The technological developments that assisted bombing, the impact of bombing on the German economy, the impact of bombing on the German civilian morale and also the effects on the German war effort all help explain why the Allied strategic bombing of Germany during the Second World War was significant to quite a far extent. Each of the following paragraphs will analyse the impacts of the Allied strategic bombing on different aspects of Germany and also what factors assisted the Allied bombing campaign in creating a significant impact on Germany during the Second World War. The technological developments during the campaign affected the significance of the bombing of Germany during the Second World War. In 1939-1941, there were less planes, or navigational …show more content…
The attacks on Hamburg were not a turning point of the war as Bomber Command’s fortunes had completely disappeared once they started targeting Berlin, where their loss rates peaked to unacceptably high levels. Therefore Gee made less of an impact in assisting the Allied strategic bombing of Germany compared to Window. However the impact on Hamburg caused by Window was relatively short-lived because the Germans countered. On the other hand the long range escort fighters, disposable fuel tanks and The Thousand Bomber raids had a long-lived impact. The P-51 Mustang was an important aircraft in the war that had an American airframe and a British Rolls-Royce ‘Merlin’ Engine. Disposable fuel tanks, which increased the Allied fighter’s range were loaded onto the P-51 Mustang and by March 1944, the modified Mustang had a 1800 mile armed range and could fly with the bombers to Berlin and back. Richard Ovary said ‘The long-range escort fighter transformed the air war overnight.’ Lastly the thousand-bomber raid on 30th to 31st May 1942 against Cologne saw the destruction of a third of the inner zone of Cologne along with the destroying of 20000 houses and the evacuation of 200000 people.
On Febuary 19th, 1942, Japanese forces launched two air raids on the city of Darwin. The attack was lead by the same commander who was responsible for the Pearl Harbour catastrophe, which occurred only 10 weeks earlier. The Japanese were planning to invade Timor, therefore they bombed Darwin in an effort to frighten Australia and its allies and prevent any of their forces leaving the country. Over 260 enemy planes attacked the city, destroying twenty military aircraft, eight ships and the majority of civil facilities, including the local hospital.
However, because of the unreliability of bomber commands performance the Nazis managed to quickly control the situation. They ensured that no photographs or news reports were published from the bomb stricken reports meaning that the rest of Germany could only gather information from stories and tales. On top of this only a small part of Germany was bombed as the allied forces simply did not have the technology to reach the majority of the Reich. That it was relatively easy for the country to regroup, resulting in heavy retaliation and a continuous growth in German production. However, in the last years of the war bombing technology drastically improved and the attacks were relentless. As opposed to less than one quarter of bombs dropping within five miles of the target, each bomb now hit their target and inflicted maximum damage due to new aiming technology. Bombing raids were now performed twenty-four hours a day, in the night by Bomber Command and in the day by the heavily armoured bombers in the American 8th squadron. 1,500 bombers were now available after a huge increase in production speed, each with the
World War II (WWII) made a significant impact in shaping modern Australia. This war contributed to social, political and technological developments throughout Australia and the world.
Germany withdrew from the Geneva disarmament conference, which meant they refused to support a British proposal that air bombing be banned. Dresden was also a very important rail centre for moving troops, concentration camp prisoners and war material but it would be no good if the allies destroyed the buildings and factories, because if there will be, still human’s; they can rebuild it. The war factories of Dresden employed around 10,000 people, many of which lived in the very centre of the city.
Despite the allied bombing of Germany in WWII perhaps appearing to be significant, overall, it was only such to a limited extent. It is possible to analyse the extent to which the bombing was significant in four aspects: economic, morale, international relations and others theatres of war. The extent to which they were significant will be assessed against their respective pre-war expectations. Whilst each dimension are important, I am going to specifically focus on economic and moral because they were the main objectives of the Allies, and directly affected Germany.
Sir Arthur Harris, popularly known as “Bomber Harris”, served in the British Air Force in World War II. In 1942, he became the commander-in-chief of Bomber Command. At that time, the Royal Air Force was continuing the daytime strategic bombing and inaccurate nighttime raids. In May 1942, he commanded the shocking saturated bombing in the German city of Cologne. Although this tactic may have lowered the morale of the enemy troops, these attacks were controversial to the public. This tactic took over the major air force offensive in the Second World War.
Over 11 million men, women and their children were killed during the Holocaust, but, more than half of them were Jewish. Innocent human beings were abducted and put into concentration camps from 1933 to 1945, where they were tortured and forced to work long hours, each day, without food or water. Eventually, more than half of the Jews were killed and only a small amount of them survived. The Holocaust happened because of one man’s plan to rid the world of all Jews. He was determined to succeed. Adolf Hitler began a movement that resulted in the execution of six million Jews.
Aircraft and the war materials are important to any war. The aircraft in the war was very different for each person. They had many different types of aircraft depending on their way of flying. Also the designed it based on how “dangerous” they felt they were. During the war there were over forty different versions of the very successful aircraft from Germany. They wouldn’t build them based on if they were better for fighting or if they were better for flying. They based them on how the person flying them wanted the aircraft to be. This caused problems for Germany. It is very time consuming for Germany. It took a long time to build each of the planes. Since they were all different they
The morale of the German people was not affected enough to effect their war-waging capacity. "Neither a maintenance of productivity nor a rebuilding of industry could have been achieved by means of compulsive but only by virtue of the voluntary response of German workers" . <br><br>It was assumed that bombing raids would be made in the daylight. In August 1940 German bombers suffered heavily in daylight even though they were escorted. This helped to confirm to Bomber Command that night bombing was the best policy. Bomber Command flew night missions over Germany during the winter of 1940-1941 in the belief their bombs had fallen within about 300 yards of their targets. This figure was plainly wrong, a new assumption was made. The R.A.F decided the average error was closer to 1000 yards, which meant that Bomber Command could not be expected to hit targets as small as oil facilities, until they had been equipped with vastly improved navigational aids. The U.S.A.A.F opposed Bomber Commands view, they believed accurate bombing could only be achieved during the day. They assumed unescorted bombers flying in well-designed formations could penetrate the German lines. On 14th October 1943, 60 out 291 flying fortresses were shot down by German fighters during the last major raid on Schweinfurt. The formation had been obliged to fly 400 miles without fighter cover. The Americans suspended daylight
The Blitzkrieg changed how Hitler waged war by saving many people from death, this caused Hitler to shorten military campaigns, and limit the artillery expansion; It was a good strategy for them to use. The Blitzkrieg was a good military strategy used to save their men, time, money, and it was the best way in Hitler’s mind to win the war. As it says in the article, “Its successful execution results in short military campaigns, which preserves human lives and limits the expenditure of artillery. German forces tried out the blitzkrieg in Poland in 1939 before successfully employing the tactic with invasions of Belgium, the Netherlands and France in 1940” (Blitzkrieg 1). The quote provided shows that this tactic changed how Hitler waged war.
Following the devastation of trench warfare during World War I, early airpower theorist believed strategic bombing could be the new way to win wars and reduced the number of lives lost. Theorist like, Guilio Douhet, Hugh Trenchard, and William “Billy” Mitchel became pioneers and advocates of strategic bombing. They believed striking the enemy’s troops, war-marking industry, and vital centers would produce a decisive victory. The airpower theory would be a key element to the Allies strategy in Second World War (WW2). Leaders in Britain and the United States believed Germany was a greater threat than Japan. Thus, the airpower strategy of the European theater of operation became the primary focus. Allied airpower was decisive in the European
But, the aircrafts were eventually used for more than scouting ahead it later turned into a point of emphasis of where the war would take place. Using this source to support my thesis will help give a better understanding of what I will be writing about. I will be using this source to help the development of sub-points that I will be using in my research paper. The context of this source will help out on the claims and development of things I will discuss in my paper, and I will not use this document to disagree
How significant was the impact of public works projects initiated by the Nazis in Germany?
The United States atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was the only time atomic bombs were used in war, and had a severe impact on the final outcome of World War II. It involved the forces of the United States and Japan battling each other in many different cities of Japan. The bombings took place on August 6, 1945, and August 9, 1945. Eleven United States troops were aboard the Enola Gay when the atomic bombs were dropped. About one hundred and forty thousand people died from the first atomic bomb and about eighty thousand died from the second bombing (Parker, 231). The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had a large impact on the outcome of World War II by ending the war in Japan. The two atomic bombs dropped during World War
Ships were also revolutionized during the World War II era. Naval technology was very poor at the time, but once radar technology was developed, navigation and detection was made much easier for submarine and ship pilots. The invention of radar was still very new — being developed only 2 years prior to the start of World War II. Hours of experimentation and development were poured into enhancing radar technology so that the allied forces could better combat the Nazi fleet. Aircrafts were also made more advanced during World War II. Aviation in general was very new at the time, so optimizing what basic aircrafts we had at the time for battle (by equipping them with guns and bombs) was a challenging feat. Considering the first powered flight had taken place only in 1903, only 40 years before