Why do Strategic Bombing campaigns not work?

>>34632916

By themselves? No shit they don't work.

If bombing isn't working, you're just not doing enough.

>>34632916
That's funny, I remember them working pretty well the last couple of times NATO used them.

>>34632939
Are you living in a different time line than the rest of us?

>>34632930
See, that's what we thought in Vietnam, but even when we ramped up the bombing with Linebacker II, it still didn't work

>>34632947
Look, there's strategic bombing against groups operating in the open during Desert Storm or Yugoslavia and then there's what we've been doing lately. That is to say using drones to blow up three dudes in house in the middle of nowhere. I'm not entirely certain what we're doing now even counts as bombing anymore.

>>34632961
Vietnam didnt have to produce all of their weapons themself. They were provided from a source they couldnt attack.

For instance against nazi germany it worked because they had to produce everything. So then you can bomb production.

>>34632916
Strategic bombing is just a nice-sounding cover phrase for "Let bomb the fuck out of civilians because we hate them so much"

>>34633056
Strategic bombing is justified in the sense that it serves to shorten a war. The entirety of the enemies remaining infrastructure should not be worth the bones of one allied soldier.

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>>34633060
More like, the entirety of the enemy civilian population should not be worth the bones of one allied soldier

>>34632961
Loving Every Laugh

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>>34633070
Correct

>>34633056
>because we hate them so much
Its not to do with hate, its to do with demoralizing the enemies population and making life hell for them. Hitting production, supply and logistics like bridges is good, but if you can cause widespread longing for the war to be over, it helps a lot.

Then again some countries just never give in no matter how "demoralized" you think they are. Britain in WW2, North Vietnam in Vietnam war, Stalingrad.

Strategic bombing with regular bombs in ww2 was simply too inaccurate to be effective.
These days guided bombs are be precision weapons and you can use strategic bombing to a very high level of effectiveness - destroying the exact targets you want to.

In the end air superiority and bombing helps, but it doesn't usually win wars on its own - you need ground forces at least threatening an area before someone is going to surrender.

>>34632916
Strat bombing did significantly impair German production. It's simply not a magical war-winning tool without nuclear-tier firepower.

>>34632961
Linebacker II literally ended the war you tard.

>>34632916
this
>>34633348

If you can bomb your opponents industry and means to wage war into dust it's working. 40s Germany had their industry constantly battered by the Allies and it hampered their ability to make just about everything. It didn't win the war but it certainly shortened it by reducing the ability of Germany to fight back.

People always seem to think you can win wars purely from the air when you simply cannot, even to this day, unless you're in a notional situation where you can nuke every city off the map and the other country has no means to retaliate and no allies to retaliate for them. Air power can do amazing things whether it's strategic bombing campaigns, CAS or ongoing surveillance, but it's always just one of the tools to be used alongside others, not entirely replacing all of them.

>>34633041
>For instance against nazi germany it worked

Except, no, it didn't

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/why-strategic-bombing-doesnt-seem-to-work/article19928220/%3Fservice%3Damp

>>34633373
Ah, yes, what's the going rate on a plane ticket to the Republic of South Vietnam nowadays, hmm?

>>34632961
>Linebacker II
It did force the commie gooks back to the negotiation table.
It did not make the commie gooks any more favorably disposed towards the US, nor any more inclined to keep their word but they did at least start talking.

>>34633386
Look up the Paris Peace accords you ditz

>>34633395

Hmm, yes, what a "Victory" that was.

Tell me, how many bullets from the north did that piece of paper stop?

>>34633395
And? When the accords were broken, not even a third Linebacker campaign would have stopped the North. It would have required boots on the ground, which America was no longer willing to give.

>>34633386
>South Vietnam
>Paris Peace Accords signed
>the US leaves Virtnam as fast as possible
>commie gooks break the peace a couple of months later
>South Vietnam request funds and weapons from the US, as promised in the Peace Accords
>commies and hippies in congress block any funding to support to South Vietnam
>South Vietnam falls, US evacuate their embassy
>last_chopper_out of_Saigon.png
The fall of South Vietnam was less a failure of strategic bombing and more one of not throwing enough lefties out of helicopters back home.

>>34632916
They didn't work in ww2 because they couldn't be accurate enough, since then they've been pretty effective against conventional opposition, the only problem is if you bomb conventional opposition enough some of them turn into unconventional opposition.

>>34632966
Its still arguably effective strategic bombing in Syria and Iraq, we've massively limited insurgents ability to organise and carry out attacks, it just hasn't been able to end the conflict and it could be said that some of the tactical bombing is setting back strategic goals.

>>34633340
>Britain in WW2, North Vietnam in Vietnam war, Stalingrad.
And Germany, and Japan until actual total annihilation was on the table.

Nobody gives a shit about being bombed,

>>34632966

it's assassination

>>34633384
>opinion
By 1944, the majority of German war production was devoted to aircraft. Less than 6% was used for panzers.
Defense of the Reich pinned over 50% of the Luftwaffe in place defending against Allied air raids. That alone strategically justifies the campaign. It destroyed the Luftwaffe.

>>34633056
It takes 6 years to rebuild a factory, it takes 20 years to rebuild a fighting human.

>>34633561
Yeah great, except most wars don't last longer than 5 years.

>>34633541

Here, if you won't listen to him, check out Richard Overy, one of the best living WWII Historians

He agrees it was a waste of men and resources, that it didn't accomplish anything near the price it took.

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/books/the-bombing-war-europe-1939-1945-by-richard-overy/2007343.article

>"Almost to the end, German industrial production continued at a remarkable rate, partly because of a policy of dispersal and partly because of the use of slave labour, and also partly because bombing caused relatively little industrial damage and that damage was quickly made good. "

>>34633565
The demographic disruption of WW1 had a direct impact on the course of WW2.

>>34633561

killbots have arrived. small caterpillar with a .50 and some nade launchers driven by remote control a k or so away are here.

might want to prioritise killbot factories.

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>>34632916

Oh it works alright, you just gotta hit the right targets.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_campaign_of_World_War_II

Albert Speer, writing in his memoir, said that "It meant the end of German armaments production."

Adolf Galland, General der Jagdflieger of the Luftwaffe until relieved of command in January 1945, wrote in his book "the most important of the combined factors which brought about the collapse of Germany,"

>>34633905
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_campaign_of_World_War_II

>Of itself, German industry was not significantly affected by attacks on oil targets as coal was its primary source of energy.

You think this article supports your argument?

>>34633916
...Yes

What part of "You have to hit the right target" does that not support?

>>34633937

What's the right target?

And why include those two quotes unless you thought the oil targets were the right ones?

>>34633951
Hitting the oil targets wouldn't stop production, it'd stop them from using the results of that production.

>>34633951
Depends on who you're bombing and how their economy is structured. AWPD-1 was based off the American economy, not that of Germany, and so when they tried to act on it, it was wholly ineffective. Later on, when they started hitting oil targets, and transportation facilities, the effect was significant. For Germany, the right target was it's fuel/oil/gas production facilities. For an island like Japan, aerial mining played a significant role (though not as great as submarines).

I chose to use two quotes, because when making an argument must back up your point with evidence. I do not have a copy of the Strategic Bombing Survey immediately available to me, but I do have a copy of Masters of the Air and Bomber Command which I could quote from if I so desired.

>>34634000
>Later on, when they started hitting oil targets, and transportation facilities, the effect was significant.

But that's not what the article in your post >>34633905 said

>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_campaign_of_World_War_II

>Of itself, German industry was not significantly affected by attacks on oil targets as coal was its primary source of energy.

>>34634011

The German synthetic oil production relied on coal. Bombing the large refineries prevented them from turning the coal to oil. You can't use raw coal to power tanks or aircraft.

>>34634026

If that was the case, why was German industry not significantly affected by attacks on oil targets?

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>>34632916
>Why do Strategic Bombing campaigns not work?

Strategic bombing campaigns do work. They just don´t work each and every single time they are used because, like any other tactic or strategy, they have to be studied and used properly. If you fail to choose obtainable objectives, gather the necessary logistics and execute a properly laid-out plan, of course strategic bombing campaigns are going to fail.

Like literally every other tactic or strategy that has ever been used.

Nobody argues that cavalry charges never worked just because of the Charge of the Light Brigade, for example.

>>34634075
Ok, what is your argument exactly?

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>>34633041
.>You don't have to worry about the enemy's strategic bombing campaigns if there is nothing to bomb

>>34634135
YOUR argument in >>34634026 is "You can't use raw coal to power tanks or aircraft" and that "The German synthetic oil production relied on coal"

But the only evidence you post to back that up is the wikipedia article that clearly states:

>German industry was not significantly affected by attacks on oil targets

Meaning either the article or you are mistaken in effectiveness of attacking Germany's oil.

>>34633575

Surely though, the fact they had to disperse their industrial infrastructure, caused additional inefficiencies compared to an unmolested industry, and the use of slaves was part of the desperate shortage of manpower with the Reich under strain from so many directions. Honestly though, probably one of the biggest effects of the strategic bombing, was encouraging excessive investment in the V-weapon programmes, which detracted from actually effective weapons.

>>34633417
>>commies and hippies in congress block any funding to support to South Vietnam
you mean patriots that helped in not wasting anymore money towards an unjust war

>>34634178
And I've already stated that Germany's ability to wage war was significantly curtailed by the damage to oil facilities. It is all very well and good that you can produce 2,000 fighters a month (the vast majority of which were designed solely for attacking allied bombers by the way) but if you can't fuel them, then they are utterly worthless. Strategic bombing includes targets other than raw production.

>>34634242

see >>34633575

>>34634219
This. The U.S could have taken advantage of the Sino-Sov split or even better yet, have Vietnam becoming a pawn in Asia by giving them exactly what they needed and acquired from the Chinks and Russians: supports and guns.

If the U.S was so much a country upholding sovereignty and freedom to rule oneself, then they should have got into talks with France over the Tonkin colonies. They were a bunch of white-flag raising pussies who were going to be BTFO by the VC later on anyway, as well as the African colonies declaring independence.

It couldn't really end better for both since US would have still maintained the iron grip of monopoly on the world then (better than the Soviets) and Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh possibly reuniting into one democratic country armed with weapons of freedom.

A unified and democratic Vietnam's tenacity backed by U.S weapon against the commies would have been a more true and righteous Vietnam war conflict.

>>34634248
Again, productions is useless without the means to use it.

>>34634296

Why would Overy call the bombing campaign a waste if it was, as you say, effective at denying Germany of "the means"

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>>34634219
>Stopping communism
>unjust

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>>34633575
>"Almost to the end, German industrial production continued at a remarkable rate, partly because of a policy of dispersal and partly because of the use of slave labour, and also partly because bombing caused relatively little industrial damage and that damage was quickly made good. "

Apply some common fucking sense, guys.

Yeah, yeah, historians love to point out that German industrial production continued, and sometimes even accelerated. But without the bombing, maybe instead of making 115% what they were making before, they would have been making 140%.

They are getting fucking bombed. That HAS to have a negative effect on their production. For example:

>partly because of a policy of dispersal and partly because of the use of slave labour

Hey, you know why the nazis did not have dispersal and slave labour right from the fucking start? Because that´s way less efficient than having big factories manned by skilled labour. Dispersal means slower and more costly production. Slave labour means lower product quality.

"I love producing my shit faster and in greater quantities than before, but I could be doing even better without those fucking bombers shitting all over me every day." - some nazi factory manager prick, probably

Don´t get me wrong. The strategic bombing campaign was kind of a shit show. It could have been carried out way better. But I think getting tons of bombs dropped on the nazis is likely to worry them a fair bit more than not bombing them at all.

>>34634178
The industry was powered by coal, which meant that bombing oil targets wouldn't effect industrial production directly. You're trying to compare two different things. The oil campaign was designed to impede German transportation and operational capacity. It doesn't matter if the factories could shit out a thousand trucks a day if you only have the fuel to get them ten miles down the road. You're also limiting Allied strategic bombing to their effects on industrial production, when the Combined Bomber Offensive had six other objectives.

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>>34634341
Except that the strategic bombing campaign more often than not just flattened cities and killed countless civilians with the epic meme justification "muh morale". Most of the damage on factories was done with comparatively tactical raids while that what most people think of with "strategic" just said "hey lets depopulate this area for no reason".

>>34632916
If you talk about against insurgency and their logistics strategies.
It is impossible to eliminate their entire supply chain, because ISIS and other shewed Terrorist Organization; are that smart to cover their supplies and other assets

Other against national countries then yes.
Take World war 2 for example.
Almost (if memory serves me correct) that 80% of German's industries were bombed out the heck out.
Knowing that without proactive war-industries, their army is surely going to reduce it's effectiveness.

>>34634328
You have actual Nazi officials saying it was effective, but why should we to listen to Adolph Galland, Hermann Goring, Albert Speer, and Erhard Milch?

>>34634447

I'm more willing to believe the published and professorship'd Historian has a greater grasp on the primary sources than someone on fucking 4chan

>>34632916
ISIS's bomb factories are in Pakistan

>>34634328
The funny thing about history is that it's at the mercy of interpretation. Overy could look, as he has, at raw production figures and say "Strategic bombing was worthless". At the same time, somebody else looks at the information and says "Only 10% of those were usable because of fuel shortage, strategic bombing must be effective".

Here's a few quotes direct from the strategic bombing survey that help explain this stance.

"German fighter production continued to increase during the summer of 1944, and acceptances reached a peak of 3,375 in September. Although it has studied the problem with considerable care, the Survey has no clear answer as to what happened to these planes; the differences of opinion between German air generals, it might be added, are at least as great as between those who have searched for the explanation. Certainly only a minority of the planes appeared in combat. Possibly the remainder were lost in transit from factory to combat bases, destroyed on the fields, or grounded because of a shortage of gasoline or pilots. Conceivably some are part of an inflation of German production figures. The answer is not clear."

"February and March of 1945 the Germans massed 1,200 tanks on the Baranov bridgehead at the Vistula to check the Russians. They were immobilized for lack of gasoline and overrun."

"These plants were producing an average of 316,000 tons per month when the attacks began. Their production fell to 107,000 tons in June and 17,000 tons in September. Output of aviation gasoline from synthetic plants dropped from 175,000 tons in April to 30,000 tons in July and 5,000 tons in September."

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Ok new mini-discussion: there are strategic bombing campaigns that work, and did not work. Assuming on what >>34634441 said, why did the German Blitz, against another national country (Britain), failed to succeed? What went wrong for the krauts? What went "right" for the Brits?

>>34634455
Yes, anon, Albert Speer is posting on /k/ right now.

>>34634455
Here's my primary source for you.

http://www.anesi.com/ussbs02.htm

Historians are secondary source material and are not as accurate, as what they produce and say is interpretation of primary sources.

>>34634481
The Germans did not capitalize on the strength of airpower, using tactical medium bombers on targets more for their moral effect then economic impact. An aerial mining campaign with these same medium bombers of important ports combined with the U-boat offensive in 1942/43 would have been significantly more effective than terror bombing Coventry.

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>>34634481
i like this pic

the life tramples the best attempts of americans to bring death to people

>>34634409
>Except that the strategic bombing campaign more often than not just flattened cities and killed countless civilians with the epic meme justification "muh morale". Most of the damage on factories was done with comparatively tactical raids while that what most people think of with "strategic" just said "hey lets depopulate this area for no reason".

Bombing German cities did have a logistical effect on their capabilities to prosecute war: cities are traffic nodes, and they provide labour for factories. By bombing them, you make transportation more difficult and kill factory workers.

I suppose they were bombed with the idea of forcing Germany to capitulate, but yeah, that was a moronic idea. Germans could not have voted to surrender if they had wanted to, since they lived in a fucking dictatorship.

Still, bombing cities just to kill civilians *could* have been a viable strategy, I guess. I don´t think anyone entertained the idea seriously, though.

>>34634528
that's probably a British man, anon..

>>34634517
That means its more because of the German method , not that they lacked the resources to do it. Aside from the fact that they still struggled to get a strat plane going (He 177, etc..).

Also according to what you said, does it mean morale damage < economic damage?

Does morale and the war economy have an inverse relation with each other? Does high morale = high productivity and vice-versa. And does economic damage means lowered morality or the other way around?

>>34632916
Because people set the bar for success way too high. When it comes to strategic bombing, it's always "lol didn't win the war so it was a failure," which is such a moronic thing to say but there you go.

>>34634545
>I don´t think anyone entertained the idea seriously, though.
Bomber Harris
Also look up the Firestorm of Hamburg, that was completely insane.

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>>34634545
>I don´t think anyone entertained the idea seriously, though.

>>34634528
That's a british milkman who even after britain was bombed by the Germans during ww2 kept delivering milk to houses on his route.

Cut the juvenile anti-American bullshit you child

>>34634528
Sorry anon. That's a Brit carrying milk in the morning. You probably got confused because I named my file randomly as "Krieg".

But you can still say the exact same thing, replacing the word "americans" with "Germans"

>>34634481
Britain had a well-organized radar and observation system coupled with efficient information dissemination. British aircraft production was well out of range for German aircraft. British air bases were using unpaved airstrips that allowed them to repair damage quickly to minimize loss of sortie rates. British pilots enjoyed the ability to bail out or land in friendly territory and ample fuel. German pilots were using relatively ineffective navigation. Flying with insufficient bomber escorts protecting bombers that weren't ideal for the task. Limited fuel reserves once German fighters reached England. The Germans also had less than ideal navigation and their target allocation was poor. They never targeted the early warning radars, they couldn't effect aircraft production, couldn't break the RAF, and didn't concentrate on rail and shipping targets when they switched to London. When one side can achieve 90% interception rates and see enemy bombers forming up over France on their radars, the other side is going to need a lot of performance and numerical superiority. Unfortunately for the Germans they didn't have either.

>>34634581
I've read about the Nazi's having a problem with fuel shortages on planes once they reached England. Would having naval superiority in the English Channel as well as one or more aircraft carriers in service with the Kriegsmarine (through some freak reasons), would the situation have improved , or changed for the least?

>>34634581
this, plus the germans just underestimated the british in general. look at what happened with enigma.

>>34634581
they could have won the air war if they hadn't begun their russian ground campaign

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>>34632916
Came kinda close.

>Wartime Germany was a chemical empire built on coal, air, and water. These three basic raw materials formed the foundation of a chemical process—often concentrated in one plant—that used gases derived from coal to produce not only liquid fuels, but 99 percent of Germany’s synthetic rubber and nearly all its synthetic methanol, synthetic ammonia, and nitric acid—raw materials used to make military explosives. This was the unseen bonus of the oil campaign: whenever American bombers knocked out two hydrogenation plants—the immense Leuna works, near Merseburg, and a much smaller plant at Ludwigshafen—Germany instantly lost 63 percent of its synthetic nitrogen, 40 percent of its synthetic methanol, and 65 percent of its synthetic rubber. The British and the Americans did not come to a full realization of the organic relationship between Germany’s synthetic oil and chemical plants until after the war, when their agents interrogated German ministers and businessmen. This is one of the most dismaying intelligence failures of the war, a failure that is all the more surprising because American oil companies helped build Germany’s embryonic synthetic oil industry in the late 1920s, when I. G. Farben opened its Leuna works, the first plant to test the Bergius process. Faulty intelligence resulted in the loss of planes and crews over crude oil refineries that were greatly less important than synthetic oil plants, with their facilities for producing chemical byproducts.

>>34634553
Well let's look at it this way. The SBS calls terror bombing a failure and that's largely true. Although quality of life was impacted for many, it didn't serve it's primary purpose of scaring people away from large cities or preventing the workforce going to work. With an effective shelter system, it just became a case of well shit just gotta wait for the raid to finish and then fill in the craters.

>>34634617
>Although Germany’s synthetic energy plants were scattered all over the Reich, a high percentage of petroleum production was concentrated in a small number of Bergius hydrogenation plants that were the sole source of Germany’s high-grade aviation gasoline and most of its motor fuel. Nearly one-third of Bergius production was concentrated in just two plants: Leuna and Politz, in Polish Silesia, and over a third more in five other plants. Earlier in the war, Speer had lived in mortal fear that the Allied air staffs would target Germany’s perilously grouped synthetic plants, which were too large and complex to be dispersed. When the plants were finally bombed, Hitler publicly rebuked I. B. Farben’s Karl Krauch, his chief minister of chemical planning, for organizing the industry as if to invite its own destruction from the sky. Yet it was Hitler who had encouraged the economic integration that made German synthetic production overwhelmingly efficient; and he had done nothing to discourage Hermann Göring’s misplaced confidence in the Luftwaffe’s ability to shield these plants from aerial annihilation.

>When the American attacks began, Speer feared that they were the opening salvos of a “long expected and long feared” single-industry offensive. Fortunately for Germany, they were not. On Sir Arthur Tedder’s orders, American bombers continued to drop most of their tonnage on targets other than oil. After the war, Speer told American interrogators that a full-out offensive against the synthetic plants by the combined air armadas of England and America—closely spaced raids, night and day, without cease—could [alone] have brought about Germany’s surrender... in eight weeks.”

>>34634545
> I don´t think anyone entertained the idea seriously, though.

You never looked up the night fire bombing of Tokyo? over 100k ded, anon

>>34634612
How historically correct was the "Imitation Game"? Did Turing really screwed the entire Abwehr over because of some German screw-ups or was it made up? or was it BASED on a true event that involved German screw-ups?

>>34634611
>naval superiority in the English Channel
m8 no one, not even the Brits, had naval superiority in a shallow channel with uncertain topography that's entirely in artillery range.

>>34633417
Honestly this>>34634219, though I feel sorry for the Vietnamese

>>34634481
There are many possible for German that failed to Blitz Britain.
- Use Submarine Warfare to prevent supplies from other allies, and to starve them out of submission.
- Luftwaffe are going on search and destroy tactics to wipe out Royal Air force.
- German's taught bombing Capital will surely surrender.
- Certainly Kriegsmarine don't have their own Landing Craft to transport Tanks and Infantry to Conquer southern part of Britain (That includes London).
- Knowing that British have reliable radar, making preemptive air-raids difficult.
- Even with Army and Air force of Germans (Specifically 1939), British Navy and Royal Air force will throw everything to repel Landing invasion.

As for the Britain's.
They needed to relocate their Royal Air force with Canadians.
Britain already knew that without their air force, German's achieve air supremacy uncontested.
Along with their sophisticated radar, their advanced warnings allow Brits to extra time to prepare before German air-raid commences.

>>34634611
It would have resulted in a large number of German navy vessels sunk.

>>34634616
Operation Barbarossa came after the Battle of Britain.

>>34634637
>How historically correct was the "Imitation Game"?
i've never seen it.

>Did Turing really screwed the entire Abwehr over because of some German screw-ups or was it made up?
it was absolutely real, but it's dumb to say that Turing did it by himself. the polish were the ones who originally figured out the weaknesses of engima, and originally set about with exploiting them. they just handed their information over to the british once they realized that they were done for in 1939.

>or was it BASED on a true event that involved German screw-ups?
almost all of it was german screw-ups. read some of this shit.

>The production of an early Enigma training manual containing an example of plaintext and its genuine ciphertext, together with the relevant message key. When Rejewski was given this in December 1932, it "made [his reconstruction of the Enigma machine] somewhat easier".[81]
>Repeatedly using the same stereotypical expressions in messages, an early example of what Bletchley Park would later term cribs. Rejewski wrote that "... we relied on the fact that the greater number of messages began with the letters ANX—German for "to", followed by X as a spacer".[88]
(this is now known as a "known plaintext attack", and is used very widely by cryptologists)
>The use of easily guessed keys such as AAA or BBB, or sequences that reflected the layout of the Enigma keyboard, such as "three [typing] keys that stand next to each other [o]r diagonally [from each other]..."[89] At Bletchley Park such occurrences were called cillies.[90][91] Cillies in the operation of the four-rotor Abwehr Enigma included four-letter names and German obscenities. Sometimes, with multi-part messages, the operator would not enter a key for a subsequent part of a message, merely leaving the rotors as they were at the end of the previous part, to become the message key for the next part.[92]

>>34634643
>>34634691

I mean like the RN has always been a pain in the ass for the Kriegsmarine, so does having naval superiority over the RN (through some weird reason) as well as having CV's in operation, would the Luftwaffe be able to bomb the British more frequently and successfully without their planes running out of fuel?

>>34634743
First they'd have to get those ships into position while under attack by the RN and RAF, then they'd have to keep them in position while under attack by the RAF. Even if Germany had finished both the Graf Zeppelin and Peter Sprasser, you're still only talking about a combined fighter complement of 84 planes that would have a primary job of protecting the carriers.

>>34632916
They worked pretty well back in 1990/91.

>>34634616
Soviet. Russia was a part of the USSR during WWII.

>>34634864

It was the Ground Invasion that pushed the Iraqis out of Kuwait, not the air campaign.

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>>34634869
The ease with which the ground forces advanced was, in large part, a result of the strategic bombing campaign.

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>>34633060
>>34633070
Had the Allies never engaged in area bombing the Germans would have just found something else to harp about. They were even saying the same shit about American artillery. It was "how a rich man fights war" because the Americans "would never send a soldier when they could send a shell". The 155mm was deemed a terror weapon at Aachen, after which Gerhard Wilck advocated for its banning.

Neither had fuck all to do w/ ethics or morality, it was a desperate search for anything by which to justify their previous actions. It was 1940's era whataboutism, that's all.

>>34634075

You're not getting it. Germany made 1200 ME262s but the largest number ever flown at one time was 37 BECAUSE THEY HAVE NO FUEL.

Tanks and planes were build and just left in the open. Pilots couldn't be trained because their planes didn't have fuel to fly. Even fighter wings couldn't got to the air to defend because of fuel rationing.

It didn't matter if Germany made 100,000 BF109s, FW190s or ME262, they only had fuel and pilots for ~100 for any mission. This was during the time when ~1200 bombers were flying over Germany with protection from ~800 fighters as well as ~500 doing CAS missions.

>>34635086
Don't forget how the 262's engine was rendered useless after 24 hours of continuous use and needed to be replaced, on top of being made of expensive materials

>killing people with bombs from above doesn't work
No, pussy restraint doesn't work.

>>34635086
>man sees jet aircraft for the first time
>shoots it down

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>>34635033
[germanic screeching]

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>>34632961
>le vietnam meme

Look up where the majority of bombs in vietnam were dropped

Also to answer OP, read pic related. The strategic bombing campaign absolutely fucked the Germans up and caused major headaches everywhere. It was a factor in the end of the war, and it had a greater effect on Japan who was ready to capitulate before the a-bombs were dropped.

The biggest mistake in the ETO was not bombing the shit out of the power infrastructure of Germany, which was a weak point that went unrecognized.

>>34635130
This still gets me, how a shotgun was/almost got banned from a war

>>34635086
>>34635104

some fun 262 related facts

In 1943 the US accidentally hit a factory that was being tooled up to make the 262. They had almost all the jigs done, and their destruction delayed production by 6 months.

The 262s engines required alloys the Germans simply couldn't produce in volume, partly due to the bombing campaign. This lead to numerous redesigns of the engines until they finally had something that worked, but it was shit alloys that had fuck all engine life.

>>34634075

Because shitty history channel programs ignore the important details.

German aircraft production increased because they pretty much stopped production of all multiengine types to focus on single engine fighters and the 262. These required far fewer man hours and raw material, which allowed them to increase output in terms of pure numbers.

>>34632916
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RceLAhPOS9Q

>>34635130
>>34635163

My history knowledge isn't great, so some backstory to this?

>>34635033
so germans using gass weapons and the allies losing their shit in WWI was just butblasted brits for not using it first?

and here is a decent page on quotes from Germans themselves on the effectiveness of the bombing campaign
http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/ww2/nazis/nazidbrf.htm

>>34635240

US troops show up in WW1. They have shotguns that are very effective at clearing Germans out of their trenches. Germans literally cry war crime weapon.

How much does it suck to lose your windscreen/canopy in a wwii-era fighter? Can you still fight as long as you've got goggles handy, or do you need to land right fucking now?

>>34635240

Germans said shotguns were too cruel for ww1. mustard gas and flame throwers arent though

>>34635304
Of course not. Those were clean, efficient German weapons.

>>34635313
*British and German and French and Russian and...
Nobody was clean in WW1

>>34635259
You'd need to fly at a lower altitude and slower. Barring further damage you could fly as long as the fuel would take you, but you wouldn't be super combat effective.

>>34632961
>Vietnam

“In Japan, we dropped 502,000 tons and we won the war. In Vietnam we dropped 6,162,000 tons of bombs and we lost the war. The difference was that McNamara chose the targets in Vietnam and I chose the targets in Japan.”

Curtis LeMay.

>>34635414
Well, LeMay chose the targets in N Korea too. By the end, B29s were dropping bomb loads on foot bridges over streams, because there were literally no other targets left- everything had been bombed flat.
People don't remember, but the way Germany or even Japan was bombed pales in comparison to Korea.

>>34633916
The German military ran on oil. Except their logistics, which ran on hay.

Are you now going to make an argument for coal powered PzKw IV's, and horsedrawn Panthers?

>>34632916
Who told you they don't work?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Pxk4zy_SQw

>>34634617
>>34634621
Where did you get this from? Source?

Trying to end a war by demoralizing the population doesnt work in dictatorships where public opinion doesnt matter. So it only makes sense if youre doing it in a democracy I guess

>people in this thread thinking that bombing in vietnam actually made any significant difference
why do you think gooks dig tunnels you dumb fucks

>>34635248
>>34635304
Pretty sure the shotgun thing is a myth

>>34632916
you don't need more bombs you need bigger bombs.

Because we fail to completely eradicate everything and then annex and occupy. We only go 90% then leave.

See N Korea

>>34635483
This is true. I live in the US and met some Germans(multiple people) who immigrated after WWII. The general populace was getting so much disinformation that they knew things were going poorly but the propaganda radio was still boasting of their glorious triumphs as Russians and UK/US troops were kicking in doors.

>>34635414
Stockdale says similar things. He claims that they were effectively demolishing Vietnamese infrastructure; bridges, fuel depots, ammo dumps, arms factories, railways, and runways, which was bringing the vietnamese war machine to its knees, but mcnamara stifled the operations, and let the vietnamese rebuild and continue the war.

>>34635510
>people in this thread thinking that bombing in vietnam actually made any significant difference
>why do you think gooks dig tunnels you dumb fucks

Good luck hiding literally all the military and civilian personnel and facilities of a country under the ground.

Tunnels had no impact at all on the air campaign over Vietnam.

>>34634569
Do it again Bomber Harris!

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>>34635481

>>34635483
Ehh, the last war ended with a coup against the leadership, made sense that it might happen again.

>>34635435
>LeMay chose the targets in N Korea too

And South Korea is still a country. Good for LeMay.

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>>34635701
T.Hanks

>>34632916
They did not work so well. They do now that you can do with one plane the work of hundreds of sorties.

>>34634484
>>34634447
Even if it was effective it doesn't necessarily mean it was the best use of limited resources.

>>34635840
Where would you have used them more effectively?

>>34635868
Development of a satellite based gay-ray would be pretty cool. Just blast your enemies with gaydiation.

>>34635868
Armored divisions and tac air for Germany.
Japan could be starved wit subs and air dropped mines.
All with Captain hindsight ofc.

>>34635510
That and didn't they have something like a civilian work force that could quickly repair roads and bridges in the matter of a few days?

>>34632916
Because the capacity of a populace to suffer against a foreign invader is consistently greater than policymakers anticipate.

>>34634658

> Luftwaffe are going on search and destroy tactics to wipe out Royal Air force.

Not possible with the tiny fuel tanks of the Bf-109. Fighter sweeps require sustained presence to be effective. Keep in mind this is the Emil version that didn't have the horsepower to heft two wing tanks without becoming sitting duck for the Spitfires.

>>34635304

I believe the objection was that Shotguns in Europe were primarily hunting weapons, and it was "ungentlemanly" to kill soldiers with weapons that were supposed to be for killing beasts.

>>34633575
You should probably try re reading that. He attributes victory in Italy due in large part to strategic bombing. He also notes how important it was to distract men from the front. That article doesn't say strategic bombing is a failure, it lists negatives and positives of it without coming to an overall conclusion. He also refers to US 8th army strategic bombing as "successful".

But hey, instead of reviewing your sources it's easier to ignore the facts and nitpick what you want

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>>34632930
Beautiful

>>34634409
>comparatively tactical raids

Learn the difference between tactical and strategic. FYI, all bombing missions over Germany were strategic. Number of planes involved makes no difference.

>>34636012
The German argument was that shotguns were weapons that caused unnecessary suffering and thus were against the Hague convention.

>>34634528
First shitpost? Screencap it, print it, frame it.

In 10 years you'll look at it and marvel at how young and ignorant you were.

>>34632916
Because bombers are vulnerable and you have to plan really well to justify high loss rates you will encounter, mostly because it takes a lot of time and money to train pilots and crewmen. Apparently there was going to be a mutiny during linebacker because the shootdowns of B-52s were cutting into the numbers of airmen and bombers that would be needed if a nuke war broke out.

>>34636220
Dude you make me wish I screencapped my first shitpost now. Pretty sure it was just calling someone on /b/ a faggot though.

>>34634481
"Keep calm and carry on" has never had quite as much meaning as it does in this picture.

>>34635773
you missed 13 states so how you gonna bring us to our knees with half step measures like that?

>>34633340
You cannot demoralize a populace by bombing.

Tell me, would you be more or less likely to want to fight the enemy if they began bombing your cities?

>>34632961
Are you fucking retarded?

2 weeks of Linebacker II did more damage to the capability of the North than 10 years of tactical bombing


USAAF strategic bombing was the deciding factor in both the European theater and the Pacific

I have no fucking clue how this meme of strategic bombing being "ineffective" came to be

usually people cite that production increased through 1944 in Germany as proof it didnt' work when the production was increasing because everything was getting blown up in the factories by the USAAF so they had to constantly replace it

And if you look at 1944 on, production falls off a cliff because strategic bombing could increase due to improvements in fighter coverage and the demise of the Luftwaffe

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>>34632916
Albert Speer attributed the destruction of German industry and specifically oil production to RAF night raids.

He said the allied weapon they most wanted to counter was the Lancaster.

Strategic bombing does work, but people who say it doesn't are routinely looking for results in the wrong place.

>>34635932
>Japan could be starved wit subs and air dropped mines.

This is pretty much what was happening at the end of the war

>>34635481
>>34635701
Same book the upcoming HBO Band of Brothers/Pacific miniseries is based on.

>>34635528
They sent a message to the US secretary of state, it'll be recorded.

"The German Government protests against the use of shotguns by the American Army and calls attention to the fact that according to the laws of war, every prisoner found to have in his possession such guns or ammunition belonging thereto forfeits his life. This protest is based upon article 23(e) of the Hague convention respecting the laws and customs of war on land. Reply by cable is required before October 1, 1918"

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>>34635130
>>34635163
>>34635248
>>34635304
There's no way the Germans actually thought the shotgun is somehow a step over the line. Protesting the use of shotguns was a simple propaganda stunt to make the other side look bad. You can tell by a) the Germans never acted on their threat to kill any Entente prisoner found with a shotgun and b) their protest 100% mirrors earlier Entente complaints about the shape of German bayonets, which is probably what gave the Germans the idea in the first place.

>>34633041
Then you bomb wherever those weapons are being dropped off. Traders can't trade without a market.

>>34635247
Good to see that 1940s whataboutism is still alive and well.

>>34635388
The joke
Your head

>>34637490
I'm sorry, I've seen too many people decry Germany as the evil end of all that is decent forever out on this site.

>>34635932
>Armored divisions and tac air for Germany.
WF was already saturated with armored divisions. The allies sent the max they could support with their logistics.

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>>34635220

>Richard Overy
>Shitty history channel program

I dnno, does murdering civilians not win a war??

>>34638743
Hasn't worked in Iraq or Afghanistan for the Americans

>>34638758
Only works when you are "liberating" cucks like Belgium/France/Netherlands who's government will tell all the relatives of dead civilians to go to hell.

>>34632961
The only reason it didn't work was because the NVA was hiding out in """"neutral"""" laos/Cambodia.

>>34638864
They tried invading those countries and lost horribly
The war in vietnam was lost on the ground, offensive operations were disasters.

>>34635528
https://youtu.be/Z0D6p3w2qgY

Germans are so garbage holy goddamn. They'll invent new lows to stoop to, then whirl around and cry about everything.

>>34635033
Direct firing a 155mm howitzer into buildings does seem a bit overkill.

>>34640361
>Overkill
Underkill exists, overkill doesn't. If you want someone dead or a building gone, you might as well make sure it's done right.

>>34634864
>When engaged by coalition ground forces, the Tawakalna Mechanized Division of Iraq's Republican Guard still possessed 70% of its tanks and 60% of its infantry vehicles; likewise, the the Hammurabi Armored Division had more than 80% of its combat forces and the Medina Armored Division still fielded almost two complete armored brigades.244

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>>34640399
touche. not like they weren't given a chance to surrender first.

http://www.303rdbg.com/leaflet09.html

i wonder if saddam could save iraq after 11th september of 2001

>>34637478
Not an argument.

>>34640429
Strictly speaking that would be tactical bombing if the units in question were deployed.

>>34638686

It was Goering himself who said the allies were making a mistake in looking at absolute aircraft production figures since it ignores the fact that 4 109s could be made for every 177

>>34635437
Their mechanized divisions, including their supply lines, and the strategic lift in every army group that had around 5,000 trucks ran on fuel, but the rest of the army basically ran on hay.

>>34632916
Yes. If the US did more Carpet bombing of civilian locations on the nations we are at war with, there wouldn't be an insurgency.

>>34634623
I Saw Tokyo Burning by Robert Guillain is a good read.

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delet this

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>>34633417
>more one of not throwing enough lefties out of helicopters back home

>>34636910
SHINING
W
O
R
D

>>34640361
>OverKill
>OK
There you go anon.

>>34633384
What is operation Tidal Wave?

>>34632916
Call me edgy but they only work if you bomb population centers. Compare bombing Dresden to bombing the empty jungle known as a Ho Chi Minh trail.

>>34634658
Even if somehow the Luftwaffe gained temporary air superiority, forced a landing through the English channel that's covered in oil and on fire with river barges and not having their frenzied horses just fall off the barges they'd just get gassed on the beaches.
Honestly it makes me wish they'd tried.

>>34642866

Are you implying the bombing of Dresden had any effect on the ending of the war?

>not work
Yew fucking what?

>look up any promising German project
>85% didn't make it to '45, reason given being "factory bombed, all tooling and prototypes lost"
The fact they all but made the StG out of stamped tin fucking cans tells me it worked brilliantly. The manpower they wasted trying to harden infrastructure and make underground factories (e.g. mittelwerk) was a massive investment that took huge amounts of men and materiel away from the fight.
>B-but production increased under the bombings!
This is attributed in no small part to several simultaneous miracles of distributed manufacturing by Speer and company, had German infrastructure not been subjected to massive bombardment and loss of capacity on a daily basis it would have exploded exponentially. Thanks to the bombing, critical components such as ball bearings remained in short supply for the duration of the war.

I'll also remind you that the Japanese got it four times as bad and we're churning out sewer pipe rifles in literal sheds by the time the war ended.

>>34642895

>Gassed the beaches

Did the UK even have gas stockholds ready in 40 and 41?

>>34643585
They had mustard gas and phosgene gas.

>>34640473
Neither was the post I was responding to.

>>34643585
I wish Sealion had happened, solely due to all the lulzworthy shit the British forces and the Home Guard had ready. Between the gas stockpiles and willingness to literally bayonet charge onto the beaches and throw the Germans into the sea, it would have been a damned spectacle for sure. That, and the Home Guard was gonna make the IRA look like a fucking joke. Those crazy faggots put a magazine feed on a PIAT, and then strapped four of the fucking things to a mount and made it fully automatic. They also had flamethrowers out the arse and more Stens than shoes. It would have been the most savage insurgency of all time.

>>34643361
An anon in the last Weeping About Dresden thread we had quantified it. He calculated that if the bombing of Dresden shortened the war by 13 minutes, then it was justified.

>>34633060
>>34633070
reconstruction is a Mafia kind of deal

>>34636072
"If at first you don't succeed, call in an airstrike" - Unknown