We do the victims of war a disservice when we attempt to discuss the savage butchery of war anything other than "harshly." No, the bombing of Dresden was completely pointless tactically. Do you know the difference? Strategy: a plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim. Tactics: an action or strategy carefully planned to achieve a specific end. "Tactics" is "I will take that bridge in order to prevent the retreat of my enemy." "Strategy" is "I will use encirclement whenever possible because my enemy's performance is significantly curtailed when he's denied maneuverability." Sowing salt into the earth of Carthage was a tactic (permanent and total area denial) to carry out the strategy of "annihilate the Phoenician Empire." Shock & Awe is a tactic (asymmetrical domination of the field of battle) to carry out the strategy of demoralizing and intimidating a poorly-organized and poorly-motivated enemy. Tactically, Dresden was a militarily unimportant center of art and commerce that was not significantly contributing to the war effort. But then, the Third Reich was making no indication that they had any interest, strategically, in armistice or surrender. They were also ramping up production of weapons intended for trans-channel terror campaigns and were using rocket interceptors and other weapons of desperation that indicated a desire to go down nobly swinging. Remember: by the time Dresden was bombed, the Allies had invaded Germany through the Netherlands and would have captured the Ruhr Valley if the Nazis hadn't chosen to flood it themselves to buy time. The Germans had lost. There was no possible way the 3rd Reich could win anything. And remember: in a similar position in WWI, the Germans had chosen to fight trench warfare for three. horrible. years. So strategically, you begin Sherman's March to the Sea. Strategically, you salt the earth. Strategically, you bring the war right the fuck to the hearth and homes of those gentle people who stood idly by as their neighbors were turned into lampshades. Strategically, you grab your enemy by the lapels and make him suffer in ways he cannot handle. There's about a thousand pages of evil shit I could write here, but the bottom line is this: Dresden wouldn't have been bombed if Dresden didn't need bombing. You think 3900 tons of ordnance comes cheaply? Was throwing over 700 heavy bombers into the sky over Germany a casual action? The Germans bet the farm and lost. The only reason they bet the farm in the first place was they'd bet the farm 25 years previously and nobody had the materiel or will to make them lose. They figured they could get away with it again. They didn't. It left their country a smoking hole. It's a terrible tragedy of human life, an outsized catastrophe for all mankind, and wholly and completely just. For every person who died in the bombing of Dresden, 44 people lost their lives IN AUSCHWITZ ALONE. The Purple Hearts given out this month were manufactured in 1945 in anticipation of the Invasion of Japan. Operation Downfall was predicted to cost the United States a half million young men. In all the wars we've fought since, we have yet to scratch the pile of commemorative medals we created to honor their sacrifice. Instead, we turned two cities in Japan into radioactive glass and the world you live in is a direct consequence. It's fashionable to point the finger at the United States and talk about atrocities. It's fashionable to argue that WWII ended the way it did because we were already fighting a Cold War with Russia. It's fashionable to know nothing about Dresden that you didn't read in Slaughterhouse Five but it's fucking insulting to pay passing lip service to the apocalyptic genocides perpetrated by every member of the Axis powers. Yes - absolutely. The Allied powers did some downright inhuman shit in pursuit of victory. But it's not like the United States invaded Poland and exterminated six million people. Go read Farewell to Manzanar and recognize that the United States did some really shitty things to people who really didn't deserve it in the name of national security. Then go read The Diary of Anne Frank and recognize that sometimes, evil is graded on a curve. You know what really pisses me off? As if the caliber of your architecture determines the value of your dead. After all, fuck the jews, they all lived in ghettos anyway - But Dresden! That shit's was the Hapsburgs' finest!I mean wasn't the bombing of Dresden completely pointless strategically?
A cultural rather than industrial centre, Dresden was previously known as the ‘Florence of the Elbe’ due to its many museums and beautiful buildings.
Thanks for the vocabulary lesson. I may be a bluecollar junkie but I paid attention in history class. I know enough about the atrocities on both sides of the war to appreciate your lengthy dissection of how strategically they were carried out. They're still atrocities and you're right, tough shit that's war. Does that make my disgust with it meaningless? Your tone is elitist and insulting. You're obviously smarter than me but you don't have to be a dick about it.It's fashionable to know nothing about Dresden that you didn't read in Slaughterhouse Five but it's fucking insulting to pay passing lip service to the apocalyptic genocides perpetrated by every member of the Axis powers.
I'm sorry I offended you. It was not my intention to offend. It was my intention to express irritation and disgust at how this subject usually comes up - "well yeah, the Nazis were horrible and all but, you know, Dresden." Even now, you're talking about "atrocities on both sides of the war" when only one side had gas chambers. The reliable statistics on Dresden are 25,000 dead. The reliable statistics on the Blitz are 40,000 dead... and we won't even get into the unrestricted warfare perpetrated by U-boats on all shipping, humanitarian and otherwise. The "both sides" canard is tired, revisionist bullshit. There aren't that many wars where one side is overwhelmingly evil. WWII is one of them.
I just stumbled on this conversation. The whole situation you're talking about reminds me of that "Boo hoo, America's bad" story about how the first bomb dropped on Berlin killed the only elephant in the Berlin Zoo. First of all boo fucking hoo. Second of all, apparently The Elephant was one of the few animals to SURVIVE the bomb. (as a Side note, I find it strange that that website advertises "Fun facts" about WW2. I mean, i understand the meaning but it just seems inappropriate.) SECOND of all, the area was targeted because of the Zoo Flak Tower. The ZFT was less than half of a kilometre away from the Zoo. From 30,000 ft? that's not so fucking bad aim, IMO. Of course, It took the British 3 tries and at least 60 tons of dynamite after the war to demo the damn thing so who knows, maybe the bomb hit the tower and nobody noticed. All parties do evil things in war, but some people are significantly more evil than others. The relativity of evil is much like the Relativity of Wrong. edit: also, another side note, isn't there significant evidence that many other countries in Europe were thinking about the same sort of idea re: the holocaust? I have no idea where I head that, but It has a lot to do with the ideas you bring up later in this thread. Racism and anti-semitism (which is really just a very specific, very prevalent form of racism and cultural oppression) are alive and well today."A bomb dropped by the Allies on Berlin during World War II killed every animal in the Berlin Zoo except the elephant, which escaped and roamed the city. When a Russian commander saw hungry Germans chasing the elephant and trying to kill it, he ordered his troops to protect it and shoot anyone who tried to kill it."
It was one of several flak towers that protected Berlin from Allied bomber raids. Its primary role was as a gun platform to protect the government building district of Berlin(...)
Fair enough. No hard feelings Klein. I learn a lot of neat stuff from you. Nazis. What a bunch of bastards.
You know... I only brought up Dresden yesterday because it was the anniversary. I post every day. You don't have to be mean. We're all human people here.
I didn't mean you offense personally. I'm sorry you took it that way. My umbrage is entirely with the article and, after browsing other articles by the same author, with the tendency for well-meaning Vonnegut fans to turn Valentine's Day into "International Be Kind to Nazis Day." See, I see some article or other about Dresden and how horrible it was about this time every year. The check boxes: - "Did you know?" - "Center of history and art" - "Questionable 'strategic' value" (these articles always confuse strategy and tactics) - "Of course Nazis are bad, but..." Yet I haven't seen an article on the anniversary of Kristallnacht since 1988. I never see anything on the Rape of Nanking. I never see anything on the Bataan Death March. I rarely even see anything on D-Day anymore, yet every year like clockwork, somebody posts "did you know we bombed Dresden today in history?" without acknowledging that it was a three-day campaign. Even Wikipedia acknowledges that people who don't otherwise give a shit about WWII have a hard-on for Dresden: I can even tell you why this is. History is taught from whatever perspective is necessary to reinforce the status quo, and the status quo is "we're all friends now, mistakes were made, no one is entirely to blame for WWII." More importantly, English teachers like to throw Vonnegut some time between 8th and 11th grade because they know he'll be well received, while History teachers get about a week to cover WWII and it's generally the last two weeks of senior year. So most people have a fuzzy History Channel-shaped conception of WWII in general but a Vonnegut-flavored perception of Dresden in particular. Vonnegut was a POW in Dresden. He went into a meat freezer in a beautiful city and came out three days later to see a ruin. It was obviously a formative experience on him, as it would be on anyone. But there are a whole bunch of dead people who can't share their "formative experiences" with you and nobody drags them out of the closet every year to get back at their parents. This shit isn't academic, either: There are active Nazi parties in Greece right now, winning seats in Parliament. Anti-semitism is a real thing in France. And those boxcars were for me. If I'd lived in Frankfurt in 1938 and had no way of getting out, I'd be in Bergen-Belsen by 1942. And I've never so much as been inside a synagogue. You brought up Dresden yesterday because you read an article about Dresden because some dipshit always writes an article about Dresden for publication February 13. Those dipshits usually use language like this: Do you like how "relative success" means "weren't actively being exterminated all the time?" It allows us to put forth the idea that things were hunky-dory for the Jews until that nasty Adolph fellow showed up and pulled the wool over everyone's eyes. But it's bullshit. The United States has plenty of problems with racism, but at least we argue about our problems with racism. For most of Europe, even now, It's just a thing. There was a post on here a week or so ago about how we logically blame the victim so we can feel better about a world full of violence. One in four Britons thinking Jews are greedy goes a long way towards making concentration camps less horrible. Yet it doesn't work the other way because we've had it drilled into our heads that the Nazis were evil, so our knee-jerk response is "well, maybe they weren't the only evil ones." Yes. They were. Overwhelmingly so. I posted 1) Five sarcastic words 2) one epithet 3) A picture of a V2 majestically rising in flight 4) An artistic picture of shoes 5) Big Ben defiantly rising above the rubble Yet I'm the bad guy here because I dare to not feel bad about the bombing of a Nazi city during the desperation stage of the end of WWII. And that's deeply fucked up, but I totally understand it, and I know of no way to have this discussion in such a way that people listen without a little shock'n'awe of my own. So that's what I do.Post-war discussion of whether or not the attacks were justified has led to the bombing becoming one of the moral causes célèbres of the war... The casualty figures are now considered to be lower than those from the firebombing of some other Axis cities; see Tokyo 9–10 March 1945, approximately 100,000 dead, and Hamburg July 1943, approximately 50,000 dead.
Prior to the Nazi’s rise to power, Jewish history in Germany had been chequered with alternating periods of success and victimisation. Stretches of relative tolerance by those in power allowed the community to prosper and caused its numbers to grow with immigration — often due to mistreatment in other parts of Europe.
Thank you for saying in text what I've been trying to say for a while. Dresden was the "keep fighting and we wipe you off the face of the earth." Dresden was not the pure evil "OMG USA bad" people want to make it out to be. Same thing with the second atom bomb. One bomb and you can tell your citizens it was a fluke or bury the news. The second now becomes a message: we are ready to obliterate you if you do not surrender. (That message worked for those of you asking. The day after the first bombing the Japanese command voted to keep fighting) We can debate the ethics until there is no more history. But these bombings saved us from an invasion of Japan, millions of casualties and who knows how many years. And a possible war with the USSR. All wars suck. And sometimes in wars there are well defined good and evil.
I don't really think I called you 'the bad guy'. Haha.