So what? They were only following the lead of the air force which bombed Guernica, Rotterdam, Hull, Coventry, Exeter (not renowned for their factories and military installations,) and I don't recall any Lancaster gunners mowing down civilian refugees, as was done in France. During a recent interview, one ex-Lancaster pilot faced some hostile questions, including,"Didn't you feel guilty, dropping bombs on civilians?" "Not really, I just felt, each time, that it was one back for Coventry."
Edgar
Rotterdam was a defended city under siege that had been beseeched for nearly 1 week to surrender as required under Hague convention . As it turns out a timezone mix up and a Dutch commander who milked the negotiations too much were ultimately responsible for Rotterdam being bombed. (the bombers were recalled but did not get thr message as their long range aierials had been reeled in) The city was messed up by fire, not bombs directly. The German army had to keep moving and cross the river, for strategic reasons. I can tell you that the German army, nor any army, was going to send its young troops into a city into the machine guns of the cities troops. There would be a bombardment; makes little difference if it was artillery or aircraft.
The Royal Air-force began its raids on Germany the day after Rotterdam. These had been planed for a long time, Rotterdam was used as an excuse. British propaganda Casualties were exaggerated by a factor of 30. The Butt report would show how inaccurate they were.
When the RAF began bombing Berlin and Munich they did so for an alleged Luftwaffe raid on London: this was a lone He 111 that had gotten lost and dropped its bombs accidentally on London killing no one and causing little damage. The raids on Berlin and Munich caused considerable civilian collateral damage.
Only then was the Luftwaffe released to attack British cities. When they did they targeted the center of the critical British machine tool and engine manufacturing center Coventry and they did so using x-geraet, a blind bombing system of exceptional accuracy. (ie still a miserable 100-150 but much better than anything the RAF had for years)
The Baedeker raids on British tourist towns were in reprisal for attacks on the medieval hanseatic cities of Lubeck and Rostok. These were of enormous cultural significance to Germans, had little in the way of industry (light industry) to such an extent that Goebells thought it was a knew form of warfare via vandalism of culturally significant areas.
Bomber Harris in his memoirs makes note they were simply selected to see how their wooden structure would burn and that no specific target was chosen: they simply did an area bombardment of the center of the city.
Hull was a port city, Luftwaffe pilots were told to use it as an alternate target and to aim for the port. Maps are available and one can see that the bombs do concentrate towards the water.
The reality is that it was the British that expanded the air war and developed the policy of terror bombing (euphemised as 'dehousing' and 'demoralization') and carpet bombing (termed as 'area bombardment')
The alleged strafing of civilians in France was British propaganda or Luftwaffe strafing attacks on columns of vehicles that were military or thought to be military or mixed up with military vehicles. Pilots on all sides occasionally did something wrong.
Had the Germans gotten the V1 and v2 operational in late 1943 instead of late 1944 when Germany still had bases in France and might still make thousands of the weapons per month then Britain would have paid a very high price for its area bombardment campaign.
They were called "Vergeltungs Waffen" or "Reprisal Weapons" for nothing.