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The aerial bombing of cities became a common tactic in World War II . ITALIAN-TURKISH WAR OF 1911-1912 The very first aerial act of aggression occurred during the Italian-Turkish War Of 1911-1912 in North Africa. Italy had been using aircraft to monitor enemy troop movements and search for Turkish artillery positions. One Italian pilot, a Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti, realized that the airplane could be used for more than simple reconnaissance. The event occurred over a Turkish camp at Ain Zara in Libya on 1 November 1911. Lt. Gavotti was flying his Taube monoplane at an altitude of 600 ft (185 m) when he took four small 4.5 lb (2 kg) grenades from a leather pouch, screwed in the detonators he had carried aboard in his pocket, and threw each bomb over the side by hand. Although no one was injured and little damage was done, Lt. Gavotti earned his place in history for conducting the first aerial bombing raid ever recorded. BALKAN WARS The second ever aerial bombardment was on October 16, 1912 by a Bulgarian military airplane during the Balkan Wars . The airplane was German built Albatros F-2. The pilot Radul Milkov and an observer named Prodan Tarakchiev flew on a reconnaissance mission over the Turkish army’s positions in Edirne . During the flight, the pilot and observer dropped bombs placed in specially designed compartments outside the airplane. The bombs were dropped over a Turkish military base. WORLD WAR I The first ever aerial bombardment of civilians was on January 19 , 1915, in which two German Zeppelin s dropped 24 fifty-kilogram high-explosive bombs and ineffective three-kilogram incendiaries on the English towns of Great Yarmouth , Sheringham , Kings Lynn , and the surrounding villages. In all, four people were killed, sixteen injured, and monetary damage was estimated at £7,740, although the public and media reaction were out of proportion to the death toll. London was accidentally bombed in May, and, in July 1916, the Kaiser allowed directed raids against urban centres. There were 23 airship raids in 1916 in which 125 tons of ordnance were dropped, killing 293 people and injuring 691. Gradually British air defences improved. In 1917 and 1918 there were only eleven Zeppelin raids against England, and the final raid occurred on August 5 1918 , which resulted in the death of KK Peter Strasser , commander of the German Naval Airship Department. By the end of the war, 51 raids had been undertaken, in which 5,806 bombs were dropped, killing 557 people and injuring 1,358. It has been argued that the raids were effective far beyond material damage in diverting and hampering wartime production, and diverting twelve squadrons and over 10,000 men to air defences. INTER WAR YEARS (1919–1938) On April 26 , 1937 , the German '' Luftwaffe '' ( Condor Legion ) bombed the Spanish city of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War . The Germans were attacking to support the efforts of Francisco Franco to overturn the Spanish Republican government. This act caused world-wide revulsion and was the subject of A Famous Painting by Picasso , but was only a taste of things to come. However, it remains significant as it was the first-ever saturation bombing of a civilian population. WORLD WAR II For detailed articles see Aerial Bombing During World War II and Strategic Bombing During World War II During the World War II , the bombing of cities became a normal practice of the German Luftwaffe . It usually had little military purpose and was used mainly as a form of psychological warfare, in order to weaken Morale of civilians. In the first stage of war, the Germans carried out bombing of most towns and cities in Poland ( 1939 ), the first of the destroyed cities being Wieluń . Later the tactics was used against Rotterdam in the Netherlands in 1940 . The Luftwaffe also carried out intensive bombing of cities in Britain, including London and Coventry , in a bombing campaign known in Britain as " The Blitz ", from September 1940 through to May 1941 . In response, the British started night air raids on Berlin and other cities. In 1943, Hamburg was heavily damaged by firebombing known as Operation Gomorrah . In the final stage of the war, the United Kingdom and the United States used Fire-bomb Attacks on Dresden during February 13 -15, 1945 , creating a Firestorm which together with the bombing itself killed 25,000–35,000 citizens (although Nazi propaganda figures at the time, and sometimes still quoted as correct, were as high as 250,000). The U.S. Bombing Of Tokyo In World War II killed 83,000 persons, the Bombing Of Kobe killed another 8,800 and the Nuclear Weapon attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed 70,000 and 36,000 respectively. Aerial bombing had the practical effect of equating the citizens of a country with those who made the decision to take that country to war. However, it is clear that not all citizens of Germany were Nazis ; in fact there was an active German resistance which, with the help of the Abwehr , Germany's intelligence organization, carried out several attempts on Hitler 's life. Similarly in Japan, although allegiance to the emperor was strong, even within the ranks of the military there were many who strongly objected to an Attack On Pearl Harbor and to war with America in general. The widespread use of the tactic of bombing civilian populations in World War II is a major reason that historians consider it a Total War . IS AERIAL BOMBARDMENT STATE TERRORISM? Some argue that these acts qualify as State Terrorism . Others state that there were valid military reasons for the attacks on these particular locations. For example, Nagasaki had major naval shipyard facilities and Hiroshima had bases where tens of thousands of Japanese soldiers were quartered. Some say that there is evidence that the United States attempted to warn the civilian populations of Nagasaki And Hiroshima to evacuate the target areas, but this claim is disputed. However as it was assault by aerial bombardment on defended enemy territory, no warning needed to be given under the laws of war at that time (see lower down in this section for more details). The minutes of the meetings of the Target Committee responsible for proposing locations for the are available. According to these minutes, it was agreed "that psychological factors in the target selection were of great importance." Later, the decision was made : (2) To neglect location of industrial areas as pin point target, since on these three targets Nagasaki, and Kyoto such areas are small, spread on fringes of cities, and quite dispersed. : (3) to endeavor to place first gadget in center of selected city; that is, not to allow for later 1 or 2 gadgets for complete destruction. Both of these quotes were taken from ''The Decision to use the Atomic Bomb'' by Gar Alperovitz, 1995. These statements are of course open to varying interpretations, but they call into question the notion that the target was chosen purely for its military significance. During World War II the British approved city busting at the highest level. Professor Lindemann was liked and trusted by Winston Churchill . Churchill appointed him the British governments leading scientific adviser with a seat in the Cabinet. In 1942 Lindemann presented a seminal paper to the Cabinet advocating the aerial bombing of German cities by carpet bombing in a Strategic Bombing campaign. It was accepted by the Cabinet and Arthur Harris was appointed to carry out the task. It became an important part of the Total War waged against Germany. Professor Lindemann's paper put forward the theory of attacking major industrial centrers in order to deliberately destroy as many homes and houses as possible. Working class homes were to be targeted because they had a higher density and fire storms were more likely. This would displace the German workforce and reduce their ability to work. His calculations showed that the RAF Bomber Command would be able to destroy the majority of German houses located in cities quite quickly. The plan was highly controversial even before it started, but the Cabinet thought that bombing was the only option available to directly attack Germany, (as a major invasion of the continent was years away,) and the Soviets were demanding that the Western Allies do something to relieve the pressure on the Eastern Front . The legal defence for this action can be found in the "Laws and Customs of War on Land "( Hague IV ); October 18 , 1907
It can be argued that (1) allied strategic bombing was a bombardment of ''defended'' towns because of immense German air defences, (2) as an ''aerial'' assault no warning was required, and (3) that ''All necessary steps as far as possible'' were taken. There were a number of legal arguments against this view, not the least of which is that in 1907 aerial bombardment of cities had not yet been conceived as a concept of war. However, unlike the proscription against waging "unrestricted submarine warfare," for which Karl Dönitz was tried and convicted at Nuremburg but for which, for example, the commanders of the US Pacific submarine campaign were not prosecuted (which is often cited as a case of Victors Justice ), because none of the Axis leaders tried for war crimes were charged with "participating in the decisions on, or execution of aerial bombardment on enemy territory," it is not possible to state categorically that aerial bombardment of cities during World War II was or was not a War Crime or Crime Against Humanity . THE COLD WAR During the Cold War , the threat of destruction of cities by Nuclear Weapon s carried on bombers or ICBM s became the main instrument of the Balance Of Terror that allegedly kept the United States and Soviet Union from open warfare with one another. See Mutual Assured Destruction . AERIAL BOMBING SINCE WORLD WAR II During the Vietnam War the United States from 1965 to 1968 conducted an aerial campaign known as Operation Rolling Thunder . The campaign began with interdiction of supply lines in rural areas of southern North Vietnam but incrementally spread northward throughout the country. On June 29 , 1966 restrictions against bombing the capital city of Hanoi and the country's largest port, Haiphong were lifted, and they were bombed by the United States Air Force and Navy The bombing of their city centres continued to be prohibited by "circles of restriction around Hanoi and Haiphong"[http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/frus/johnsonlb/v/13154.htm . The United States has bombed city areas during a number of military operations, including Tripoli ( 1986 ), Belgrade ( Kosovo War 1999 ) and Baghdad ( 1991 and 2003 ). These attacks were made using Precision-guided Munition s (or "smart bombs") and Cruise Missile s. Following the September 11, 2001 Attack the United States attacked the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, bombing urban areas, military bases and mountainous regions, with some estimates of deaths amounting to 5000. During the US-led Invasion Of Iraq and the US-led Occupation Of Iraq , targets in many Iraqi urban areas were bombed by the U.S. and the Royal Air Force . During the invasion the US and Britain's stated objectives were Iraqi Military and Government targets and the Iraqi head-of-state, Saddam Hussein . During the post-invasion conflict their stated objective was to target Terrorists / the Iraqi Insurgency entrenched in cities as a part of urban warfare. Some sources claim that over 10,000 Civilian s have been killed as a result of this bombing. In all of these instances the United States government maintained that it has a policy of striking only militarily-significant targets while doing all possible to avoid what it terms " Collateral Damage " to non-military areas and persons. The September 11, 2001 Attack , which killed 3000 people, mostly Civilian s, can also be viewed as a form of kamikaze aerial bombing of New York by Al-Qaeda . ::''See Strategic Bombing for a more thorough treatment of this subject.'' SEE ALSO NOTES See |
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