The Awful Spectre of Victory

Once again, the memory of an appalling holocaust is perverted by an obscene and repugnant revisionism by the guilty perpetrators and self-serving interests groups, not the least of which are the snivellers in Masoch-Staat Deutschland.

Typical of the obscenity was BBC report on the 70th anniversary of the Dresden bombing which, under a cascade of crocodile-tears for the terrible destruction of a beautiful city, repeats the canard that only 25,000 people were killed in the raids.  Perpetrating that falsehood is the real purpose of all the tear-jerking and the falsehood is perpetuated in order minimize guilt and clear the way for enshrining that other “holocaust” as the solely important crime of the war.

Minimizing the casualties is only the piece de resistance of a polemic which begins with an attempt to justify the bombing as an of course regrettable military necessity.  It is alleged that Dresden was the site of industrial factories and rail-hub which were essential to the German war effort.

The claims are bullshit.  In modern warfare any factory has some potential military use.  On the outskirts of Dresden there existed a chemical plant as well as a lens-grinding and small ammunitions factory.  Dresden was also a rail hub for east-north railway traffic.  Given the all out rout that had become the Eastern Front in February 1945 the notion that any of these installations were of value to the German war effort is risible.  If anything, the railway junction would have been used for and by the millions fleeing westward from the murderous Soviet advance.

But let’s not nit-pick.  Let is be assumed that Dresden was the site of militarily useful installations, the indisputable fact is that the aim, thrust, and impact of the bombing was directed at the historic city centre — site of residences, churches, museums, concert halls, city and parks.  Look at the map, with open eyes.

There were no factories next the Frauenkirche.  And while precision bombing was always subject to error, an attack on the rail hub to the north-west of the city did not entail 2,500 tons of “stray” and “unintended” collateral damage of the entire city centre.

Moreover, the attack came in two waves, the first of which dropped almost 1,000 tons of incendiary bombs which are useless against rail-lines but which are excellent at destroying houses and buildings with wooden structures and roofs.  

This first wave, lasting for half an hour at 10 p.m. and consisting of incendiaries followed by explosive bombs, hit the Old City (Altmarkt)  The second wave, three hours later, targetted the “NewCity” (Neustadt) across the river and the “South City” (Sudvorstadt).  It was this second wave that set off the firestorm that turned asphalt into molten liquid and exploded people like so much human popcorn.

All that to hit a rail station to the northwest and factories on the outskirts?  Anyone who believes this “justification” is a criminal moron and anyone who polemicizes it is criminal scum.

Moreoever, area or “carpet” bombing was the explicit policy of British and American air warfare. The express purpose of area bombing was simply to terrorize the civilian population into submission.  This policy, based on the strategic theories of Giulio Drouhet’s Command of the Air, (1921) was adopted by the British and the Americans before the Nazis even came to power. 

As stated by Douhet, “a complete breakdown of the social structure cannot but take place in a country subjected to this kind of merciless pounding from the air. "

Again, open your eyes and look at the pictures of the devastation of German cities.  That kind of bombing had nothing to do with targeting military infrastructure. 

This is not to say that the Allies did not target military installations; it is rather to say that they knew how to do so when they wanted.  The destruction of Dresden was not an accident.  It was a planned and intentional act of sado-terror against civilians.  Period.

To minimize the monstrosity, Allied and interested parties fall back on minimizing the effect of the intended crime. The notion that only 25,000 people were killed is that kind of obscenity that merits a kick in the teeth to the spewer of the sewage.

It is certainly true that, due to the influx of wartime refugees, exact population estimates for Dresden in February 1945 are hard to come by.  But that difficulty is only used as preliminary smoke-screen for making difficult something which is not actually hard to estimate.

The pre-war population of Dresden stood at somewhat over 600,000.  Let it be very generously assumed that 100,000 were away in armed forces.  To the remainder add an estimated 150,000 to 250,000 influxing refugees, for a net result of approximately 700,000 in February 1945.

These figures are consistent with the known number of residences in Dresden.  An RAF assessment completed in 1945 estimated that  around 78,000 dwellings had been completely destroyed; 27,700 were uninhabitable, and 64,500 damaged, but readily repairable.   The total of these figures is 170,200 which is somewhat under the figure of 220,000 homes in all of Dresden.

Assuming 200,000 residences in the city occupied by an average of three persons yields a residential population of 600,000 which is consistent with official population figures. 

If 78,000 dwellings were completely destroyed in a fire-bombing, it is a safe assumption that the contents thereof, including humans were also destroyed.  At one person per dwelling unit, the figure of bombing deaths is 78,000; at 3 per unit, 234,000.

This is a lower estimate given that the city inhabitants had been ordered to accomodate influxing refugees.  A figure of 5 persons per unit would not be out of line with the demographic circumstances in February 1945.

It is of course true that not everyone who inhabits a dwelling is necessarily killed.  The people might have fled in time.  Those that did may have been killed by falling structures or may have survived in city parks.  On the other hand, they may have suffocated in bomb shelters or exploded, like human popcorn, in the heat. 

There really were not many places to run and casualty estimates of 78,000 to 234,000 are not unreasonable.  What is criminally unreasonable is the assertion that notwithstanding that 78,000 dwelling units were demolished  only 25,000 people died.

Some other figures we have come across, list the “houses” in Dresden at 24,000.  This lower figure is not inconsistent given that dwelling units include apartments whereas “houses” designate the apartment building itself.

Kurt Vonnegut, the American novelist and playwrite, who was present in Dresden as a prisoner of war, estimated the deaths at 130,000.  Until the revisionist ilk went to work corroding the truth, accepted estimates in the 1960’s and 1990’s hovered around 180,000 to 200,000.

The precise figure will never be known.  But the substance of the crime is evident and palpable.  Mass murder of civilians in Germany was the genocidal aim of the Allied war machine.  Dresden is the awful spectre of “victory.”

©Barfo 2015