www.airforcehistory.hq.af.mil/PopTopics/dresden.htm
Home HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF THE 14-15 FEBRUARY 1945 BOMBINGS OF DRESDEN Prepared by: USAF Historical Division Research Studies Institute Air University I. 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. 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. What strategic objectives, of mutual importance to the Allies and to the Russians, underlay the bombings of Dresden? Did the Russians request that Dresden be bombed by allied air forces? On whose recommendation, whether by an individual or by a committee, and by what authority were Allied air forces ordered to bomb Dresden? Were the Russians officially informed by the Allies concerning the intended date of and the forces to be committed to the bombing of Dresden? With what forces and with what means did the Allied forces bomb Dresden? What were the specific target objectives in the Dresden bombings? What were the immediate and actual consequences of the Dresden bombings on the physical structure and the populace of the city? Were the Dresden bombings in any way a deviation from established bombing policies set forth in official bombing directives? 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? 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? 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. 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. As a primary communications center, Dresden was the junction of three great trunk routes in the German railway system: Berlin-Prague-Vienna, Munich-Breslau, and Hamburg-Leipzig. As early as 1943, the Allies and Russians had begun high-level consultations for the conduct of the war against Germany; 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. On 14 December 1944, the American Ambassador to Russia, Mr. Averill Harriman, personally stated to Marshal Stalin that General Dwight D. 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. To what extent air bombardment can delay the move eastwards of these or other divisions destined for the Eastern Front is . 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. 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 . 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 Russias 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: To defeat the Germans on the Eastern Front. To defeat the German groupings which have advanced into the Ardennes. 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). 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). 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 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 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. 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 bo...
|
http://csua.com/feed/