Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!apple!veritas!amdcad!amdcad!military
From: d0mof@dtek.chalmers.se (Marcus Gustavsson)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: WWII city bombings
Message-ID: <1991May7.062639.13112@amd.com>
Date: 4 May 91 04:37:49 GMT
References: <1991May1.030243.19860@amd.com> <1991May2.040234.20284@amd.com>
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Followup-To: soc.history
Organization: Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden.
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From: d0mof@dtek.chalmers.se (Marcus Gustavsson)


[1. 28 lines quoting the entire previous article deleted.
 2. Don't start paragraphs with From!
 3. Followups to soc.history; this one slips through because
    there is some technical info not yet mentioned.
 --CDR ]

[F]rom what I remember everyone bought the then science fiction ideas about
air war. Every nation put their money into strategic bombers, because the
airforce of the different nations used that type of bombing, as a mean to
justify their own existence as a separate body of arms. I think that the
airforces of the world could pull this off, because of the behaviour of
the British people that got targeted by Zeppelines during WWI. I remember
having read J.C Fuller (name?) and an Italian author (I could check his name),
that wrote one or two books about the devastating effects of strategic
bombing. The idea they had was mainly that, the future war i.e 1935+ would
be won by the side that first could drop bombs on the enemy. They thought
it would be enough with some 200 tons for to ensure victory.
There was even a military doctrine that simply said "The bombers will
always get through." When the allies started their, until mid-1944 tactical
defeat, offensive, they quickly changed that into "Some bombers will make
it back." Note that I don't think that some public pressure is the right
word to use, on why the RAF started to invest in defence. Given the above
doctrine, it is more likely that the only reason that the RAF invested in it,
was because Churchill and some other politicians pushed quite much for it.

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