Was the contribution of RAF Bomber Command decisive in bringing about the defeat of Germany?
Bombing cities was always a controversial tactic as early as 1917 when a fleet of German Gotha bombers bombarded the costal town of Folkestone killing 95 people and injuring 175. This initial attack on Britain was the first major air offensive targeting the civilian population. This sparked the British population and government into understanding the realisation of a bombing offensive. In 1925 the government produced a projection of civilian casualties in the event of an attack by the French Air Force, the results were shocking an estimated 5,000 people would be killed or wounded in the first 24 hours. It was these results accompanied with other evidence that led the Prime minister, Stanley Baldwin, to state in the houses of parliament that “the bomber will always get through”. This consensus explains why the government and the RAF invested the lion’s share of available money on RAF Bomber Command rather that Fighter Command. However the question still remains whether this investment was justified and if it was money well spent.
When World War Two broke out on the 3rd of September 1939 Bomber Command’s capability was restricted to small numbers of slow aircraft carrying primitive navigation equipment including sextants. In order not to provoke Germany, Bomber Command’s early flights were merely to drop propaganda leaflets. However there were many major successes by bomber command as the war progressed, for example in 1942 the attack on U-boat factories in Bremen hampered German U-boat production significantly thus assisting in the overall success in the battle of the Atlantic. Technological advances also helped Bomber Command achieve success; Operation Window was a very simple but effective way of jamming the German radar, it used pieces of foil accurately cut that when dropped from a plane would give returns on German radars. This was so successful that on its first night in operation almost all of Hamburg was destroyed for the loss of only twelve bombers. The development of planes also helped RAF Bomber Command achieve successes for example the introduction of the Avro Lancaster in 1942 helped bomb dams in the Ruhr thus disrupting main transport routes. The Avro Lancaster was known as an double functional aircraft as it could reach speeds of 266 mph and had a bomb load of 14000lb, which was the largest out of any other bomber on the British or German side. Such was the success of the bombing campaign that it diverted 900,000 men from the eastern front in the USSR to man flak and 88 mm guns, which were originally built for defence against Russian tanks. The indirect help persuaded Stalin that the USA and Britain doing their bit in the war effort as millions of Russians lost their lives. Finally and probably the most controversial of Bomber Command’s objectives was the introduction of area bombing in 1942. The decision to target Germany’s urbanised areas and “de-house” the civilians was not a decision taken lightly and some British people protested against this controversial tactic. There were many successes in this campaign and even Joseph Gobbeles said that “… Bombers were creating extraordinary difficulties.” Therefore proving that industry and possibly civilian morale was being affected. An illustration of these difficulties is that over one raid 94% of the German city Wuppertal was destroyed.
