Why were the Major Cities of Britain bombed during 1940 - 1941?

Finally, in October 1940, when the R.A.F was struggling to maintain the upper hand the attacks stopped, and it seemed as if the Battle of Britain was won. However the attacks only stopped, because Hitler was becoming impatient. He was preparing to commence an assault on the Russian front, and needed his firepower to take Moscow, so decided to change his strategy.  A British bombing raid on Berlin gave Hitler the answer he had been looking for. Seeing the complete chaos caused by one night of bombing in Berlin he came up with a the idea. Blitzkrieg, which in German means lightening. He ordered the Luftwaffe to bomb London and other major cities, every night, and cause chaos and devastation there. He believed that this would destroy the morale of the British people who would force the Government to surrender or negotiate. Hitler’s belief that this would be effective was strengthened by the success the Germans had during the Spanish Civil War when a similar air raid destroyed the city of Geunica.

The German people were led to believe that bombing was concentrated on targets of a military interest. However, the truth was far from this, because bombing was targeted on largely populated cities, such as Birmingham, Belfast, Coventry, Sheffield, Southampton, Cardiff, Liverpool, and the heart of the county, London.

Initially Hitler’s plan was to destroy factories, to disrupt British industry and cripple the economy.  Highly populated large cities containing factories, shipyards and naval bases were obviously much easier targets than single factories, and as most of the bombing took place at night, Cities made a much easier target.   Subsequently Hitler failed to put British industry out of action, and the vast majority of factories remained in production throughout the war. The bombing of the major cities however had a negative effect on the morale of the people, and it was the destruction of the morale of the British people, that Hitler believed would win him the war.