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A key issue when assessing the World War II air campaign is the bombing of civilians. There can be little question that the NAZI bombing of civilians for the expressed purpose of inspiring terror is morally repugnant. The British air offensive against Germany, with impossible to target night-time raids, comes periously close to an equivalent strategy. The Americans in day-time raids accepted higher casualties in an effort to better target the bombing raids, but in terms of casualties killed civilians in air rades than the Germans and Brtish combined because of the size of the American air campaign. Here a variety of questions rise. Does a country which is attacked and subjected to terror bombing have a right to strike back at the aggressor's civilians. Are their limits on the dimensions of the counterstrikes. And even more basic question is, if a civilian population is committed to an aggresive country's war which include war crimes and even genocide, is that civilian population still morally protected from air strikes. Is the prohibition on civilians changed when the country uses children to man anti-aircraft guns around war plants, inducts children and old men into the army, and uses children to carry out war crimes? What about a country which has used bombers to launch chemical or biological weapons aginst your civilians? Another question is whether the moral issues are relaxed if civilian casualties will result in a faster conclusion of the war and the overall reduction in casualties? Would it have been more moral to refrain from stretegic bombing even though the War would have lasted longer and more soldiers and civilians would have been killed? Here we are unsure just how to make the calculation. Does the level of evil of an agressor nation permit higher levels of violence against it civilians? Does a lower net loss of life permit the bombing of civilians?
None of the questions posed here permit easy answers, but must be considered in any assessment of the morality of the air camapaign. HBC does not, for the most part, seek here to provide a definitive answer to the issues posed concerning the strategic bombing campaign. We do seek to bring out the major issues and to show the complexity of those issues which defy easy answers. We encourage HBC readers to submit their insights and opinions.
Several of the major combatant countries conducted air operations that included attacks on cities. There were major differences involved in the capabilities, targets, and results of these operations.
There can be little question that the NAZI bombing of civilians for the expressed purpose of inspiring terror is morally repugnant.
The British air offensive against Germany, with impossible to target night-time raids, comes periously close to an equivalent strategy.
The Americans in day-time raids accepted higher casualties in an effort to better target the bombing raids, but in terms of casualties killed civilians in air rades than the Germans and Brtish combined because of the size of the American air campaign.
A variety of questions rise concerning the air campaigns conducted during World War II. The moral issues concerning World War II have since the War been aggressed at great length. At first it was the barvaric artocities of the Axis. Then as meories of how the threat to Western Civiization faded, the actiins of the Allies have been questioned. And in more recent years the very values oif Western Civilization have even been questioned. While the literarure on morality is extensive, it has primarily been conducted by those wiuth socialist and pacifist orientations which has meant that the debate hasbeen one sided. And to a large part the debate has been around the iudea tha=t war itself is evil. Now there is no doubt that war is terrible, but evil is a very different matter. If you posit as a fact that war is evil, then there is no doubt that the strategic bombing campaign and other Allied actions were evil. Msny wars certainly can be classifiued as evil. But not war itself. Americans can only turn to the Civil War which emancipated the slaves as a war that was not evil. And if there is one war in all of human history that was not evil, it was World War II. Much of the argument we see about World War II is an argument about the brutality if war. But no onedisagrees here here. War regardless of the outcome is a human tragedy, brutal and tragic. People are harmed and killed. But a coindemnation of war in geberal can not not legitimately be used to condemn the Allied war effort.
Does a country which is attacked and subjected to terror bombing have a right to strike back at the aggressor's civilians. A European reader writes, "No, unless there is fullproof evidence that the entire nation shares at 100 percent the policies followed
by it's government. This case will be quite uncommon as the terror bombing politic is not the decision of a democratic nation. And even then the counter terror bombing will kill children that obviously did not contribute in the choice of government." HBC has some difficulties with this assessment. We believe that the 100 percent criterion is not a reasonable guideline, but at what level of support we place the guideline could be debated endlessly. The question of democratic goverment is an interesting one. While we are in agreement that democratic governments are less likely than totalitarian governments toi go to war, here this is not an imutable rule. There was considerable support in France for war with Germany in the years leading up to World War I. Of course in world War II there was considerable reluctance among democratic countries to go to war. This reluctance in large measure explaind the defeat of France and thge reverses suffered by Britain and America iun the eary years of the War. There was also considerble relucrance by the Allies to bomb civilians in the early yeas of te War. This attitude changed as the War progressed. The British strategic bombing campaign against Germany was largely and assault on the civilian populations of cities. The bombing campaigns were very popular among both British amnd American populations. This was also the case among the civilian populations of the occupied countries, unless their communities were hit by the bombs. The American air campaign against Japan also became largely a campaign taretting whole cities through fire bombing attacks casing fire storms in Japanese cities. This campaign was widely aplauded by American civilians, although the nature of the campaign was not stressed in the American media. Concerning the atomic-bomb, if President Truman had not used the bomb and massive casualties had ocucurred in an invasion of the Home Islands, almost certainly the American people would have demanded his impeachment.
Are their limits on the dimensions of the counter strikes. A Europen reader writes, "As discussed above, there are either no limits whatsoever, or the limits defined by a complex mix of: a) importance of actual losses occured in both terms of human life and infrastructure; b) History, culture, religion; c) Opinion of the surrounding nations; d) Willingness to preserve some space for rebuilding future relations. The solution is undoubtedly the 'surgical' bombing aimed at destroying the government and the
infrastructure not directly linked to the civil population." HBC notes that the concept of "surgical" strikes is more appropriate to present day discussions and not really aplicable to World War II bombing technology. In strategic terms, however, many believe that the War may have been shortend had the British and Americans targeted the fuel production centers at an earlier stageof the War rather than targeting manufacturing centers.
An even more basic question is, if a civilian population is committed to an aggresive country's war which include war crimes and even genocide, is that civilian population still morally protected from air strikes. Here a complicating issue is that wars my be started by totalitarian regimes which use their contol of the media to mold domestic civilian opinion. A European reader writes, "War is already crime, war crime is double crime and genocide is not human. Revenge is, however, human provided it remains in human limits. If the civilian population did approve or even encourage genocide, it cannot expect any moral protection against counterstrikes."
No one suffered more from World War II than children. Much of the reason for this was German genocidal policies in occupied countries, especially in the East. Children also sufferd in the stratgic bombing campaign. No one inolved their childrn more in the War than the NAZIs. Thisraises the question, is the moral prohibition on bombing civilians changed when the country uses children to further the War effort. Here there are differnt levels od envolvement. The Japanese marched whole school classess into war plants to produce a materials. The NAZIs used children more directly in the War effort to man anti-aircraft guns around war plants. The NAZIs also inducted children and old men into the army and used them to procecute the War. There are also incidents of children being used to carry out war crimes--although the incidents we are aware of were conducted under adult supervision. Here we have to operate under the assumtion that children because of their age have diminished responsibility for their actions. To the soldiers and civilians affected by their actions, however, such destinctions may be difficult to accept.
Numbers are a factor thas have to be considered in asessing the strategic bombing campaign. There is a common argument to codemnn tha Allies for strategic bombing because so many more Germns and Japanese died from bombing than Allied civilians. Some claim thast the Allies in their Strategic Bombing Campsigm used undo, excessive force. We are setting aside here the German and Japanese being the first countries to bomb cities. We address that issue separately. Here we consider only the numbers. There are severaln issues to consider involving mumbers.
First, it is true that it was the Anglo-Amrricans that eventually bombed with the greatest intensity. It was late in war, but the Allies dropped more bombs and more tonnage than the Axis powers. And the Allies did nore danage and killed more peoole than the Germans and Japanese.
Second the nunber od German and Japanese cviliasns killed is far less than commonly believed as a result of bery effctive German air defences abd civil defense and the fact that sigbifucant bmbing of Japan did not begin until very late in ge War (March 1945). We estimate some 0.5 million Germans and less than 1.0 million Japanese.
Third, while Allied bombing killed more civilans than Axis bombing, bombing is a very expensive and very inefficent way of killing peoole. The numbers killed are barely more than foot notes comapred to the huge mumbers of people killed by the Axis powers in a wide tange of killing operations. The Gernmans killed some 25-30 million Sovioet civilans, mostly civilans. And that wasjust one country. Deaths in Poland were 25 percent of the popuation. Bombing deaths in Germany and Jaspan weere only about 0.6 percent of the German populatuiin and 1.3 percent of the Jpanese population. Th numbers are not inconsiderbke, but a giny fraction of the number of peoople the Axis countries were killing.
Fourth, we have to also calculte not only the 10s of millions of people the Axis powers actully killed during the War and the even larger numbers thst they they plasnned to kill once they won the war. Here it is imprtant to look at Germn Generalplan Ost.
Fourth, last an most imoprtantly, and the question the critics refuse to answer is how could the Axis murder operations have bebn stopped wuth less loss of life.
Weapons of mass destruction raise a variety of other issues. Gas and chemical weapons wre used before and during the War, primarily by Italy and Japan. What about a country which has used bombers to launch chemical or biological weapons aginst your civilians? The United States developed and used the atomic bomb. This has been the weapon of mass destruction most widely discussed. Japanese assessments of World War II often focus on the dropping of the two atomic bombs.
Another question is whether the moral issues are relaxed if civilian casualties will result in a faster conclusion of the war and the overall reduction in casualties? Would it have been more moral to refrain from stretegic bombing even though the War would have lasted longer and more soldiers and civilians would have been killed? Here we are unsure just how to make the calculation. Does a lower net loss of life permit the bombing of civilians? A European reader writes, "Definitely yes, the moral issue is relaxed if you kill hundred to save thousand. But is it humanly possible to limit the deads to the forecasted hundred and to be absolutely sure you will save these thousand? Only God and the future have this reply."
Does the level of evil of an agressor nation permit higher levels of violence against it civilians? Does the fact that aggressor nation has as a war goal the murder and enslavemnent of civilians by the tens of millions and that was only in Europe. We all know about the Holocaust. Less well known is that the murder of 6 million Jews was just a dry run for the slaughter of Slavs and other ethnic groups in Eastern Europe -- Generalplan Ost. Given the NAZI escalation of mass murder asa primary war goal, does that not justify the Allies using all force at gheir disposal. In fact would history no comndemn them on moral grounds alone for not destroyongb the NAZIs when they had the military force to do so.
World War II was fought by civilian soldiers. Thisraises the question, Does a Government not have the responsibility to support it soldiuers with the full use of both its military and indusrial capacity? It is really moral to send one's civilians into battle and face many if the best weaponry of the War and make no effort to reduce German production of the War? Now this is not an easy issue. Obviously the same argument could be used by the NAZIs to justify their terror bombing camoaign. There are, however, differences. First iof all it was the NAZIs (and Soviets) who launched the War and were the aggressor country. Second, stratehioc bombing is not the only way of killing people. The Germans pursued mass murder to eliminate or reduce the population of groups identigied as racial enemeies (Jews, Slavs, and others). The argument can be made that the level of fiorce in defending one's country and people is legitimately much higher than that of an aggessor nation seeking to commit mass murder. It needs to be noted that stratehic bombing was not the major killer of the war. The major cause of death was the murder of civilians by organized German and Japanese military and para-military forces.
Anthropolgists have developed the Killer Ape Theory postulating that war and interpersonal aggression was the driving force behind human evolution. It was first stated by Raymond Dart (1950s) and further developed by Robert Ardrey. [Ardrey] Now we do not fully endorse the Killer Ape Theory, but is undeniable that humans are capable of incredible violence. Any study of history can not fail to confirm this. Information on prehistoric times is lacking, but we suspect that the small number of humans limited contact and thus war. We do observe war and violence among primitive people which survived into the modern age such as the head hunters of New Guinea. But from the dawn of civilization and the development of art illustrating human gehavior and writing, we observe war and violence. We do think that war has been a major factor in driving technological change. But another major historical trend associated with civilization is the develooment of law which in large part was aimed at limiting violence. Some socities such as the pre-Columbian civilizations of Meso-America institutionalized violence and endemic wardare along with mass murder. Others have sought to limit it. The Crusades were organized by the papacy seeking to limit warfare between feuding Eurooean nobels and monarchs. The 20th century reversed the steady advancement of law in Western civilization and limits on violence. The 20th century with the rise of totalitarian powers became the most violent century in human history. The iotalitarians (Soviets and Axis) essentially unleashed the genie of hate and violence latent in the human character. This resulted in mass killing around the world, and body counts in the tens of millions. Now one issue that has has to be asked. It is reasinable that a country attacked and sunjected to terrible violence to place Christian morality and benevolence at ghe top of its natioinal priorities. Rightly or wrongly theuy are going to strike back and sometimes with actions that can be morally questioned. The commonly unasked questiion is who is resoonsibe, the ciountry defending itself or the country that unleashed the genie of violence and hatred? President Lincoln appeaked to 'the better angels of our nature'. [Lincoln] This is something that leaders can not always control and mnany do not seek to do so.
Ardrey, Robert. African Genesis (1961).
Lincoln, Abraham. First Innagural. (March 4, 1861).
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