly emphasized the following six points in the replies that were immediately dispatched to Washington: (1) it had always been the policy of the American forces that civilian targets were not suitable military objectives; (2) there had been no change in the American policy of precision bombing of military objectives; (3) attacks against German communications were listed as the second priority objective in the Combined Chiefs of Staff “Directive No. 3 for the Strategic Air Forces in Europe (see paragraph 20 above): (4) the power of the Russian advance was regarded ads the greatest strategic factor in the war at that time and should be, as the situation dictated, supported; (5) Dresden, and other key communications centers, had been attacked as targets important to the Eastern Front; (6) the attacks on Dresden and other communications centers were appreciated by the Russians.74 This information satisfied Headquarters, AAF that all open questions concerning the current operations of the American strategic air forces in Europe had been satisfactorily resolved and that the American forces in Europe had been satisfactorily resolved and that the American forces were operating in strict conformity with established bombing policies.75

34. A few weeks later, the issue of the Dresden bombings was reviewed by the Secretary of War. On 6 March 1945, the Secretary was informed by General George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff, that Dresden had been bombed on 14-15 February because it was a communications center of great importance, through which reinforcements passed to reach the Russian front, and because the city was closely related to German potentialities for launching a counterattack against the southern wing of the Russian offensive, and that standard bombing methods had been used in the Allied air attacks against Dresden.76 With General Marshall’s statement to the Secretary of War, the issue of the Dresden bombings within the framework of established bombing policies was considered closed.77

The Specific Forces and Means Employed in the Dresden Bombings in Relation to the Forces and Means Employed by the Allies in Other Aerial Attacks on Comparable Targets in Germany:

35. The Allied bombings of Dresden on 14-15 February 1945 were an example of the standard pattern of RAF night area bombing, followed by Eighth Air Force daylight precision attacks against specific installations in the general area--in this instance, attacks against the Dresden Marshalling Yards. A comparative analysis of the forces and means employed by the respective strategic air forces requires, first, a definition and description of area bombing operations.

36. As defined by the United States Strategic Bombing Survey, area attacks were raids “intentionally directed against a city area by more than 100 bombers with a bomb weight in excess of 100 tons, which destroyed more than 2 per cent of the residential buildings in the city attacked.”78 Area raids had four principal characteristics: they were generally made at night; they were made against large cities; they were designed to spread destruction over a wide area rather than to knock out any specific factory or installations; and they were intended primarily to destroy morals, particularly the morals of industrial workers.79 During World War II, Allied air forces--primarily the RAF--dropped more than half a million tons of bombs in area raids on 61 German cities with populations of more than 100,000.80 The Strategic Bombing Survey estimated that the area raids against these 62 German cities totally destroyed or severely damaged 3,600,000 residential units (some 20 per cent of all the dwelling units in Germany) and that the raids killed about 300,000 people, injured some 760,000 and rendered 7,500,000 persons homeless.81 Against at least 40 of the largest cities in Germany, the RAF conducted fire raids as a specific means of area bombing, and it conducted raids on at least eight other cities that were not among the 62 with populations of more than 100,000.82 Moreover, against certain of the largest cities in Germany the RAF conducted more than one fire raid; for example, at least six against Berlin, at least five each against Hamburg, Munich, and Essen, and at least two against Cologne.83

37. The forces and means employed by the RAF in the area bombing of Dresden were significantly, but not unduly large: 722 heavy bombers dropped 1477.7 tons of high explosives and 1181.6 tons of incendiaries, a total weight of 2659.3 tons.84 In its sustained area raids on Hamburg in 1943, the RAF had used comparable numbers of aircraft in single raids; for example, 740 heavy bombers on 24/25 July, 739 on 28/29 July, and 726 on 29/30 July.85 In other area raids, the British had dispatched such tonnages as 11,773 tons of high explosive and 4,106 tons of incendiaries against Cologne on 9 October 1944, 4,368 tons of high explosives and 3,846 tons of incendiaries against Hamburg on 7 August 1943, and 3,476 tons of high explosives and 3,814 tons of incendiaries against Frankfurt-am-Main on 24 March 1944.86

38. In its 14 February daylight precision attacks on the Dresden Marshalling Yards, the Eighth Air Force employed 316 heavy bombers on the 14th for a tonnage of 487.7 tons of high explosives and 294.3 tons of incendiaries, a combined tonnage of 782 tons, and in its attacks on 15 February it employed 211 heavy bombers and 465.6 tons of high explosives (no incendiaries)--a total of 527 bombers and 1247.6 tons in the two days operations.87 In an attack on railway stations in Berlin on 26 February 1945 the Eighth Air Force employed 1089 heavy bombers for a total tonnage of 2778 tons, and in an attack on the Nurnberg Marshalling Yards on 21 February 1945 the Eighth employed 1198 heavy bombers for a total tonnage of 2868.8 tons.88 Analysis of the Eighth Air Force’s operational missions indicates, in fact, that the goals of the attacks on the Dresden Marshalling Yards was relatively small as compared with many sources of precision attacks in which it employed larger forces and means.89

The Specific Ways and the Degrees to Which the Dresden Bombings Achieved or Supported the Strategic Objectives that Underlay the Attack and wars of Mutual Importance to the Allies and the Russians:

39. The Allied bombings of Dresden on 14-15 February 1945 were one of many major air actions undertaken to bring about the defeat of Germany by a combination of Allied air operations, of Allied ground operations against Germany from the west, and Russian operations against Germany from the east. No single action, whether by land, sea, or air, could of itself bring about the defeat of Germany. Each specific action, through whatever medium or by whatever force, was--if successful--an action that contributed to ultimate victory. The Allied bombings of Dresden were by no means either the largest or the most important air actions that were specific contributions to the defeat of Germany. Nevertheless, the bombing of Dresden was by its design and the degree of success achieved a highly significant air action.

40. The major significance of the Dresden bombings lay in the fact that they were among several immediate and highly successful air actions made in response to the specific Russian request, given by General Antonov at the ARGONAUT Conference, less than two weeks earlier, for Allied air support of the Russian offensive on the Eastern Front. Had the German communications centers leading to that front--among which Dresden was uniquely important--act been successfully attacked by Allied strategic air forces, there can be little doubt that the course of the European war might have been considerably prolonged.90 At the time of the Dresden bombings, Marshal Koniev’s armies were less than seventy miles east of Dresden and by virtue of their extended positions highly vulnerable to German counterattack, provided the Germans could pass reinforcements through Dresden.91 With communications through Dresden made impossible as a consequence of the Allied bombings, the Russian salient in that area was rendered safe throughout the ensuing months of the war.92

41. Of secondary significance, but by no means negligible, was the destruction or disruption of Dresden’s manufacturing activities, particularly of military goods, and the further reduction of Germany’s critically short railway rolling stock and operating facilities. Again, the death and destruction inflicted on the largest German city that had not before undergone large--scale bombing was almost certainly a major contribution to the final weakening of the will of the German people to resist. While the Americans, happily, cannot and would not claim credit for this aspect of the Dresden bombings, the fact remains that the RAF area raid on the city was the last of the instances during World War II in Europe when the shock effects of area bombing resulted in nearly total demoralization of a great enemy city.93

42. The ultimate significance of the Dresden bombings in terms of the strategic objectives that underlay the attack and were of mutual importance to the Allies and the Russians is evident in statements bearing on the last phase of operations that were designed to bring about the final defeat of Germany. On 28 March 1945, in a personal message to Marshal Stalin, General Eisenhower, outlined his plans for total defeat of the German ground forces in the west and stated that his final task would be to divide the enemy’s forces “by joining hands with your forces.”94 The best axis on which to effect the junction of forces, General Eisenhower stated, would be a line through Erfurt-Leipzig-Dresden.95 On 1 April Marshal Stalin replied to General Eisenhower: “Your plan of dividing the German forces by means of the union of Soviet armies with your armies completely falls in with the plan of the Soviet High Command. I also agree that the place of the junction of your and the Soviet Armies should be in the area of Erfurt-Leipzig-Dresden.”96 Less than four weeks later, on 27 April, American and Russian forces joined at Torgau, on the Elbe river near Leipzig, and Hitler’s Germany had been cut in two.97 Eleven days later, on V-E Day (8 May 1945), in the final military action in the war against Germany, Marshal Koniev’s armies entered and captured Dresden. The war in Europe was over.98

III. CONCLUSION

The foregoing historical analysis establishes the following definitive answers to the recurring questions concerning the February 1945 bombings of Dresden by Allied strategic air forces:

a. Dresden was a legitimate military target.

b. Strategic objectives, of mutual importance to the Allies and the Russians, underlay the bombings of Dresden.

c. The Russians requested that the Dresden area be bombed by Allied air forces.

d. The Supreme Allied Commander, his Deputy Supreme Commander, and the key British and American operational air authorities recommended and ordered the bombing of Dresden.

e. The Russians were officially informed by the Allies concerning the intended date of and the forces to be committed to the bombing of Dresden.

f. The RAF Bomber Command employed 772 heavy bombers, 1477.7 tons of high explosive and 1181.6 tons of incendiary bombs, and American Eighth Air Force employed a total of 527 heavy bombers, 953.3 tons of high explosive and 294.3 tons of incendiary bombs, in the 14-15 February bombings of Dresden.

g. The specific target objectives in the Dresden bombings were, for the RAF Bomber Command, the Dresden city area, including industrial plants, communications, military installations, and for the American Eighth Air Force, the Dresden Marshalling Yards and railway facilities.

h. The immediate and actual consequences of the Dresden bombings were destruction or severe damage to at least 23 per cent of the city’s industrial buildings; severe damage to at least 56 per cent of the city’s non-industrial buildings (exclusive of dwellings); destruction or severe damage to at least 50 percent of the residential units in the city’s non-industrial buildings (exclusive of dwellings); destruction or severe damage to at least 50 percent of the residential units in the city, and at least some damage to 80 per cent of the city’s dwellings; the total disruption of the city as a major communications center, in consequence of destruction and damage inflicted on its railway facilities; and death to probably 25,000 persons and serious injury to probably 30,000 others, virtually all of these casualties being the result of the RAF area raid.

i. The Dresden bombings were in no way a deviation from established bombing policies set forth in official bombing directives.

j. The specific forces and means employed in the Dresden bombings were in keeping with the forces and means employed by the Allies in other aerial attacks on comparable targets in Germany.

k. The Dresden bombings achieved the strategic objectives that underlay the attack and were of mutual importance to the Allies and the Russians.

Allied Aerial Bombardments of the Seven Largest German Cities99

Chart A
City Population in 1939 American Tonnage British Tonnage Total Tonnage
Berlin 4,339,000 22,090.3 45,517 67,607.3
Hamburg 1,129,000 17,104.6 22,583 39,687.6
Munich 841,000 11,471.4 7,858 27,110.9
Cologne 772,000 10,211.2 34,712 44,923.2
Leipzig 707,000 5,410.4 6,206 11,616.4
Essen 667,000 1,518.0 36,420 37,938.0
Dresden 642,000 4,441.2 2,659.3 7,100.5

NOTES:
1. Statistics on 8th Air Force bombing from Eighth Air Force Target Summary, Period 17 August 1942 thru 8 May 1945, p. 20. Supporting Document No. 1, Statistics on RAF Bomber Command bombing from Allied Air Attacks Against Targets in Dresden, Headquarters, United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe, Office of the Commanding General, p 1. Supporting Document No. 2.
2. Census of 17 May 1939 as reported in The Statesman’s Year Book, London, 1945, p. 960. Within Greater Germany, which after 1938 included Austria, Dresden ranked eight in size.
3. Statistisches Handbuch von Deutschland: 1928-1944 (Statistical Handbook of Germany, 1928-1944), Munich, 1949, p. 19
4. Encyclopedia Brittanica, Chicago, 1948, Vol. IV, p. 646
5. Chambers Encyclopedia, New York, 1950, Vol. IV, p. 636.
6. Chambers Encyclopedia, New York, 1950, Vol. IV, p. 636.
7. Statistisches Handbuch von Deutschland: 1928-1944, Munich, 1949, p. 8 (for land area), p. 343 (for railway mileage, and p. 353 (for railway tonnage).
8. Dresden, Germany, City Area, Economic Reports, Vol. No. 2, Headquarters U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, 10 July 1945; and OSS London, No. B-1799/4, 3 March 1945, in same item.
9. Interpretation Report No. K. 4171, Dresden, 22 March 19145, Supporting Document No. 3.
10. Interpretation Report No. K. 4171, Dresden, 22 March 1945, Supporting Document No. 3.
11. OSS London, T-3472, Germany: Air/Political, Conditions in Dresden, 6 April 1945, in same source as footnote 8.
12. MS NO. P-050, Historical Division, European Command
13. United States Army in World War II: The European Theatre of Operations: Cross-Channel Attack, Washington, D. C., 1951, pp. 121-126. (This volume is by G. A. Harrison.)
14. Ibid.
15. OCTAGON Summary, Office No. 691, United States Military Mission Moscow, 16 September 1944; Memorandum of Conversation, Marshal I. Y. Stalin, Prime Minister Churchill, Ambassador Harriman, Moscow, 14 October 1944.
16. Ibid.
17. Memorandum, Conversation between the American Ambassador, Mr. Harriman, and Marshal I. V. Stalin, 14 December 1944. Supporting Document No. 4
18. Ibid.
19. Message, SHAEF 1659 WARX-82070, 25 December 1944. Supporting Document No. 5.
20. Message, WARX-82144 SHAEF, 26 December 1944. Supporting Document No. 6.
21. Memorandum of Conference with Marshal Stalin, 15 January 1945. Supporting Document No. 7.
22. Same item and Message 22378, U.S. Military Mission Moscow, 16 January 1945. Supporting Document No. 8.
23. J.I.C. (45) 31 (O) (Revised Final), 25 January 1945. Supporting Document No. 9.
24. Ibid.
25. Ibid.
26. Message, SHAEF SCM OUT 4025 1274A, 31 January 1945 . Supporting Document No. 11.
27. ARGONAUT Conference Minutes of the Plenary Meeting between the U.S.A., Great Britain, and the U.S.S.R., held in Livadia Palace, Yalta, on Sunday, 4 February 1945, at 1700. Supporting Document No. 12.
28. Message, Air Ministry NSW 207, Serial No. 7/9, 8 February 1945. Supporting Document No. 13.
29. Message, SHAEF SCM IM 5157, 14 January 1945. Supporting Document No. 14.
30. Supporting Document No. 15.
31. Ibid.
32. Message, ARGONAUT-OUT-43, 061739Z, 6 February 1945, Supporting Document No. 16; Message HQ USTAAF UA-53861, 7 February 1945, Supporting Document No. 17; letter, Maj. Gen. S. P. Spalding, Acting Chief, U.S. Military Mission (Moscow), to Maj. Gen. N. V. Slavin, Assistant Chief of Staff of Red Army, 8 February 1945, Supporting Document No. 18; Message, ARGONAUT 122, 10 February 1945, Supporting Document No. 19; letter, Spalding to Slavin, 10 February 1945 , Supporting Document No. 20; Message, HQ HAAF MI-45899, 11 February 1945, Supporting Document No. 21.
33. Supporting Document No. 12
34. Message, USTAAF UA-53861, 7 February 1945. Supporting Document No. 22. It must be presumed that the Commander-in-Chief, RAF Bomber Command, forwarded a similar message to the British Military Mission, Moscow, although the documentary sources that would verify this fact are not available at the present time to the USAF.
35. Ibid.
36. Letter, Maj. Gen. S. P. Spalding, Acting Chief, U.S. Military Mission, Moscow, to Maj. Gen. N. V. Slavin, Assistant Chief of Staff of Red Army, 8 February 1945. Supporting Document No. 23.
37. Message, HQ USTAFF US-642102, 12 February 1945. Supporting Document No. 24.
38. Letter, Maj. Gen. E. W. Hill, Chief, Air Division, U.S. Military Mission, Moscow, to Maj. Gen. N. V. Slavin, Assistant Chief of Staff of Red Army, 12 February 1945. Supporting Document No. 25. Again, it must be presumed that similar information was conveyed to the Russians by the British, through the British Military Mission, indicating that the RAF Bomber Command was preparing to strike Dresden.
39. Message, Eighth Air Force D-63497, 13 February 1945. Supporting Document No. 26.
40. Message, Eighth Air Force D-0010, 13 February 1945, Supporting Document No. 27; Letter, Lt. Col. D. V. Anderson, Executive Officer, Air Division, U.S. Military Mission, Moscow, to Maj. Gen. N. V. Slavin, Assistant Chief of Staff of Red Army, 13 February 1945, Supporting Document No. 28.
41. Message, HQ USTAFF UAX-64452, 18 February 1945. Supporting Document No. 29.
42. All figures in this paragraph taken from Eighth Air Force Target Summary, Period 17 August 1942 thru 8 May 1945, p. 20, and Allied Air Attacks Against Targets in Dresden. Headquarters, United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe, p.1. Supporting Documents Nos. 1 and 2.
43. Ibid.
44. See Supporting Document No. 3 and footnote 8.
45. See Supporting Documents Nos. 1 and 3.
46. RAF incendiary raids on 32 German cities (exclusive of Dresden) with populations over 100,000 are described and analyzed in Fire Raids on German Cities. The United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Physical Damage Division, 1947. Especially pertinent sections of this document are reproduced in Supporting Documents Nos. 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35.
47. Supporting Document No. 3.
48. Ibid.
49. OSS London, T-3472, Germany: Air/Political, Conditions in Dresden, 6 April 1945. Endnotes 8 and 11.
50. Air Ministry, RE. 8. Area Attack Assessment: Dresden, undated (filed 30 October 1945). Supporting Document No. 35.
51. Supporting Document No. 3.
52. Contemporary estimates of one number of refugees and evacuees in Dresden in February 1945 ranged from several hundred thousand into several millions. See Supporting Document No. 2 (second enclosure thereto) and extract from Keesing’s Contemporary Archives, 1943-1946, p. 7054, in Supporting Document No. 36.
53. Supporting Document No. 34.
54. Air Ministry RE. 8, Area Attack: Dresden. Supporting Document No. 35.
55. Supporting documents Nos. 37 and 38.
56. Supporting Document No. 2 (second enclosure thereto) for examples of the propaganda releases issued by the Germans immediately following the bombings.
57. MS No. P-050, Historical Division, European Command
58. Overall Report (European War), United States Strategic Bombing Survey, 30 September 1945, p. 95
59. Ibid.
60. Fire Raids on German Cities, United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Physical Damage Division, January 1945. Supporting Document No. 34.
61. Contemporary estimates of one number of refugees and evacuees in Dresden in February 1945 ranged from several hundred thousand into several millions. Supporting Document No. 2 and extract from Keesing’s Contemporary Archives, 1943-1946, p. 7054, in Supporting Document No. 36.
62. The Report of the United States Strategic Bombing Survey, used as the basis for this comparison does not list the number of injured in the fire raids cited.
63. CCS 166/1/D, 21 January 1943.
64. Ibid.
65. Ibid.
66. Report of Lieutenant General Ira C. Eaker on USAAF Activities in the UK Covering Period from February 20, 1942 to 31 December 1943.
67. USTAFF Message 161551B, 16 April 1945.
68. A basic statement of the American objectives to participating in area and morale bombing in Europe is contained in the remarks of General H. H. Arnold and Admiral William D. Leahy in the minutes of Joint Chiefs of Staff, 176th Meeting, 14 September 1944.
69. On 14 February, following the RAF area bombing of the city, Heinrich Himmler, Chief of the German SS, sent this message to the head of the SS in Dresden: “The attacks were obviously severe, yet every first air raid gives the impression that the town has been completely destroyed.” Supporting Document No. 2
70. Same item, and Supporting Document No. 27
71. War Department Message CM-IN-18753, 19 February 1945.
72. War Department Message CM-IN-39730, 18 February 1945. Support Document No. 39.
73. War Department Message CM-OUT-39222, 17 February 1945. Support Document No. 40.
74. War Department Message CM-IN-18652 and 18745 , 18 and 19 February 1945. Supporting Documents Nos. 41 and 42.
75. War Department Message CM-OUT-39954, 19 February 1945. See Supporting Document No. 43.
76. Memorandum for the Secretary of War, by G. C. Marshall, Chief of Staff, 6 March 1945. Supporting Document No. 44.
77. Official files for 1945 do not contain further significant reference to the Dresden bombings of 14-15 February 1945.
78. Over-all Report (European War), United States Strategic Bombing Survey, p. 72.
79. Over-all Report (European War), United States Strategic Bombing Survey, p. 71.
80. Over-all Report (European War), United States Strategic Bombing Survey, p. 72.
81. Ibid.
82. Fire Raids on German Cities, United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Table No. 2.
83. Fire Raids on German Cities, United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Tables Nos. 4 and 5.
84. See paragraph 23, above.
85. A Detailed Study of the Effects of Area Bombing on Hamburg, United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Area Studies Division, January 1947.
86. Fire Raids on German Cities, United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Table No. 5.
87. See paragraph 23, above.
88. Eighth Air Force Target Summary, Period 17 August 1942 thru 8 May 1945.
89. Ibid.
90. Memorandum for the Secretary of War, by G. C. Marshall, 6 March 1945, Supporting Document No. 44
91. See Map No. II.
92. See Maps III-V.
93. Over-All (European), United States Strategic Bombing Survey, p. 74.
94. SHAEF Message 18264, 28 March 1945. Supporting Document No. 45.
95. Ibid.
96. Telegram from Marshal I. Stalin to General Eisenhower, 1 April 1945. Supporting Document No. 46.
97. David Marley, The Daily Telegraph Story of the War: January 1st-September 9th, 1945, London, 1946, p. 142.
98. Facts on File Yearbook 1945, New York, 1945, p. 142.
99. For American bomb tonnages, Eight Air Force Target Summary, Period 17 August 1942 thru 8 May 1945, and Fifteenth Air Force Daily Bombing Operations by Target; for Britian tonnages, War Room Manual of Bomber Command Operations 1939-1945.
It is interesting how Dresden was used for propaganda by so many groups for different reasons. First, Goebbels used it to prove that the Allies were heartless killers to persuade Germans to fight to the last man. Then the Soviets used it in their propaganda to try to win some allegiance from their vassals in eastern Europe and to minimize their own very real war crimes during the war. Then the western Left used it to accuse the West of war crimes, much as they did with the atomic bombings of Japanese cities. And various historians have made good money peddling these ideas. More recently, you see the exaggerated claims to the numbers of victims (500,000) being used by the German Right and then being refuted by German historians who claim that the evidence only shows that about 25,000 died in the actual bombing, horrible as that was. But that is only about 10% of the number claimed by the anti-Churchill British historian Irving on whose questionable work the claims of 200,000 to 500,000 dead were largely based. Yet, the records of local officials in the area and cemetery records and the like simply do not support such a huge number of victims.

TooConservative  posted on  2011-01-20   9:44:38 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#3. To: Shoonra (#1)

See my previous. I don't think you can legitimize it simply by saying "they war-crimed us first". The Hague and Geneva conventions don't leave much room for such war conduct standards.

TooConservative  posted on  2011-01-20   9:46:45 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#4. To: TooConservative (#2)

Dresden represents what the State does best.....mass murder and property destruction. WWII was an unnecessary war, Americans were duped into it by one of the worst war criminals know to man, FDR. His legacy Will be buried with the collapse of thus filthy murderous empire.

Lysander_Spooner  posted on  2011-01-20   10:12:04 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#5. To: TooConservative (#2)

First, Goebbels used it to prove that the Allies were heartless killers to persuade Germans to fight to the last man. Then the Soviets used it in their propaganda to try to win some allegiance from their vassals in eastern Europe and to minimize their own very real war crimes during the war. Then the western Left used it to accuse the West of war crimes, much as they did with the atomic bombings of Japanese cities. And various historians have made good money peddling these ideas. More recently, you see the exaggerated claims to the numbers of victims (500,000) being used by the German Right

Were you there, and tell me, did you notice?
They were all out of step but Jim!

The next president will be: Romney

Prefrontal Vortex  posted on  2011-01-20   10:16:46 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#6. To: Itistoolate (#0)

A real holocaust

Quite literally. Good piece.

The next president will be: Romney

Prefrontal Vortex  posted on  2011-01-20   10:19:13 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#7. To: Itistoolate (#0)

deleted

The relationship between morality and liberty is a directly proportional one.

"Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin

Eric Stratton  posted on  2011-01-20   10:29:03 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#8. To: Eric Stratton (#7)

Have to do some research. I don't know.

Itistoolate  posted on  2011-01-20   10:30:18 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#9. To: Itistoolate (#8)

deleted

The relationship between morality and liberty is a directly proportional one.

"Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin

Eric Stratton  posted on  2011-01-20   10:33:37 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#10. To: Eric Stratton (#7)

Slaughter House 5

Lysander_Spooner  posted on  2011-01-20   10:37:26 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#11. To: Lysander_Spooner (#10)

Had the A bomb been ready six months earlier, we would have fried Germany to a crisp. Modern day wags would justify every bit of it.

Against Japan???? How horrible.

Cynicom  posted on  2011-01-20   10:45:41 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#12. To: Shoonra (#1)

You're out of your mind and suffering from severe hallucinations. Someone as evil as you is probably Jewish.

"If ever this vast country is brought under a single government, it will be one of the most extensive corruption, indifferent and incapable of a wholesome care over so wide a spread of surface. This will not be borne, and you will have to choose between reform and revolution. If I know the spirit of this country, the one or the other is inevitable." - Thomas Jefferson

Turtle  posted on  2011-01-20   10:51:11 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#13. To: Cynicom (#11)

Some Human Beings choose to be monsters, despicable.

Lysander_Spooner  posted on  2011-01-20   11:08:10 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#14. To: Eric Stratton (#7)

"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men." -- Samuel Adams (1722-1803)‡

"The ground of liberty is to be gained by inches, and we must be contented to secure what we can get from time to time and eternally press forward for what is yet to get. It takes time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good." -- Thomas Jefferson

ghostdogtxn  posted on  2011-01-20   11:39:42 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#15. To: Cynicom (#11)

"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men." -- Samuel Adams (1722-1803)‡

"The ground of liberty is to be gained by inches, and we must be contented to secure what we can get from time to time and eternally press forward for what is yet to get. It takes time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good." -- Thomas Jefferson

ghostdogtxn  posted on  2011-01-20   11:40:51 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#16. To: ghostdogtxn, Lysander_Spooner (#14)

deleted

The relationship between morality and liberty is a directly proportional one.

"Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin

Eric Stratton  posted on  2011-01-20   13:05:18 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#17. To: Eric Stratton (#16)

"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men." -- Samuel Adams (1722-1803)‡

"The ground of liberty is to be gained by inches, and we must be contented to secure what we can get from time to time and eternally press forward for what is yet to get. It takes time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good." -- Thomas Jefferson

ghostdogtxn  posted on  2011-01-20   13:14:31 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#18. To: Prefrontal Vortex (#5)

Were you there, and tell me, did you notice? They were all out of step but Jim!

Witty. I can hardly believe anyone still knows obscure Irving Berlin songs that well. But you do, it seems.

TooConservative  posted on  2011-01-20   13:16:19 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#19. To: ghostdogtxn (#17)

Pretty sure slaughterhouse 5 is the book Vonnegut wrote about dresden.

True. But Vonnegut was only a hack compared to the great writer, Kilgore Trout.

TooConservative  posted on  2011-01-20   13:21:08 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#20. To: ghostdogtxn (#17)

deleted

The relationship between morality and liberty is a directly proportional one.

"Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin

Eric Stratton  posted on  2011-01-20   13:21:47 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#21. To: TooConservative (#19)

Kilgore Trout.

No, no, no....lol.....it was Dwayne Hoover, he is at least one finger better ;)

Lysander_Spooner  posted on  2011-01-20   13:58:39 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#22. To: Itistoolate (#0)

Yeah, that was one of many real Holocausts in WW2. Unless we end Jewish control of the USA there will many more in WW3.

God is always good!

RickyJ  posted on  2011-01-20   14:13:02 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#23. To: RickyJ (#22)

The 13th Tribe of Khazaria


Watch this video at SolvoSermo.Com

Itistoolate  posted on  2011-01-20   14:23:50 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#24. To: Lysander_Spooner (#21)

In fairness, a few words of explanation.

Kilgore Trout is a fictional character created by author Kurt Vonnegut. He was originally created as a fictionalized version of author Theodore Sturgeon (Vonnegut's colleague in the genre of science fiction), although Trout's consistent presence in Vonnegut's works has also led critics to view him as the author's own alter ego. Trout is also the titular author of the novel Venus on the Half-Shell, pseudonymously written by Philip José Farmer.

TooConservative  posted on  2011-01-20   20:07:51 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#25. To: TooConservative (#24)

Dwayne Hoover bit off killgore Trout's finger in Vonnegut 's 'Breakfast of Champions'.......LOL.....I remember some strange things at times LOL

Lysander_Spooner  posted on  2011-01-21   19:47:04 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#26. To: Lysander_Spooner (#25)

You obviously know your Vonnegut better than me.

I have noticed that sometimes the really odd details of a novel stick with me more than some of the major elements of the plot. A trick of memory perhaps.

TooConservative  posted on  2011-01-21   22:40:16 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#27. To: TooConservative (#26)

Not long ago i read something somewhere that research showed that memories were enhanced by the presence of shock, surprise or stress. Perhaps I remembered the Kilgore finger incident because to me it was shocking. I think it may well be true. A few years ago I was in a bad car accident, luckily nothing permanent, but I remember all the details leading up to the crash. ....it as as if it happened in slow motion....when in fact it was a matter of seconds.

Lysander_Spooner  posted on  2011-01-21   22:50:42 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#28. To: Lysander_Spooner (#27)

The mind is a queerer beast than we realize. Every now and then, you discover we are rather wonderfully constructed somehow.

TooConservative  posted on  2011-01-21   22:54:22 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


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