What is strategic bombing?

RayC · Post by **RayC** » 10 Jul 2009 11:45

Possibly because tactical nuclear weapons (and which will not devastate to the extent a large nuclear weapon would) would be for the immediate battlefield and under the control of the local commander!

Airavat · Post by **Airavat** » 10 Jul 2009 11:55

I chose "none of the above" because the phrase 'strategic bombing' can have varied meanings depending on the strategic objectives.....of India, of the Indian Air Force, or of the Indian Army.

nrshah · Post by **nrshah** » 10 Jul 2009 13:23

It is not an absolue term. It depends on what are objectives and ways to secur them.

Mostly term is used to mean to bomb Air Bases, Ports, Missile bases, Important links connecting two important places etc.

-Nitin

krishnan · Post by **krishnan** » 10 Jul 2009 13:34

Bombing anything that is vital,strategic in nature to enemy country like power plants , airports , sea ports, highways,crude oil depots, communication lines etc etc...

RayC · Post by **RayC** » 10 Jul 2009 13:46

For a high-yield explosion of approximately 10 megatons detonated 320 km (200 miles) above the centre of the continental United States, almost the entire country, as well as parts of Mexico and Canada, would be affected by EMP.

Strategic bombing?

No takers on this?

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 14:10

RayC wrote:For a high-yield explosion of approximately 10 megatons detonated 320 km (200 miles) above the centre of the continental United States, almost the entire country, as well as parts of Mexico and Canada, would be affected by EMP.

Strategic bombing?

No takers on this?

RayC - this would be disaster for the US, Europe, even India.

But for a group such as the Taliban? It would mean nothing.

Shankar · Post by **Shankar** » 10 Jul 2009 14:54

strategic bombing in my mind is a bombing mission carried out to achieve a particular strategic aim like us bombing the german v-2 factory killing all personnel and that greatly affected German war effort or the use of dam busters and ofcourse the attack on hiroshima

It has nothing to do with explosive power delivered but more to do with mission objective meeting the strategic goal

trushant · Post by **trushant** » 10 Jul 2009 15:32

I have chosen the option " None of the above"

I thinks its a concept that aims to strike the enemy where it hurts the most - for eg. Allied bombing of German Ball Bearing industry in WWII ..half of the production was concentrated at one place...thus effectively reducing the war fighting ability of the opponent - also to impact its morale..it very will to resist....which may or may not include destruction of a target of any economic value.

I wonder whether Dolittle's famous raid on Tokyo in 1942 can be termed as strategic bombing..did minimal damage ..but instilled fear in Japanese minds that they are not invincible ..while boosting the morale on the other side of the pacific.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 15:57

shiv wrote: Bombing his cities would cause chaos and break the morale of his people who would the cower and beg for mercy, or would surrender, bombing his power supply and industries would put the out of action affecting his ability to fight.

Strategic bombing was not really effective in either paralysing the enemy or breaking his will to fight. On the other hand tactical use of air power could defeat an enemy locally allowing advancement and occupation.

So its turns out that the concept of "strategic bombing" and the machines that were spawned from that concept - the "strategic bombers" were not as successful in conducting or concluding the strategy of war.

I strongly disagree Sir; you are only looking at Germans while making that statement -- Allies learned from Germans that strategic bombing was a great idea after all.

The effort spent on fire bombing Dresden and reducing Ruhr to rubble went a long way in making sure the exceptionally effective German war machine was crippled.

The Tigers alone would have finished the allies when they landed in France otherwise (bit of a hype statement)
-------------------------------

I chose the first option, despite reading through the entire set of arguments against it. Strategic bombing is any activity (bombing activity) which reduces the war machine in a large manner in a strategic way. This could mean industries and infrastructure but not only limited to the same. It could mean large troop concentrations, repeated bombing to bottle up the war machine (like early around the clock German bombing on RAF sites) essentially not concentrating on immediate destruction but harrasement.

As such of the options available on poll the first comes closest to describing what is strat bombing fully. (Yes this does not mean only those platforms can do the particular bombing) What it means is that the roles those aircraft are used for are usually always strategic.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 16:20

Sanku wrote:
shiv wrote: Bombing his cities would cause chaos and break the morale of his people who would the cower and beg for mercy, or would surrender, bombing his power supply and industries would put the out of action affecting his ability to fight.

Strategic bombing was not really effective in either paralysing the enemy or breaking his will to fight. On the other hand tactical use of air power could defeat an enemy locally allowing advancement and occupation.

So its turns out that the concept of "strategic bombing" and the machines that were spawned from that concept - the "strategic bombers" were not as successful in conducting or concluding the strategy of war.
I strongly disagree Sir; you are only looking at Germans while making that statement -- Allies learned from Germans that strategic bombing was a great idea after all.

The effort spent on fire bombing Dresden and reducing Ruhr to rubble went a long way in making sure the exceptionally effective German war machine was crippled.

The Tigers alone would have finished the allies when they landed in France otherwise (bit of a hype statement)

No Sanku.

You have not read analyses of the effects of the bombing. If you do - you will find that Germany's industries and warfighting ability were not affected by the bombing. For a detailed account you need to read a boring book called "The Bomber Offensive"

But summaries are available on the Net

For example

Number of Aircraft produced in Germany: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_air ... rld_War_II)
1939 - 1,928
1940 - 7,829
1941 - 9,422
1942 - 12,822
1943 - 20,599
1944 - 35,076

At the height of the Allied bombing in 1944 Germany produces more aircraft than in 1942 and 1943 put together.

The same is true for Armored Fighting vehicle production.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_arm ... rld_War_II

It is only when Germany itself was overrun in 1945 that the factories stopped production.
Germany surrendered in early May 1845. Just look at the produstion figures for the first 4 months of 1945

Aircraft: 1945 - 7,052
Armored Fighting vehicles: 1945 - 4,406

And as you can see from this link - power supply for all these industries was not a problem despited the much hyped Hollywood blockbusters about Ruhr dams bouncing bombs. Those attacks did more for the morale of the Allies than damage German power supply.

And recall that Germany designed and flew the first fighter jets in the world during the height of the "strategic bomber offensive"

The "success" of the allied strategic bombing is a myth that should not be carried around.

The "allies" won because the occupied territory and out produced weapons. The US produced over 96,000 (Ninety-six thousand) aircraft in 1944 alone.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 16:31

shiv wrote:You have not read analyses of the effects of the bombing. If you do - you will find that Germany's industries and warfighting ability were not affected by the bombing. For a detailed account you need to read a boring book called "The Bomber Offensive"

Ok I admit that data caught me by surprise, of the books I read (and I have read many trust me on that) they all mention that the allied bombing was critical to success, some also trotted out their own data (however usually limited to a specific sector or industrial unit).

I cant figure this one out though, if the strategic bombing was not having any effect of Germany why continue it? Surely the Allies during 42-43 were not looking for glamorous excuses to support the Mil-Ind complex?

Could it be that without the bombings the German production would have been even higher?

krishnan · Post by **krishnan** » 10 Jul 2009 16:33

You meant may 1945

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 16:38

One of the books that influenced my thinking on this was "The Bomber Offensive" by the British CAS Arthur "Bomber" Harris who actually conducted the Brit strategic bombing campaign

The book is available on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Bomber-Offensive- ... 1853673145

One of the reviews is interesting:

Harris is fond of quoting Albert Speer to show how much damage bombing did to German war effort. But Harris is extremely selective, so it is good to quote other comments by Speer, for instance on attacks on ball bearing industry: "But already in the connection of the first attack enemy made a crucial mistake: instead of concentrating his efforts on ball bearings, it divided its forces... and what is more important, the British continued their haphazard attacks on German cities..." Ball bearings had been pinpointed early on as targets of primary importance, but Harris overruled those incompetent idiots of the economic warfare office. He claims to have known that the attacks would be useless, but his reasoning proved all wrong after the war. In 1944, Speer "thanks" Harris indirectly: "bombings on economically critical targets are clearly planned by men who understand German economy... We are clearly lucky that the enemy has been insane not to carry out its own policy." This means that British area bombings of 1942 and 1943 had been rather inefficient and only intensified American bombing in 1944 of critical resources started to have effect on German war effort.

It is curious that the British only sent a dozen men to assess bombing damage in Germany after the war: they had, after all, lost 50 000 men in the skies of Germany. When discussing German civilian casualties, Harris distances himself by quoting US Strategic Bombing Survey figure of 300 000 (many others put the figure at 600 000). On the whole the neglect of effects of bombing is amazing. To quote Harris: "The RAF was not in a position to judge the result of its main offensive in the light of a sufficient body of indisputable evidence". RAF "measured" the success of bombing by the the number of bombed-out people, or acres of destroyed build-up area. The Americans later perfected this approach in Vietnam: because bombing damage could not be assessed, they just reported the tonnage of bombs dropped.

Harris claims that he could have forced Germany to surrender by air power alone, if only he had been given 4000 heavy bombers. Harris completely ignores the aircraft building effort. The fact is that the Bomber command never grew big because the Germans kept shooting down heavies at the same rate as the British build them. The idiots at the Ministry of Aircraft Production did supply some 7000 Lancasters, 7000 Halifaxes, 10 000 Wellingtons (and 7000 medium Mosquitos), yet Bomber command never had more than 1600 planes at any one time.

krishnan · Post by **krishnan** » 10 Jul 2009 16:40

Isnt that what americans still did. They always used to report the amount of bums they have dropped

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 16:49

Sanku wrote:
I cant figure this one out though, if the strategic bombing was not having any effect of Germany why continue it? Surely the Allies during 42-43 were not looking for glamorous excuses to support the Mil-Ind complex?

Sanku 1942 and 43 events were approximately as follows

http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/t ... w2time.htm

Dec 1941 - Pearl Harbor was attacked and the US lost half its navy

So by January 1942 the US had just joined the war in earnest and was desperately seeking to fight the Japanese.

In 1942 the so called "Battle of Britain" was being fought to stave off a German invasion of Britain.

So certainly in 1942 the "allies" were on the back foot. It was only in 1944 that the Allies got their act together, invaded the European mainland (again immortalized by Hollywood in "The Longest Day")

Less than a year later Germany was defeated. But it was the ground troops steady advances and Hitler's defeat by Russia in the East that did them in. The Russian came in from the East and the Allies from the West. The Russians made it into Berlin first.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 17:00

You can check the effectiveness of the US Strategic Bomber force in Vietnam in these 4 related Videos of the history of the Vietnam war.

All are good

Video 2 shows some of the Air war:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGvLGfxaz7Y

Video 3 is particularly interesting
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-kNG_8HuUI

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 17:05

shiv wrote:....We are clearly lucky that the enemy has been insane not to carry out its own policy." This means that British area bombings of 1942 and 1943 had been rather inefficient and only intensified American bombing in 1944 of critical resources started to have effect on German war effort. ....

Um Okay my point is still the same (havent read the book you refer too), strategic bombing has a role, it took time for the Allies to get to know how to do it right, and when they did by 44 (still learning in 42-43) they produced results.

Overall I am still a little confused as to how the concept of strategic bombing itself was a failure. I would say it was "overall" a success, despite the mixed results and early missteps.

The Battle of Britain too was a loss for Germany not because of the concept of the battle, but because Luftwaffe changed its focus from Marine and Air force assests on to London itself.

However in Japan bombing the cities did also achieve the response like "attlia the hun" tactics.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 17:07

shiv wrote:You can check the effectiveness of the US Strategic Bomber force in Vietnam in these 4 related Videos of the history of the Vietnam war.

The problem with Vietnam was that in the asymmetric warfare, there are no strategic targets you can bomb.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 17:11

Sanku wrote: it took time for the Allies to get to know how to do it right, and when they did by 44 (still learning in 42-43) they produced results.

What results? If you mean poor results I agree.

I have posted the German manufacturing figures.

These are not good results. It was the ground offensive that beat back the Germans. Not the strategic bombing that stopped the war machine. The war machine kept working. The Germans were not intimidated and their factories produced more than ever. Are you saying that this is "a success" for the "strategic bombing offensive"?

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 17:14

Sanku wrote:
shiv wrote:You can check the effectiveness of the US Strategic Bomber force in Vietnam in these 4 related Videos of the history of the Vietnam war.
The problem with Vietnam was that in the asymmetric warfare, there are no strategic targets you can bomb.

This is exactly what I am getting at. Every strategic bombing campaign has a long list of excuse makers as to why a war was not won. If the strategic bombing campaign is not meeting a strategic goal as given by RayC on page 1 of this thread what the hell is that strategic bombing campaign doing?

RayC wrote:As per Neville Jones, The Origins of Strategic Bombing (London: William Kimber, 1973), :

Strategic bombing may be defined as the direct attack against the most important elements of an enemy’s war-making capacity, for example, his industries, communications, and the morale of his civilian population, as opposed to the units and equipment of his armed forces. The object of such bombing, which is the product of an age in which the distinction between soldier and civilian has disappeared, is to undermine the enemy’s war effort.

K_Rohit · Post by **K_Rohit** » 10 Jul 2009 17:29

Would terrorist bomb attacks on railway stations, mindless car bomb attacks in A'stan and Iraq be counted as strategic bombing? Technically, it fits the definition.

My point being, is the means also a way of defining "strategic bombing"?

And Shiv, a strategic nuclear attack on japan ended the war. So strategic bombing was extremely effective. No?

SivaVijay · Post by **SivaVijay** » 10 Jul 2009 17:30

- By bombing => jump in a a/c fly over strategic target and bomb.
- Strategic bombing => destroys enemys ability to put up hindrance in our drive to achieve the war objectives(note:enemy's ability not massacre enemy)

That said when startegic bombing was tried the results were never there (Germany, Vietnam, Iraq)
WW2 carpet bombing and terror bombing were similar to nuke in idea . The reason for a strategic bombing is destroy enemy capacity and expect some collateral but carpet/terror/nuke is intentional cause of huge collateral and hoping that the strategic targets will be destroyed. So even in ww2 strategic bombing failed so terror bombing became the strategy(pls note the difference).
in modern assymetry war even terror bombing are not yielding results let alone strategic bombing.
So if strategy bombing is using airpower to dump munition on enemy hoping that he will loose his ability to resist, then strategic bombing is a sham for above reasons and soon will get reduced to terror bombing/carpet/nuking.
I voted strategic bombing is a sham....

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 10 Jul 2009 17:38

as part of the RAF Bomber Command's Operational Research Section, Freeman Dyson, (later to become a noted physicist) estimated that bomber command's strategic bombing activities were incredibly ineffective, given the no of lives lost in the campaign.
not surprisingly, he faced hostile reactions from RAF top brass.

FWIW, while googling for the exact quote, I came across this :
http://yarchive.net/space/politics/bomber_command.html

One reason why there is some controversy about lionizing "Bomber" Harris
is that his strategy seems to have gotten a lot of bomber crews killed to
little purpose. LeMay's campaign was both more effective and far less
costly, due to more vulnerable targets, greater resources, and the near
collapse of Japanese air defences.

Harris was obsessed with razing cities, to the point that he largely
ignored pleas for more focused attacks on more specific targets. When
such attacks were arranged despite his opposition, they often proved
inordinately effective. For example, the aerial mining of the Danube --
permitted partly because Harris considered it a low-risk mission, useful
for breaking in new bomber crews! -- required a fraction of the resources
spent on even one of Harris's monster raids, and was a devastating blow to
Germany's economy. The closing of the Danube to barge traffic doubled or
tripled the demands on Germany's already-overloaded rail network, and
greatly reduced the flow of oil to Germany in particular. This was done
at a total cost of eleven (11) bombers; it is not even mentioned in the
official history of the bombing campaign. It could have been done at
least a year earlier, and extended to other areas of water transport as
well, had Harris been less obstinate.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 17:44

shiv wrote:What results? If you mean poor results I agree.

I quoted from what you posted

This means that British area bombings of 1942 and 1943 had been rather inefficient and only intensified American bombing in 1944 of critical resources started to have effect on German war effort.

So in 44 it started to have an effect right, note the claim is not whether the war can be won by strategic bombing alone.

Further more, if the Allies persisted with strat bombing though 42-44 from bad and good conditions and also finally had some success with it -- it shows that when start bombing is used correctly it does produce results. Apart from the above the results are

1) Psychological impact on Japan
2) Reduction of British Marine in first phase of Battle of Britain

Overall the point is, just like any other tool, start bombing has a time and place and usage. When done well will produce results, at other times it will flop.

For WWII the question still is, what would you have Allies do with the same effort which went into strategic bombing (note roads, bridges etc are all strategic bombing too) wouldn't they have faced more V2s more Tigers etc? The fact that production went up despite bombing does not me show that the bombing itself did not degrade the potential and bring down the possible number of working war pieces into battle.

-----------

PS> I would like to add high value Mil targets into the list of industries and other "civilian" sectors.

-----

PPS> A harassing raid on Karachi is not a tactical bombing, its strategic, however it did force PN to bottle itself up in Paki areas and not go out maruaduring.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 10 Jul 2009 17:48

RayC wrote:As per Neville Jones, The Origins of Strategic Bombing (London: William Kimber, 1973), :

Strategic bombing may be defined as the direct attack against the most important elements of an enemy’s war-making capacity, for example, his industries, communications, and the morale of his civilian population, as opposed to the units and equipment of his armed forces. The object of such bombing, which is the product of an age in which the distinction between soldier and civilian has disappeared, is to undermine the enemy’s war effort.

I think it is critical to disable the people (the leaders) who run/make this war. Either by elliminating them (a rather difficult a proposition) or destroying assets that they think that are critical to continue the war. So, even within "strategic" assets those assets that are very close to the leadership should be deemed assets of greater strategic vallue to target. Becomes a mind game - this game shoudl be started ASAP.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 17:49

K_Rohit wrote:Would terrorist bomb attacks on railway stations, mindless car bomb attacks in A'stan and Iraq be counted as strategic bombing? Technically, it fits the definition.

My point being, is the means also a way of defining "strategic bombing"?

And Shiv, a strategic nuclear attack on japan ended the war. So strategic bombing was extremely effective. No?

So strategic bombing is nuclear attacks then.

Based on the two bombs used on one nation the strategy is found to be effective.

Therefore there is no point in having strategic air forces like the US. A nuclear delivery system should be enough.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 18:00

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_ ... rld_War_II

Much of the doubt about the effectiveness of the bomber war comes from the oft-stated fact that German industrial production increased throughout the war. While this is true, it fails to note production also increased in the United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, Canada and Australia. And, in all of those countries, the rate of production increased much more rapidly than in Germany. Until late in the war, industry had not been geared for war and German factory workers only worked a single shift. Simply by going to three shifts, production could have been tripled with no change to the infrastructure. However, attacks on the infrastructure were taking place. The attacks on Germany's canals and railroads made transportation of materiel difficult.

The attack on oil production, oil refineries and tank farms was, however, extremely successful and made a very large contribution to the general collapse of Germany in 1945. In the event, the bombing of oil facilities became Albert Speer's main concern; however, this occurred sufficiently late in the war that Germany would soon be defeated in any case. Nevertheless, it is fair to say the oil bombing campaign materially shortened the war, thereby saving many lives.

German insiders credit the Allied bombing offensive with severely handicapping them. Speer repeatedly said (both during and after the war) it caused crucial production problems. Admiral Karl Dönitz, head of the U-Boat arm, noted in his memoirs that failure to get the revolutionary Type XXI U-boats (which could have completely altered the balance of power in the Battle of the Atlantic) into service was entirely the result of the bombing. The United States Strategic Bombing Survey, however, concluded the delays in deploying the new submarines cannot be attributed to air attack.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 18:03

More from above

A year after the war, the United States Army Air Forces's Strategic Bombing Survey (Pacific War) reported that they had underestimated the power of strategic bombing combined with naval blockade and previous military defeats to bring Japan to unconditional surrender without invasion. By July 1945, only a fraction of the planned strategic bombing force had been deployed yet there were few targets left worth the effort. In hindsight, it would have been more effective to use land-based and carrier-based air power to strike against merchant shipping and begin aerial mining at a much earlier date so as to link up with the effective Allied submarine anti-shipping campaign and completely isolate the island nation. This would have accelerated the strangulation of Japan and ended the war sooner.[132] A postwar Naval Ordnance Laboratory survey agreed, finding that naval mines dropped by B-29s had accounted for 60% of all Japanese shipping losses in the last six months of the war.[133] In October 1945, Prince Fumimaro Konoe said that the sinking of Japanese vessels by U.S. aircraft combined with the B-29 aerial mining campaign were just as effective as B-29 attacks on industry alone[134], though he admitted that "the thing that brought about the determination to make peace was the prolonged bombing by the B-29s." Prime Minister Baron Kantarō Suzuki reported to U.S. military authorities that it "seemed to me unavoidable that in the long run Japan would be almost destroyed by air attack so that merely on the basis of the B-29s alone I was convinced that Japan should sue for peace."[133]

So there....

K_Rohit · Post by **K_Rohit** » 10 Jul 2009 18:15

shiv wrote:
K_Rohit wrote:Would terrorist bomb attacks on railway stations, mindless car bomb attacks in A'stan and Iraq be counted as strategic bombing? Technically, it fits the definition.

My point being, is the means also a way of defining "strategic bombing"?

And Shiv, a strategic nuclear attack on japan ended the war. So strategic bombing was extremely effective. No?
So strategic bombing is nuclear attacks then.

Based on the two bombs used on one nation the strategy is found to be effective.

Therefore there is no point in having strategic air forces like the US. A nuclear delivery system should be enough.

Playing devils advocate.

Nuclear bomb = massive loads of conventional bombs

If we are able to convince the enemy that we can continue to devastate vast amounts of enemy territory at little or no cost to us, we will be able to defeat the enemy through strategic bombing.

Maybe, purely for the sake of argument, the european offensive failed because:
1) Allies didnt drop enough bombs
2) the Germans were never convinced that the allies could drop the tonnage required for them to capitulate

In a sense, I am supporting the argument, that a conventional strategic bomber is unlikely to be very effective. But a nuclear one would be.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 10 Jul 2009 18:36

K_Rohit wrote: In a sense, I am supporting the argument, that a conventional strategic bomber is unlikely to be very effective. But a nuclear one would be.

A conventional bomber can be both strategic or tactical, and these days any platform can be kitted out for different roles, we are in multi role world now. The question is not the platform but the doctrine -- some times the doctrine may require special tools.

I for one strongly support the need to have platforms which can hit south china sea if needed (with conventional weapons) to block shipping and what not.

Wonder how keen Chinese will be to fight if they know we can freeze economic activity around Hong Kong without nukes.

Drevin · Post by **Drevin** » 10 Jul 2009 18:45

I've heard of MOAB-type conventional bombs ..... explosive power of a nuke without the radiation/contamination. But again this becomes a contradiction. why would you want to save people in a strategic installation of the enemy.... But its definitely an option.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 19:09

If you look at "strategic aerial bombing" as single war winning tool it has failed fairly miserably.

One victory against Japan in WW2 and that too with nuclear bombs.

German strategic bombing failed against Britain and was non existent against the US allowing those countries to produce more (as Sanku's links above eloquently demonstrate) . The allied campaign had zero effect in the year that it was used maximally and the war was won by ground forces.

It failed to win wars in Korea and Vietnam. Even the much touted naval blockade "which should have been used" against Japan (in hindsight) was useless for Vietnam

It has failed to win a war in Iraq and Afghanistan

So what the hell is the use of this "strategic bombing" by air if it has not won any wars?

What kind of "strategy" is made to win wars, "destroy the enemy;s warfighting potential, demoralize his population - and at the end of it all the war is either not won, or won by ground troops in the manner that all wars have been won for the last 5000 years?

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 19:11

K_Rohit wrote: In a sense, I am supporting the argument, that a conventional strategic bomber is unlikely to be very effective. But a nuclear one would be.

This is the current theory. Nobody knows for sure. But the world is heading towards finding out one way or another. IMO

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 10 Jul 2009 19:21

shiv wrote:German strategic bombing failed against Britain and was non existent against the US allowing those countries to produce more (as Sanku's links above eloquently demonstrate) .

germany never had the tools to do strategic bombing, luftwaffe was primarily a tactical close support air force.

the tools for so-called strategic bombing were mostly in their infancy for much of WW2 and since then there haven't been long-drawn out conventional wars where strategic bombing could have found its use.

situations where SB makes no meaning
A) a war lasting less than a couple of weeks

against an adversary who doesn't go by conventional military thinking

there are exceptions however, bombing of the osirak reactor was a classic success story of strategic bombing.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 10 Jul 2009 19:31

Rahul M wrote:
shiv wrote:German strategic bombing failed against Britain and was non existent against the US allowing those countries to produce more (as Sanku's links above eloquently demonstrate) .
germany never had the tools to do strategic bombing, luftwaffe was primarily a tactical close support air force.

the tools for so-called strategic bombing were mostly in their infancy for much of WW2 and since then there haven't been long-drawn out conventional wars where strategic bombing could have found its use.

situations where SB makes no meaning
A) a war lasting less than a couple of weeks
against an adversary who doesn't go by conventional military thinking

there are exceptions however, bombing of the osirak reactor was a classic success story of strategic bombing.

Rahul I cannot disagree with you. But I would like to point out that the sort of statements you have made are carbon copies of statements made by proponents of strategic bombing who call for the expenditure of huge sums of money on building up and maintaining a strategic bombing force such as that maintained by the US

And similarly, the sort of arguments I am making are carbon copies of those made by opponents of such expenditure.

I believe such expenditure is wasteful and can be better used in applying funds in efforts that have a better track record of helping to win wars. In my opinion both "body counts" and "strategic bombing" constitute a type of war rhetoric that has a deeper meaning that seeks to portray greater success than what the record of history suggests.

But if you ask me what those "better methods are" - I am myself stuck. I only know that "strategic conventional bombing" is a bogey in the genre of "body counts" in winning wars.

That is the raisin dieter of this thread.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 10 Jul 2009 19:49

well, I'm no proponent of maintaining a huge 'strategic' bomber force.

in fact, I raised the question of 'tools for strategic bombing' precisely because I think big bombers are no longer necessary, with the advent of PGMs and AAR a decent strike fighter can do the same job at MUCH lower cost, be more survivable and best of all it will have other uses when you don't have juicy strategic targets to bomb(IOW flexibility), so you don't have to invent enemies in order to use them, ala america.

the need for large bombers in ww2 arose from the fact that due to pi$$-poor accuracy an air force needed to off load a huge amount of explosives to ensure the destruction of a target, this is in fact what led to the concept of carpet bombing.
and for economical carpet bombing you do need large bombers.

My point is that carpet bombing is obsolete and hence large bombers are irrelevant to strategic bombing. (*)

It is not for nothing I raised the example of the osirak reactor, the most succesful example of 'strategic bombing' since ww2 (IMHO) using decidedly 'non-strategic' platforms, piddly F-16s to be precise ! (an aircraft whose normal T/O weight is half the bomb-load of a B-52 !)

(*) I'm sure some people will raise the point of cruise missile equipped bombers and I humbly submit that same or similar arguments will apply to those too.

Drevin · Post by **Drevin** » 10 Jul 2009 22:52

An indication of change in times regarding bombing is probably there in the number of tomahawks the US launched during the gulf war(s). So it seems cruise missiles are doing the job now below the nuclear threshold. But one can argue that since iraq was a coastal country the relatively inexpensive tomahawk was very viable over bombing runs by b52 ... So maybe geography also plays a part ....

Maybe for a larger country in the middle of the continent the US wouldnot use thousands of tomahawks .... So maybe its best to have a lot of bombing options.

Suddenly "Bombing Industries and Infrastructure" seems to be a definition that is more generic. If I had the option I would change my vote at this juncture.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 11 Jul 2009 07:44

Let me try and narrow down the scope of the discussion by taking three very broad goals of strategic bombing posted on page 1 by Sandipan, RayC and me. Note that I am not disputing other definitions of narrower aims (eg "Industries and infrastructure" etc made by others. I am talking about how "strategic bombing" is advertised as a means to achieve th following aims:

Sandipan wrote:Military Channel had a program on Strategic Bombing, which clarified that Strategic Bombing is incessant bombing through any means whether Aeroplanes / missiles which brings the enemy to submission. Where the citizens are so petrified that they approach their government to bring an end to the conflict. If this is not the definition of Strategic Bombing, it is actually the objective of it.

RayC wrote:As per Neville Jones, The Origins of Strategic Bombing (London: William Kimber, 1973), :

Strategic bombing may be defined as the direct attack against the most important elements of an enemy’s war-making capacity, for example, his industries, communications, and the morale of his civilian population, as opposed to the units and equipment of his armed forces. The object of such bombing, which is the product of an age in which the distinction between soldier and civilian has disappeared, is to undermine the enemy’s war effort.

shiv wrote:Strategic air power was the use of air power to hit any mix of civilian or military targets way beyond the frontlines to inflict damage on the enemy and break is ability and will to fight. Bombing government building would disrupt his command. Bombing radio stations was supposed to disrupt his communication and propaganda apparatus. Bombing his cities would cause chaos and break the morale of his people who would the cower and beg for mercy, or would surrender, bombing his power supply and industries would put the out of action affecting his ability to fight.

I would first like to talk of the most hyped up goal of "strategic bombing" - the breaking down of the morale of a people and their will to fight. This bogey is pushed endlessly but there is precious little evidence that this has ever happened. Conventional bombs are just not big enough for even a small country like Vietnam (which received more tonnage of bombs than Germany in WW2) to have the morale of its people beaten out.

The worst air raids on London did not break British civilian morale.

Two days after the 1945 fire bombing air raid on the German city of Dresden in which 70,000 people died - the trains were running again.

Battles in January 1945 in Germany resulted in 8000 allied deaths and 25000 German deaths. After all the "strategic bombing" of 1944 these figures only indicate that the Germans were fighting, and fighting hard.

Pages 159 to 163 of this link show how all these gaoals of strategic bombing failed over North Korea.

Vietnam has already been mentioned several times. The less said the better about the effectiveness of "strategic bombing" as a war shortening or war terminating strategy. Iraq and Afghanistan are modern day examples in which air power of the "strategic" type was utilized and those wars have hardly broken the will of a population to generate fighting men.

At this point, when it is perfectly clear that all the aims that "strategic bombing" are advertised to achieve are not being met, we start getting - from the highest policymakers who started these "strategic bombing" attacks - a series of strategic excuses as to why it won't work

*Germany was unable to conduct proper strategic bombing
*The allied bombing worked well - hiding the fact that it was not teh bombing that worked - it was the physical occupation of territory by hard won battles right up to the end of the war. The Germans kept on fighting.
*Utter failure in Korea (guerilla warfare)
*Utter failure in Vietnam (guerilla warfare)
*Failure in Iraq (guerilla warfare)
*Failure in Afghanistan (guerilla warfare)

Heck - strategic bombing does not work as advertised. From the list of strategic failures and strategic excuses given it can be concluded that the claims about "civilian morale" and "enemy's will to fight" are all balderdash.

Does this mean that "strategic bombing" does not work?

Not at all. Not by a long shot. Bombing does work. Even if i merely improves the morale of your own troops - it is an asset. But the dividing lines between so called "strategic bombing" and "tactical bombing" need to be re examined.

What is called strategic bombing is the same as tactical strike. It helps in a war effort. But it does not do all those war winning things that are claimed. "Strategic" is therefore tactical, not strategic. One needs to use the words "strategic bombing" with caution because it evokes pictures of effects that simply do not occur.

The more I think about it - the more it appears to me that strategic bombing really is a sham. It is tactical strike by another name. Sony vs Panasonic.

wig · Post by **wig** » 11 Jul 2009 08:59

In WW2 the Luftwaffe (German Air force) was lacking in certain aspects during the aerial bombing of Britain. Its Bombers were relatively speaking light. secondly, the fighters of the Luftwaffe by the time they were over Britain were at the end of the tether ( figuratively speaking) they were running out of fuel. Probably Me 109 the mainstay fighter of the Luftwaffe had 10 minutes of combat time remaining if they wanted to return to the french coast - not necessarily a landing strip. The RAF ( British air force) by contrast was fighting and crashlanding on its own soil. i think this must have helped morale of the RAF pilots whereas the Luftwaffe pilots would have been at a disadvantage. Luftwaffe Bombers were finding it difficult to deliver bomb loads to designated targets due to attacking RAF machines and the lack of staying power of there own machines.
Modern day bombs would be much more effective. The infrastructure available to citizens makes a difference. Most Western countries in the cold war era concentrated on underground railway networks in cities primarily because of the utility that the London Underground (tube) had during the WW2 Blitz. People could sleep in shifts and use the toilet facilites. Their homes had been reduced to rubble.
What i imply is that a modern city would be unable to recover promptly. peak bombing in Vietnam took place in 1965 to 1972 . The civic amenities available at that time in North Vietnam at that time in my opinion were rudimentary.
But modern day strategic bombing would not mean much to a population that is lacking in civic infrastructure that we have in Indian cities. it would steel up the resolve of the recipeint of the strategic bombs.Survivors of A bombed out community could be sufficiently motivated to end up as even more dangerous IED (human bombs) where ther is little to do to prevent them. An example could be Israel. (The Palestinian Human Bombs)

Prem Kumar · Post by **Prem Kumar** » 11 Jul 2009 10:52

Shiv,

It depends on what goals you are trying to achieve via strategic bombing. For example: if our goal is to bomb the infrastructure and war making ability of Pakistan so that its never a serious threat to us again, then strategic bombing will be very effective. If however, our goal is the occupation of Pakistan, then it will be only effective in a limited fashion - because of guerrilla warfare on our troops if they become occupying troops.

Similarly, if you define the U.S goals of bombing both Iraq and Afghanistan back to the stone age, then the bombing has succeeded spectacularly. Neither of these countries will anytime soon become a serious conventional military threat to anyone. Yes, they will carry out guerrilla attacks but thats the best they can do. If we can do to Pakistan what was done to Iraq, I am sure we will all be mighty happy.

Also, from reading your notes & links on WW2, Vietnam etc you do make a very good case for the limitations of strategic bombing. But if we extrapolate these past results to today, we will end up learning the wrong lessons from history. That is because the bombing campaigns of yesteryears had nowhere near the precision that today's airforces can muster. That's why you had trains running 2 days after Dresden. If the U.S decides to bomb Dresden today, you can be darn sure there is going to be no train running for a few years.

What makes strategic bombing very attractive in today's environment is the combination of precision and payload. This needs to be, of course, tied to clear goals.

Strategic bombing means..