Crucial points of the Battle of Britain?

pbehn · Mar 22, 2014

redcoat said:
Churchill was asking about operational units being held in reserve, not aircraft held in reserve, and when Park said "none" he was only referring to units within 11 Group, not the whole of Fighter Command. In other groups a number of Squadrons saw no action at all on this day.

Thinking about this, again my books are at home so is from memory. The operational situation of 11 group was at the front line of the defence. It was part of the strategy that when 11 group was committed then adjacent groups would share the load as I remember 10 group did their job but 12 group was somewhat "remis" with Leigh Mallory's politiking. For 11 group to be completely committed with no reserves would be expected when the whole of the Luftwaffe was going between the Pas de Calais and London. Also as I remember Uxbridge was a short detour from Churchills normal trip from Chartwell to London, I believe he was there on many occasions although how much he knew of the minutae of Dowding and Parks strategy I dont know

parsifal · Mar 22, 2014

pbehn said:
Thinking about this, again my books are at home so is from memory. The operational situation of 11 group was at the front line of the defence. It was part of the strategy that when 11 group was committed then adjacent groups would share the load as I remember 10 group did their job but 12 group was somewhat "remis" with Leigh Mallory's politiking. For 11 group to be completely committed with no reserves would be expected when the whole of the Luftwaffe was going between the Pas de Calais and London. Also as I remember Uxbridge was a short detour from Churchills normal trip from Chartwell to London, I believe he was there on many occasions although how much he knew of the minutae of Dowding and Parks strategy I dont know

lee mallory's group to the North was supposed to provide cover over 11 Gps airfields, whilst 11 gp was to step forward aggressively and engage the LW in its approaches. The idea was to break up the attacking formations before they started pasting RAF assets. It didnt work. Operating forward meant Parks squadrons were more exposed to the attentions of the 109s, which lavished lots of attention on the relatively green fighter units of 11 Gp. Moreover, and more importantly Lee Mallory failed to position his fighters in a timely fashion, being preoccupied with the so called "big wing". It took too long to form the big wings, by which time the LW was on its way home, its fighters had had time to regroup to cover the returns by the bombers. all around, this phase of the battle was least satisfactory for the RAF, and the stage where it came very close to losing.

Park may have been able to not push forward a quite as much, but there is a lot of debate about that as to whether he could or not. but Lee Mallory should have been relieved of his command for his failures at this time IMO.

pbehn · Mar 22, 2014

parsifal said:
lee mallory's group to the North was supposed to provide cover over 11 Gps airfields, whilst 11 gp was to step forward aggressively and engage the LW in its approaches. The idea was to break up the attacking formations before they started pasting RAF assets. It didnt work. Operating forward meant Parks squadrons were more exposed to the attentions of the 109s, which lavished lots of attention on the relatively green fighter units of 11 Gp. Moreover, and more importantly Lee Mallory failed to position his fighters in a timely fashion, being preoccupied with the so called "big wing". It took too long to form the big wings, by which time the LW was on its way home, its fighters had had time to regroup to cover the returns by the bombers. all around, this phase of the battle was least satisfactory for the RAF, and the stage where it came very close to losing.

Park may have been able to not push forward a quite as much, but there is a lot of debate about that as to whether he could or not. but Lee Mallory should have been relieved of his command for his failures at this time IMO.

That is exactly what was contained in my comment about Politiking..if a commander with the talent of Park was in charge of 12 group the battle would have run very differently, to me Park should have a statue in Trafalgar square on a column equal in height with Nelsons

pbehn · Mar 22, 2014

parsifal said:
lee mallory's group to the North was supposed to provide cover over 11 Gps airfields, whilst 11 gp was to step forward aggressively and engage the LW in its approaches. The idea was to break up the attacking formations before they started pasting RAF assets. It didnt work. Operating forward meant Parks squadrons were more exposed to the attentions of the 109s, which lavished lots of attention on the relatively green fighter units of 11 Gp. Moreover, and more importantly Lee Mallory failed to position his fighters in a timely fashion, being preoccupied with the so called "big wing". It took too long to form the big wings, by which time the LW was on its way home, its fighters had had time to regroup to cover the returns by the bombers. all around, this phase of the battle was least satisfactory for the RAF, and the stage where it came very close to losing.

Park may have been able to not push forward a quite as much, but there is a lot of debate about that as to whether he could or not. but Lee Mallory should have been relieved of his command for his failures at this time IMO.

That is exactly what was contained in my comment about Politiking..if a commander with the talent of Park was in charge of 12 group the battle would have run very differently, to me Park should have a statue in Trafalgar square on a column equal in height with Nelsons

CobberKane · Mar 22, 2014

nuuumannn said:
Pretty simplistic view, though, Milosh, considering the USAAF was targeting specific targets within the cities, not just the cities themselves - they didn't just swan over and attack Cologne for the hell of it to achieve victory.

That old chestnut? I'm sure the residents of Dresden where comforted to know the USAAF were precision bombing them, not area bombing. The Axis bombed the allied civilians, the Allies bombed the Axis civilians. To say anything else is semantics. C'este la Guerre.

pbehn · Mar 22, 2014

CobberKane said:
That old chestnut? I'm sure the residents of Dresden where comforted to know the USAAF were precision bombing them, not area bombing. The Axis bombed the allied civilians, the Allies bombed the Axis civilians. To say anything else is semantics. C'este la Guerre.

You cannot make a precision raid with 1000+ bombers flying in defensive boxes, sure you may make a factory the target but in fact it is the factory you may hit and the homes of its workers you will hit....pure statistics

GrauGeist · Mar 23, 2014

CobberKane said:
That old chestnut? I'm sure the residents of Dresden where comforted to know the USAAF were precision bombing them, not area bombing. The Axis bombed the allied civilians, the Allies bombed the Axis civilians. To say anything else is semantics. C'este la Guerre.

Sure, bomber command said "hey, how many civilians can we screw today?"

And the general consensus was that while targeting civilians, perhaps a military target or two might get knocked out in the conflagration...hey, bonus, right?

mhuxt · Mar 23, 2014

Needs new thread.

CobberKane · Mar 23, 2014

mhuxt said:
Needs new thread.

Yeah, I know it. I don't mean to hijack the thread, I just hate to see the myth propagated that the Allies did not target German civilians, just as I hate to read the BS about Eisenhower deliberately starving to death thousands of German POWs and, in a repulsive league of it's own, the pseudo-academic holocaust denial of David Irving and his like. Those who forget history, or revise it, are doomed to repeat it. I'll go away now...

GrauGeist · Mar 23, 2014

I suppose it might be a moot point to mention that the first two raids on Dresden were done by the RAF...

mhuxt · Mar 23, 2014

GrauGeist said:
I suppose it might be a moot point to mention that the first two raids on Dresden were done by the RAF...

It would be moot, since the first three raids on Dresden were all USAAF affairs. But, as noted, that's another thread.

stona · Mar 23, 2014

The only difference between the RAF and USAAF approach was that the British, realising the limitations of bombing accuracy much earlier than their colleagues, acknowledged that civilians were targets as in the 'dehousing' of workers. The USAAF was never quite so upfront about it.

I think you would have a hard job describing the fire bombing of Tokyo as any more of a precision raid than the fire bombing of Hamburg.

The reality was that by 1944, as far as heavy bombers went, the RAF's night bombing was more accurate, that is more concentrated around the aiming point, than the USAAF's daylight effort, special missions excepted.

It was war. Who are we to judge? Get over it!

Cheers

Steve

GrauGeist · Mar 23, 2014

mhuxt said:
It would be moot, since the first three raids on Dresden were all USAAF affairs. But, as noted, that's another thread.

Then hopefully that thread will show you that out of three raids between 14 and 15 February that started the disasterous fires, the first two waves that struck (772 aircraft total) were RAF bomber command, the following two were 8th AF (527 aircraft total). Three raids followed later between 2 March and 17 April.

Whether it was right or wrong, the fact remains that the bombing was a joint effort.

Milosh · Mar 23, 2014

GrauGeist said:
Then hopefully that thread will show you that out of three raids between 14 and 15 February that started the disasterous fires, the first two waves that struck (772 aircraft total) were RAF bomber command, the following two were 8th AF (527 aircraft total). Three raids followed later between 2 March and 17 April.

Whether it was right or wrong, the fact remains that the bombing was a joint effort.

The Dresden attack was to have begun with a USAAF Eighth Air Force bombing raid on 13 February 1945. The Eighth Air Force had already bombed the railway yards near the centre of the city twice in daytime raids: once on 7 October 1944 with 70 tons of high-explosive bombs killing more than 400,[37] then again with 133 bombers on 16 January 1945, dropping 279 tons of high-explosives and 41 tons of incendiaries.[5]

On 13 February 1945, bad weather over Europe prevented any USAAF operations, and it was left to RAF Bomber Command to carry out the first raid. It had been decided that the raid would be a double strike, in which a second wave of bombers would attack three hours after the first, just as the rescue teams were trying to put out the fires.

On the morning of 14 February 431 bombers of the 1st Bombardment Division of the United States VIII Bomber Command were scheduled to bomb Dresden at around midday, and the 3rd Bombardment Division were to follow the 1st and bomb Chemnitz, while the 2nd Bombardment Division would bomb a synthetic oil plant in Magdeburg. The bomber groups would be protected by the 784 P-51 Mustangs of VIII Fighter Command which meant that there would be almost 2,100 aircraft of the United States Eighth Air Force over Saxony during 14 February.[56]

There is some confusion in the primary sources over what was the target in Dresden, whether it was the marshalling yards near the centre or centre of the built up area. The report by the 1st Bombardment Division's commander to his commander states that the targeting sequence was to be the centre of the built up area in Dresden if the weather was clear. If clouds obscured Dresden and if it was clear over Chemnitz, then Chemnitz was to be the target. If both were obscured then the centre of Dresden would be bombed using H2X radar.[57] The mix of bombs to be used on the Dresden raid was about 40% incendiaries, much closer to the RAF city busting mix than that usually used by the USAAF in precision bombardments.[58] This was quite a common mix when the USAAF anticipated cloudy conditions over the target.

redcoat · Mar 23, 2014

GrauGeist said:
I suppose it might be a moot point to mention that the first two raids on Dresden were done by the RAF...

As Milosh has already posted the USAAF first bombed Dresden on the 7 October 1944 and then on the 16 January 1945.

pbehn · Mar 23, 2014

redcoat said:
Why are you repeating something that has already been shown to be wrong ???????

As Milosh has already posted the USAAF first bombed Dresden on the 7 October 1944 and then on the 16 January 1945.

I cant understand why Dresden has such special status. Both the USA and British fire bombed cities, you would think the bombing of Dresden took place after the surrender when some refer to it. I did meet a guy who claimed that one evening, but it was an Irish pub in Hamm and he was drunk lol

GrauGeist · Mar 23, 2014

redcoat said:
As Milosh has already posted the USAAF first bombed Dresden on the 7 October 1944 and then on the 16 January 1945.

Because the Firestorms were initiated between 13 February and 15 February, that's why.

The two previous bombing missions hit the marshalling yards with HE, not incindiary munitions.

parsifal · Mar 23, 2014

guys, wtf. how is Dresden relate to the BoB

bobbysocks · Mar 23, 2014

agreed....all this will do is start something that will get this thread locked. start a dresden thread if you want to debate it

CobberKane · Mar 23, 2014

Fair enough. Here's something a bit closer to the topic: given the RAFs response to the accidental bombing of London during the BoB was almost instant, do you think Churchill's go-ahead to bomb Berlin was a considered effort to move the Luftwaffe's focus from the beleaguered airfields to the British civilian population?

Crucial points of the Battle of Britain?

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