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Carpet bombing can be seen as a rational response to the V2 rocket which was indiscriminate of it's targeting of Londoners. War is often a case of responding i
by iaw 6y ago
Carpet bombing can be seen as a rational response to the V2 rocket which was indiscriminate of it's targeting of Londoners. War is often a case of responding in kind.
If the Germans had had the capability of bombing London they would have (but couldn't thanks to radar). This was not a small conflict but an existential fight for existence between two groups of countries.
I have a hard time judging the decision to carpet bomb during WWII harshly given the circumstances. Note that both sides had nerve agents that were not deployed because neither wanted that escalation.
There are definitely events, and even wars, where the US has committed atrocities but I don't think carpet bombing during WWII is a good example of it.
- iso947 6y agoGermany did bomb the crap out of London and other cities - the blitz in London, destroyed Coventry, and the “Baedeker blitz” Which had limited military justification
- cmrdporcupine 6y agoSorry but these efforts are completely pale in comparison to what was done to the cities of the German industrial heartland in the last year of the war. I have seen pictures of Mainz (my grandparent's home) where there's not a single building left fully standing in the entire downtown core. That's not to say the Germans wouldn't have tried, if they could have. But they were tied up in the east doing very awful things there. The Russians unfortunately bore the brunt of total Nazi savagery.
- iso947 6y agoPoland I think had even more civilian deaths per population than USSR. - 5 million from 35 million vs 7 million from 170 million.
- philipkglass 6y agoCarpet bombing can be seen as a rational response to the V2 rocket which was indiscriminate of it's targeting of Londoners. The British strategic bombing against Germany started with Operation Abigail Rachel in December 1940: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Mannheim_in_World_War_II https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Mannheim_in_World_W... Which itself followed the start of the London Blitz in September 1940: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blitz#First_phase https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blitz#First_phase The first V2 attack against the UK was much later, in September 1944: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-2_rocket#Operational_history https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-2_rocket#Operational_history