Allied Strategic Bombing - Essay Example

Allied Strategic Bombing Strategic bombing refers to “a strike at the enemy’s capa and willingness to continue in the conflict Allied bombingof German cities during World War II was significant because of its disastrous impact on the German economy, which also reduced the force of the German war machine. However, allied strategic bombing did not start off with the intent to destroy German cities, rather the objective of the war was to selectively target small industrial centers which were producing the ammunition and supplies to fuel the German war machine. The change of strategy in the later stages of the war was also responsible for the attainment of the political objectives of the war - to cripple Germany and destroy her continued occupation of territories in Europe, including her attacks on Britain. What Britain was unable to achieve on the political front in arresting German occupation of Europe, was however achieved through the change in the strategic bombing policy of the allied forces. Strategic bombing by allied air power was the decisive factor that led to victory for the allies in World War II. The change in the British war policies and the bombing effort was the direct effort of political pressures. One of these was the growing tide of British public opinion in favor of bombing of German cities, in the aftermath of 1940, when France fell to Germany. Another significant reason for the shift in policy to direct bombing of German cities was the pressure exerted by Stalin on the British, to open up a second front to allow for some relief on the German-Soviet frontlines. However, Clausewitz’s abstract theory of war is based upon the premise that war commanders must decide at the outset “the kind of war on which they are embarking”2 and politics and war cannot be mingled with each other; policy should not be the guiding force that influences military operations. If one looks at the political objectives of strategic bombing as the twin destruction of a country’s will to fight as well as its ability to produce materiel, the Allied missions between 1942 and 1944 were the hammer blows on German industry and morale. Had the Allies not developed their long-range fighters, or had they not decided to move their targets to large cities instead of small, industrial targets, the outcome might have been much different, even with the addition of the Eastern Front. This entailed a change in war policy that was directly the result of political pressures, disproving the notion that politics and war cannot be mingled with each other. As detailed below, the development of the bombing effort was a deviation from the initial war policy objectives, dictated and governed purely by political concerns, rather than relying on war strategy, the war became the vehicle through the political objectives of reducing German military might as well as morale were achieved. As Gerhard Weinberg points out, the intense trench warfare that had characterized the First World War turned into nothing more than a bloody stalemate. The possibility of bombing targets located far from the combat zones offered two opportunities: to destroy enemy capacity by eliminating industrial facilities, and the collective will of the enemy to continue fighting by eroding the morale of citizens far from the front.3 In fact, the Germans had tried strategic bombing in World War I: they had sent zeppelins and airplanes capable of long-range missions over London and bombed it. However, these sorties had neither of the desired effects listed above, because industrial capacity was not reduced, and the net effect of the zeppelin campaign was to inspire the British to construct their own fleet of long-range aircraft. The only effect that the bombing campaigns had on the morale of the country was to make the British hate the Germans even more, for daring to bring the horrors of war to the home front.4 One of the major goals of the Allies at the outset of the Second World War was to neutralize the dramatic advantage that the German air force had over its enemies. In 1939, when combat began, the Germans had the strongest air force in the world. Initially, the British idea was to demolish German industrial targets -- particularly the oil industry. Targets selected by the RAF included aluminum and aero engine plants as well as transportation systems. However, they had a problem: the bombers had to fly at night, and at high altitude, to avoid being destroyed by the German fighter fleet. Under those conditions, industrial targets were proving just about impossible to hit and the bombing had little effect on German production capacity. By early 1942, the decision had been made to shift the target of British bombing raids to German cities, which were sufficiently large even for night raids to have dramatic effect from high altitude. Under the command of Sir Arthur Harris, the Royal Air Force set about finding and destroying German cities, beginning with the port city of Lűbeck.5 From the summer of 1943 onwards, the bombing attacks became more successful and impacted upon German production of steel, ball bearings and crankshafts which were important for the German war economy. By the middle of 1944, the bombing had started to become more catastrophical for the German economy, impacting negatively upon the production of ball bearings, gasoline output, aircraft and rubber production as well a steel output. The bombing attacks were more successful due to better aircraft and radar systems and the facility for repeated attacks. Since the British and the Americans differed on the attack policy, with the British preferring nighttime attacks and the Americans preferring day time attacks, the net result was that the bombing attacks were almost continuous. While the initial goal of reducing German industrial capacity failed, because of the difficulty of hitting small industrial facilities at night, when the British changed tactics, they actually ended up accomplishing both of the primary goals of strategic bombing -- reduction of capacity and erosion of morale -- at the same time. A key factor in this result was the German decision to prioritize construction resources towards the attack on both the Eastern and Western fronts, until the raids on Hamburg in July of 1943. After these raids, the Germans started to build more fighters, and to move some of their fighters back from the Eastern Front. By October, the Allies had to stop their daytime raids on German cities, because the fighters were repelling the bombers’ attack. However, it was too late for this change to make much of a difference: the Germans had had to scatter out their factories for aircraft, which took months to accomplish and led to a production gap of fighters that lasted for several months. Until the Allies made successful raids on the German oil industry and transportation infrastructure in 1944, this was the most significant impact that the Allies had on the German war industry.6 This was the first domino in many that led to the ultimate demise of the German war effort. The German need for anti-aircraft defense became so great that, by August of 1944, over one million German soldiers were stationed at anti-aircraft batteries alone -- and there were over 39,000 anti-aircraft batteries. This was an enormous commitment of men and materiel that was taken away from both fronts. Another domino was the highly successful American bombing raid on Regensburg on August 17, 1943. The facility there was in charge of designing the German ME-262 jet, and that facility was gravely damaged.7 Yet another in the line of events was the victory of the new long-range fighters that the Allies had devised over the Luftwaffe in February and March of 1944. Once the Luftwaffe was broken, the Allies basically had free rein to pursue more daylight bombing raids, which resulted in the ability to destroy smaller, more specific targets on those raids. The first piece of the infrastructure to fall was the communication system. This started with the eradication of communication systems and transportation infrastructure in France and Belgium, and then swiftly moved to transportation targets within Germany. The next major piece of the infrastructure to give way was the German oil industry. The American air force carried out extremely successful bombing raids that basically destroyed the Germans’ ability to process and refine crude oil, which was the death knell for their troops.8 It was difficult, at first, for the Allies to get intelligence about the overall effect of their strategic bombing campaigns on the German enemy. Since one of the primary effects was the destruction of the German communication system, it was very difficult for the Allies to receive and decipher coded communications among the Germans. In the end, the Allies had to rely on reports from the Japanese, specifically conversations between the Japanese diplomats and the German leadership about the various effects of the strategic bombing campaign on the German war effort. This became easier once the cable and wire systems were destroyed, and messages had to go via radio. And so yet another domino effect began -- as the more intricate communication systems were destroyed, the Allies had access to more and more of the Axis communications, and were able to pile on successful raid after raid.9 The basic strategy of attacking the German industrial base was a sound one because it resulted in a crippling of the German war machine, by reducing the supplies of steel, ball bearings, gasoline and other items that were vital in the war effort. Moreover, by attacking the German cities, the bombing also created a destructive impact on the morale of the people living in the cities. Since a great deal of housing was destroyed, workers were dislocated and production was negatively impacted despite the production facilities themselves not being hit. By the end of the war, 45 of the 60 largest German cities were destroyed. The destruction of the German cities and the consequent impact upon the German economy was singularly the effect of the bombing raids and were thus largely responsible for the Allies winning the war. The bombing paved the way for the allied forces to enter Germany and win the war, by destroying production facilities and by lowering the morale of the Germans. The air power of the allies and the control of enemy air space was a crucial element in winning the war. The domination of air space was essential because without it, the attacks on the German economy could not have been delivered with the required level of force to bring about the desired results. However, it has also been argued that while strategic bombing may have played a role in the victory, it was not solely responsible for it. The contribution made by armored divisions, amphibious vehicles and ships was also crucial. Critics have argued that the damages caused to the German economy were the result of losses of territory rather than strategic bombing, because if there had been no strategic bombing at all, the war would have ended in the same way and at about the same time10. (4) The role of the strategic bombing was more of a complementary effort to the ground war rather in supporting the ground forces rather than playing a decisive role in gaining a victory. Moreover, Lidell Hart’s view of grand strategy was that ends and means should be balanced, so that statesmen need to consider not only how to win a war, but also what the costs would be11. The strategic bombing has been criticized for the high number of civilian causalities that were inflicted in proportion to the extent of damage to production which was achieved and suggests that the costs in terms of civilian casualties may not have justified the ends of crippling the German war machine. It has also been argued that the bombing effort would have made sense only if it could have achieved decisive results on its own and forced Germany to capitulate. In reality however, allied air power was greater in terms of potential than what it actually achieved. While there were immense amounts of resources directed towards the bombing strategy, the civilian casualties appeared to indicate that the British and American forces were following an inhumane policy in the war, with eighteen months of bombing failing to produce a significant impact upon German war production or the German morale. Despite the arguments that have been offered against the decisive aspects of the strategic bombing campaign, the contribution of the bombing to the final victory cannot be denied. While victory in WW II cannot perhaps be attributed to air power alone, there is little doubt that the bombing efforts allowed the allies to exercise domination over the skies which considerably improved the success of the ground efforts by setting out favorable conditions to prepare for an invasion and thereby strengthening the land efforts. Moreover, the constant bombing also helped to destroy some of the pipelines that served the German war machine, and especially during the latter part of the war, contributed directly and indirectly to the crippling of the German economy, which helped to produce a victory. In conclusion, it may thus be argued that the reason for the success of the Allies in World War II was largely due to the role played by the strategic bombings. With the continued German occupation of Europe, the political objectives of ending German occupation of Europe and preventing a German occupation of Britain became possible only when German cities were targeted by allied air power, despite the civilian casualties which ensued. It was only through the shift in the allied bombing strategy that German ability for production could be severely crippled, while the attack on cities undermined public morale and resulted in displacement that was able to achieve the goals of reducing production without even targeting the production facilities themselves and severely disable the German economy, which impacted negatively on the German war effort. Had the allied bombing strategy not changed mid way through the war, the outcome of the war could have been entirely different, in according to the trends that were emerging during the early stages of the war when Britain was not able to achieve any significant degree of success in crippling the German economy. The question of whether the land troops would have been able to achieve the territorial successes they did is also questionable, since their rapid progress into Germany was aided by the advance preparation provided by the strategic bombing effort, together with the damages to the German war machine. On this basis, it may be argued that air power was indeed the decisive factor that led to victory of the allies in WW II and helped in achievement of the required political objectives. Read More