The Royal Air Force Was Not Justified in Learning Lessons From Spain, Poland and the May War

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Richard Overie says the RAF was right to take different lessons from what it could see. AC Grayling is asked about Otto Clempro, a German Jewish diarist who survived the Holocaust as a consequence of the bombing of Dresden. And Anthony Gormley asks why such terrible things were going on in Europe? Why wouldn't one need to deal with them in a comprehensive retaliation?

No one doubts the bravery of the thousands of men who flew and died in Bomber Command. The death rate was an appalling 44%. And yet until the opening of a monument in Green Park this year they have received no official recognition, with many historians claiming that the offensive was immoral and unjustified. How can it be right, they argue, for the Allies to have deliberately targeted German cities causing the death of hundreds of thousands of civilians? Even on a strategic level the offensive failed to bring about the collapse of civilian morale that was its intention. Others, however, maintain that the attacks made a decisive contribution to the Allied victory. Vast numbers of German soldiers and planes were diverted from the eastern and western fronts, while Allied bombing attacks virtually destroyed the German air force, clearing the way for the invasion of the continent. In this debate from October 2012, philosopher and author A C Grayling and Professor of History at Exeter University Rochard Overy...

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