Evening star., 1943-07-31
Bombing Of Hamburg |
Test of German Morale
By Maj. George Fielding Eliot.

The Allied high command appears to
have taken the decision to destroy the
city of Hamburger at least to continue
major air attacks on that city until 1t
Is seen that results can be obtained from
| concentrated and continuous bombing
on the truly terrible scale possible under
conditions now prevailing on the west
ern air front.
Hamburg is the second city of Ger
many. Its normal peacetime population
Is we'll over a million. 1t is thus COM
parable with such American cities as
Detroit or Cleveland. 1t has very large
| industries, many of them connected
directly or indirectly with shipbuilding.
| 1t contains, for example, the largest
submarine building establishments in
! Germany. 1t is also Germany's most
| important seaport.
There can be several very good reasons
| why Hamburg was chosen for this con-
| centrated air attack. One would be to
| paralyze the German U-boat campaign
by cutting sharply into Germanys means
| for building Uboats and manufacturing
U-boat engines and other equipment.
That, in itself, would be very great
gain for the United Nations.
Another might be to interfere with the
now OF German coastwise shipping,
which is so important a part of the
German transportation system. Recently
good deal of our air attention has been
devoted to attacks on German transpor-
tatlon. The Raj coastal command has
been attacking coastal shipping at sea;
the fighter command and American day
raiders have been attacking trains, with
special attention to locomotives, and
there have been many bombings of docks.
railway yards and locomotive factories,
as well as canal locks and canal dock
ing areas
The destruction of the whole of the
port facilities at Hamburg would put
severe crlmp in the German atten1pts
10 make up, by the increased use of
coastal shipping, for the reduced CAPACITY
OF German railways and canals. re-
ouctlon as far as railways are con-
cerned, which is partly due to lack of
manufacturing and repair capacity. as
we'll as to Allied bombing.
Still another reason for the smashing
OF Hamburg might be the effect on the
situation in Norway. Germany still
maintains 10 or II divisions in NORWAY
and the defensive measures taken there
indicate that the Germans are still ner-
vous over the possibility of an Allied Of
fensiVe striking the Norwegian coast.
AT present, the Germans are rushing
troops to Russia to bolster up their tot
terlng defense lines at Orel; thev are
moving other troops into Northern Italv.
they are reported as sending still others
into the Balkans to take the place of
Italian troops, which are either with
drawing or in which the Germans have
ios1 confidence. They must remember
the possibilities of fresh Russian often.
SlVe at some other part of the front
OF an Italian collapse, bringing the
armies OF Gen. Eisenhower clear I'M to
the 70, and of an Allied descent on
the Aegean Islands
This is not the moment when tho
German high command would choose
W nave 10 meet an attack on Norway.
yet IL IS just this sort of possibility which
Is opened up to the Allied high command
oy That strategic mobility which sea and
air command confers on the side which
possesses them. If Norway were to be-
come battle-ground, the wiping out of
the great seaport of Hamburg would
make 1t almost as difficult for the Ger
mans to reinforce Norway across the
SKaggerak as the destruction of the port
OF New York would make it for the
united States to reinforce Great Brit
ain at moment of emergency.
however, 1t seems likely that one of
1he major purposes in the continuous
bombing OF Hamburg is to determine bv
actual test just what results NAV be
expected from such bombing as a major
contribution to our victory in this war.
1t Is OF vital Importance to our high
command to know how long it takes.
ana now much effort must be expended
ana at what cost in men and planes,
10 put such great industrial and COM
munlcatlons center as Hamburg CON-
pletely out of commission, and how long
1t takes the enemy to begin to restore
some sort of useful functioning within
such a bombed area or whether he can
do it at all.
Having learned this, the lesson can be
applied to our further operations. we
shall know what proportion of effort
10 put into extending the scale and SCOPE
OF aerial bombardment, and how long
IL Will take us to reduce all the indus-
trial area of Western Germany to COM
ple1e impotence by this means.
FINALLY, there is another lesson to he
1earned-What effect will the destruction
| Oh HAMBURG have on the morale of the
| German people? Suppose that we learned
| that Detroit or Cleveland was beinp me.
thodically wiped out by enemy bomb
ers, had been raided seven times in
! IlVe Gays, day and night. with three
hlsnt attacks on a major scale DROP
ping more than 1000 tons of bombs each
"ltnln the target area And suppose
we learned that no really adequate de-
tense could be made, or was being made
against these enemy operations. How
would we feel about that? Maybe we
Wouldn't crack up. probably we wouldn't.
put we wouldn't be very happy about it,
elther, and we would be very nkelv to
demand that our Government do some
tnlng about it and do it quickly-which
would tend to prevent the Govor,,r r,o,,+