Sir Arthur "Bomber" Harris

[Slater]

http://www.ospreypublishing.com/content2.php/cid=66

 

The above is an Osprey write-up on this individual. Would a comparison with with USAAF's General LeMay be a fair one?

[KingSargent]

http://www.ospreypublishing.com/content2.php/cid=66

 

The above is an Osprey write-up on this individual. Would a comparison with with USAAF's General LeMay be a fair one?

No. LeMay was competent.

[Guest aevans]

No. LeMay was competent.

 

I was about to say...

 

Harris, when his tools couldn't be made to work as intended, kept looking for ways to make the tools work as originally intended. LeMay, when confronted with the same problem, abandoned original intentions and used his tools to do what could be done with them.

[rmgill]

I was about to say...

 

Harris, when his tools couldn't be made to work as intended, kept looking for ways to make the tools work as originally intended. LeMay, when confronted with the same problem, abandoned original intentions and used his tools to do what could be done with them.

 

Forgive my possible ignorance but was sticking to daylight bombing missions was abandoning original intentions? Seems to me the British figured out that daylight raids were going to be casualty intensive, then moved to nighttime raids with different tactics. More harassment than anything but still. The british also designed bigger bombs for special targets and special bombs for special targets. The US method just kept concentrating on bigger bombers with more guns, and for a time wanted the fighters to Not sweep ahead but to try and defend the bombers. Didn't the fighter sweeps have a better longer term effect?

[PONGO_7409]

Albert Speer, tasked with producing Hitler's war tools, thought Bomber Harris was extremely effective.

 

Imperfect ? Why yes. But during those long dark years when it was imperative to hit back at Germany, to keep Russia in the war, to give British civilians some good news stories to sustain them, Harris' command was really the only practical means of doing so.

 

He scared the hell out of the German High Command.

Edited July 13, 2007 by PONGO_7409

[Guest aevans]

Forgive my possible ignorance but was sticking to daylight bombing missions was abandoning original intentions? Seems to me the British figured out that daylight raids were going to be casualty intensive, then moved to nighttime raids with different tactics. More harassment than anything but still. The british also designed bigger bombs for special targets and special bombs for special targets. The US method just kept concentrating on bigger bombers with more guns, and for a time wanted the fighters to Not sweep ahead but to try and defend the bombers. Didn't the fighter sweeps have a better longer term effect?

 

US objective and tactics changed over time. It's arguable that the British were still trying to knock the Germans out of the war with terror bombing (which was an inherritance from pre-war theories). These are obviously generalizations, as there were attempts by the US to salvage precision bombing and attempts by the British to target industrial chokepoints. But as generalizations they would, IMO, stand up pretty well.

 

Fighters defending the bombers were in fact pretty effective in fighting the Luftwaffe once the fighters could escort all the way to the deep targets. It was an almost textbook combined arms attack. The Germans had to come up and try to get at the bombers, else acquiesce to the relatively uncontested bombing of the target(s). (Flak was a problem, but in most cases a relative nuisance compared to fighters.) But if the fighters came up to attack the bombers, they had to contend with escorting fighters as well, oftentimes in greater numbers than the Germans could muster at any one point. Battles like these over the winter of 1943-44 are what made it possible for the bomber to become really effective in the last year of the war.

Edited July 13, 2007 by aevans

[Briganza]

I have also had the feeling it was as much to do with the RAF needing to have an offensive victory so that they could stand beside the RN and army.

[KingSargent]

I have also had the feeling it was as much to do with the RAF needing to have an offensive victory so that they could stand beside the RN and army.

No, it was more like the RAF, specifically Bomber Command, had sold the British politicians a Douhetian con-job, and had to at least PRETEND they were making good on their pre-war promises.

[Old Tanker]

The Brits basically shunned Bomber Harris after the war.

 

While LeMay became the most powerfull U.S. general of the '50s building a cult following.

He even was George Wallace's running mate in the '68 POTUS election.

[Cookie Monster]

When George Wallace asked him about the Roswell incident, it was said that LeMay angriliy told Mr. Wallace never to ask him that question again even if George Wallace became the President.

[Sardaukar]

There was this good story about AM "Bomber" Harris. He was driving his official car himself, coming from late nite meeting and was speeding along darkened streets of London. Young Bobby stopped him in crossroads and said: "Sir, if you continue driving like that, you are going to kill someone!"

Harris was silent for few moments and then said: " Son, I kill thousands every night..."

[vardulli]

There is an excellent book by Robin Neillands called 'The Bomber war'. There is an awful lot of food for thought in that book, and its far too easy to write off Bomber Commands offensive as a failure. I for one find it rather hard to seperate the AAC and BCs offensive. If the Americans bombed though cloud on Radar (as they often, though not exclusively, had to do) then its hard to conclude they were significantly more accurate than Bomber Command at night. And if the end results were similar, how can one conclude after the event the American offensive was more successful than the British one? Post 44, its not like RAF Bomber Command didnt bomb by day as well anyway.

 

Harris has too long been accused of being not being competent, particularly when Le may used similar tactics in Japan and is complimented on his ablities. I find it rather muddled reasoning. Both understood the quickest way of burning out the military capablity in a city was to burn out the city. The difference was that Le may had at his fingertips the ability to do it rather more easily than Harris, partly due to equipment, but largely due to the target. Its also interesting to note that postwar bombing strategy was much closer to the Harris/Lemay school than it was the Doolittle one.

 

Pinpoint bombing didnt work, 'Big Week' seems to support that.

 

 

I was just looking through that book as well (having read it a couple of years ago)

 

I didn't come to the conclusion that preceision bombing didn't work- its just that it could, in the right conditions and unfortunately in Europe those conditions were rarely right.

 

there was a difference in presentation which reflected perhaps the public's perception about what was morally acceptable

 

 

and that the early USAAF campaign in many ways mirrored that of the early RAF

 

Neillands states that if Harris has a case to answer it is only from Sept 1944, but that case is shared with others

[MiloMorai]

How can ppl claim precision bombing by the 8AF when, depending on the time period, formations were from 1500ft to 2500 ft across? This with a CEM of 1000ft plus.

[DougRichards]

Remember that early theories of terror bombing included dropping of poison gas on urban populations.

 

If only those pesky politicians hadn't signed things like Geneva Conventions then the Bomber Harrises of the world (of all sides) could have gotten on with real terror bombing, instead of having to wait for Little Boy and Fat Man in August 1945 to show how to do the job as intended.

[Ssnake]

If only those pesky politicians hadn't signed things like Geneva Conventions then the Bomber Harrises of the world (of all sides) could have gotten on with real terror bombing, instead of having to wait for Little Boy and Fat Man in August 1945 to show how to do the job as intended.

Would have worked both ways, and probably not in the favor of Britain.

[Sardaukar]

Well...smashing German transportation network did work.

Edited July 14, 2007 by Sardaukar

[KingSargent]

How can ppl claim precision bombing by the 8AF when, depending on the time period, formations were from 1500ft to 2500 ft across? This with a CEM of 1000ft plus.

Well, it's more precise than not being able to find the right country, and having a CEP of five miles plus.

[Gunguy]

All of this talk about how bad "Bomber Harris" was, is not realistic. He did a great job of not becoming ineffective by constantly changing the strategy. He pounded Germany as best he could with the technology of the day. He was killing the enemy when they had no way to do it other than with bombers.

[Sardaukar]

Well, it's more precise than not being able to find the right country, and having a CEP of five miles plus.

 

Well..during WWII Soviets accidentally bombed Stockholm....daytime...Feb 22, 1944...

 

And in Winter War....Soviet planes invade the Swedish air space and bomb a village of Pajala, in the Swedish soil. Soviet Union deny the accusation, saying that it's a lie and ill-disposed talk.

Edited July 14, 2007 by Sardaukar

[MiloMorai]

Well, it's more precise than not being able to find the right country, and having a CEP of five miles plus.

That was early war. A US BG web site I came across, had in late '44 the British bombing being more accurate than the American bombing.

[KingSargent]

That was early war. A US BG web site I came across, had in late '44 the British bombing being more accurate than the American bombing.

Yeah, because the British targets were whole cities, the US targets were buildings.

 

If one shooter scores 100% hits in the broad side of a barn and another shooter scores 50% hits in a knothole in the barn, who's the better shot?

[vardulli]

this might be of interest

 

http://www.447bg.com/library/survey.html

[Mote]

The British system was pragmatic. It wasnt exceptionally accurate. The point was that if you wrecked a city from end to end, by and large, you tended to destroy all the military production sites in it. It sure as hell seemed to work in Coventry.

 

Weren't the British hitting the parts of the cities that didn't possess much industry however?

[MiloMorai]

Yeah, because the British targets were whole cities, the US targets were buildings.

 

If one shooter scores 100% hits in the broad side of a barn and another shooter scores 50% hits in a knothole in the barn, who's the better shot?

 

Yes, tell us once more about the 'pickle barrell' accuracy.

 

Don't know much about British bombing, do you?

[swerve]

All this talk about US vs British bombing accuracy ignores Japan, where the USAF bombing policy was to lay waste residential areas with incendiaries.