Aerial bombing of cities A species of strategic bombing , the aerial bombing of cities began in 1915 during World War I , grew to a vast scale in World War II , and continues to the present day . The development of aerial bombardment marked an increased capacity of armed forces to deliver explosive weapons in populated areas and , as such , has been controversial . A number of multilateral efforts have been made to restrict the use of aerial bombardment so as to protect civilian populations . Before World War I . First Italian War of Independence . The first bombs delivered to their targets by air were launched on unmanned balloons , carrying a single bomb , by the Austrians against Venice in 1849 , during the First Italian War of Independence . Balkan War . Adrianople ( presently Edirne ) was bombed by Bulgaria in 1912 in the First Balkan War . Historically , it was the first bombardment of a city from a heavier - than - air craft . In the morning of 29 October 1912 at 9 : 30 a . m . the plane Albatros F - 3 took off from an airfield near the village of Mustafa Pasha - present day Svilengrad , Bulgaria . The pilot was captain Radul Mikov with spotter and bombardier Prodan Tarakchiev . The airfield was specially created to carry out the take off and landing . According to the report weather conditions were perfect . The flight lasted for 1 hour and 20 minutes and the altitude was 500m . During the flight the crew flew over the city of Edrine , discovered hidden ottoman forces in the nearby villages and flew towards to city railroad station , near the village of Karaagach . The plane was equipped with two bombs , which were released at 10 : 00 am over the station . The crew landed successfully at the airfield with 4 holes on the hull . A number of journalists and military attachés attended the site . Mexican Revolution . In May 1914 , during the revolution of 1910 – 17 , General Venustiano Carranza , later president , ordered a biplane to bomb Neveria Hill adjacent to the downtown area of Mazatlán in order to take the city . The bomb landed not on target but in a city street and in the process killed two citizens and wounded several others . World War I . One of the first aerial bombardments of civilians during World War I was on 19 January 1915 , in which two German Zeppelin s dropped 24 fifty - kilogram ( 110 lb ) high - explosive bombs and ineffective three - kilogram incendiaries on the English towns of Great Yarmouth , Sheringham , King ' s Lynn , and the surrounding villages ; in all , four people were killed , 16 injured , and monetary damage was estimated at £7 , 740 . London was bombed in May and in July 1916 , the Kaiser allowed directed raids against urban centers , sparking 23 airship raids in 1916 in which 125 tons of ordnance were dropped , killing 293 people and injuring 691 . Gradually British air defenses improved and the Germans also introduced large bomber aircraft for bombing Britain . In 1917 and 1918 there were only eleven Zeppelin raids against England , and the final raid occurred on 5 August 1918 , which resulted in the death of KK Peter Strasser , commander of the German Naval Airship Department . By the end of the war , 51 raids had been undertaken , in which 5 , 806 bombs were dropped , killing 557 people and injuring 1 , 358 . In the course of the Zeppelin raids the Germans lost more than half their airships and 40 % of their crew . It has been argued that the raids were effective far beyond material damage inflicted , in diverting and hampering wartime production , and diverting twelve squadrons and over 10 , 000 men to air defenses . The British developed an Independent Force of long range bombers that could bomb Berlin but the war ended before these raids began . After the war , bombers ' increasing sophistication led to the general belief that aerial bombing would both destroy cities and be impossible to stop ; as Stanley Baldwin stated in a 1932 speech , " The bomber will always get through " . Interbellum period . Somaliland Campaign . Following the end of World War I , the British stepped up their efforts in their war against the Somali Dervish state , led by the so - called " Mad Mullah " , whom they had been fighting for the control the area formerly known as British Somaliland . However , they had been unable to defeat the Dervish state for nearly 25 years . In January 1920 , the British launched a combined aerial and land attack , bombarding Taleeh , the capital of the Dervish State . The Somaliland Campaign has been described as one of the bloodiest and longest - running conflicts in the history of sub - Saharan Africa and the Somali forces are noted for concurrently repelling the invading British , Italian and Abyssinian forces for a period of 25 years . Second Italo - Abyssinian War . The Italians used aircraft against the Ethiopia n cities in the Second Italo - Abyssinian War . For example , in February 1936 , the Italian invasion forces in the south prepared for a major thrust towards the city of Harar . On 22 March , the " Regia Aeronautica " bombed Harar and Jijiga as a prelude . Both cities were reduced to ruins even though Harar had been declared an " open city " . Spanish Civil War . During the Spanish Civil War , the Nationalists under Francisco Franco made extensive use of aerial bombing on civilian targets . Nazi Germany gave aircraft to Franco to support the overthrow of the Spanish Republican government . The first major example of this came in November 1936 , when German and Spanish aircraft bombed Republican - held Madrid ; this bombardment was sustained throughout the Siege of Madrid . Barcelona and Valencia were also targeted in this way . On 26 April 1937 , the German " Luftwaffe " ( Condor Legion ) bombed the Spanish city of Guernica carrying out the most high profile aerial attack of the war . This act caused worldwide revulsion and was the subject of a famous painting by Picasso , but by the standards of bombings during World War II , casualties were fairly minor ( estimates ranging from 500 to 1 , 500 ) . Shortly after , the front page headlines of the " Diario de Almeria " , dated June 3 , 1937 , referred to the press in London and Paris carrying the news of the " criminal bombardment of Almeria by German planes " . Barcelona was bombarded for three days beginning on 16 March 1938 , at the height of the Spanish Civil War . Under the command of the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini , Italian aircraft stationed on the island of Majorca attacked 13 times dropping 44 tons of bombs , aimed at the civil population . These attacks were at the request of General Franco as retribution against the Catalan population . The medieval Cathedral of Barcelona suffered bomb damage and more than one thousand people died , including many children . The number of people injured is estimated to be in the thousands . Many others Spanish towns and cities were bombed by the German " Legion Condor " and the Italian " Aviazione Legionaria " among them Jaen , Durango , Granollers and Alicante . Second Sino - Japanese War . During the Manchurian Incident of 1931 , the Japanese widely used airplanes to indiscriminately bomb key targets and cities , such as Mukden . After the Marco Polo Bridge Incident , the Imperial Japanese Army Air Service , in conjunction with the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service , began relentlessly bombing Shanghai , Beijing ( Peking ) , Tianjin ( Tientsin ) and several cities on the Chinese coast from the beginning of the Second Sino - Japanese War in 1937 . The bombing campaigns on Nanking and Canton which started in September 1937 evoked protests from the Western powers culminating in a resolution by the Far Eastern Advisory Committee of the League of Nations . An example of the many expressions of indignation came from Lord Cranborne , the British Under - Secretary of State For Foreign Affairs : Words cannot express the feelings of profound horror with which the news of these raids had been received by the whole civilized world . They are often directed against places far from the actual area of hostilities . The military objective , where it exists , seems to take a completely second place . The main object seems to be to inspire terror by the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians . . . World War II . European theatre . At the beginning of World War II , bombing of cities prior to invasion was an integral part of Nazi Germany ' s Blitzkrieg concept . In the first stages of war , the Germans carried out many bombings of towns and cities in Poland ( 1939 ) , including the capital Warsaw ( also bombed in 1944 ) , with Wieluń being the first city destroyed by 75 % . The Soviet Union also attempted strategic bombing against Finland , bombing Helsinki . Similar tactics were also used by the Germans during the Rotterdam Blitz in 1940 . While Germany refrained from aerial bombing of British cities after the British declaration of war on Germany in September 1939 , Britain started aerial bombing of Germany , officially focusing on military and industrial targets , on the night of 15 / 16 May with 78 bombers against oil targets , 9 against steelworks and 9 against marshaling yards . Oil remained the main British objective until the summer of 1941 . After the German victory in the Battle of France , the Luftwaffe turned its attention to the United Kingdom . The scale of the attack increased greatly in July , with 258 civilians killed , and again in August with 1 , 075 dead . During the night of 28 / 29 August , British bombers raided targets in and around Greater Berlin for the first time , in response to the bombing of London by the Luftwaffe . On 7 September the Luftwaffe began massed attacks on London in retaliation . Following Hitler ' s decision to drop the invasion plans , there was an intensive bombing of cities in the UK , including London and Coventry . The bombing campaign was known in the UK as " the Blitz " , and ran from September 1940 through to May 1941 with the goal of forcing the British government to accept peace without the need for an invasion . The Coventry Blitz and the Belfast Blitz were two of the most disastrous of all bombings by the Luftwaffe , killing 568 - 1 , 000 civilians of Coventry , killing over 1 , 100 people in Belfast and destroying much of both city centres . British bombing policy evolved during the war . In the beginning , the RAF was forbidden to attack targets in Germany due to the risk of accidental civilian casualties . Following a German attack on military targets in the Orkney Islands on 16 March 1940 that killed a civilian , the RAF mounted its first attack against a German land target , the seaplane base on the island of Sylt . The RAF began attacking transport targets west of the Rhine on the night of 10 May following the German invasion of the Low Countries , and military targets in the rest of Germany after the bombing of Rotterdam . On 9 September 1940 RAF crews were instructed that due to the " indiscriminate " nature of German bombing , if they failed to find their assigned targets they were to attack targets of opportunity rather than bring their bombs home . On the 15 / 16 December the RAF carried out its first area bombing attack ( destroying 45 % of the city of Mannheim ) , in response to the raid on Coventry . In 1942 , the goals of the British attacks were defined : the primary goal was the so - called " morale bombing " , to weaken the will of the civil population to resist . Following this directive intensive bombing of highly populated city centers and working class quarters started . On 30 May 1942 , the RAF Bomber Command launched the first " 1 , 000 bomber raid " when 1 , 046 aircraft bombed Cologne in Operation Millennium , dropping over 2 , 000 tons of high explosive and incendiaries on the medieval town and burning it from end to end . 411 civilians and 85 soldiers were killed , more than 130 , 000 had to leave the city . Two further 1 , 000 bomber raids were executed over Essen and Bremen , but to less effect than the destruction at Cologne . The effects of the massive raids using a combination of blockbuster bomb s and incendiaries created firestorm s in some cites . The most extreme examples were caused by the bombing of Hamburg in Operation Gomorrah ( 45 , 000 dead ) , and the bombings of Kassel ( 10 , 000 dead ) , Darmstadt ( 12 , 500 dead ) , Pforzheim ( 21 , 200 dead ) , Swinemuende ( 23 , 000 dead ) , and Dresden ( 25 , 000 dead ) . The Allies also bombed urban areas in the other countries , including occupied France ( Caen ) and the major industrial cities of northern Italy , like Milan and Turin . Some cities were bombed at the different times by the Luftwaffe and the Allies , for example Belgrade in Yugoslavia and Bucharest in Romania . The Luftwaffe also bombed cities in the Soviet Union , destroying Stalingrad in a massive air raid at the start of the Battle of Stalingrad and bombing Leningrad during the siege of the city of 1941 - 1943 . The Soviet bombing of the German cities was limited in comparison with the RAF bombing ( destruction caused by the Soviet army was mainly due to the land artillery ) . The Soviet Air Force also bombed Budapest in Hungary . Pacific theatre . In the Pacific theater , Japan continued to bomb Chinese cities during the Second World War . In the first few months of the war with the Western Powers , Japan projected its airpower on cities as distant as Honolulu , Colombo , and Darwin . The U . S . firebombed Tokyo and killed more than 100 , 000 in the deadliest conventional bombing in history , while some 450 , 000 other civilians died in 66 other cities . In a few hours , 100 , 000 people who were in Tokyo including civilians died either by the bombing or the fire that followed the bombing by 325 US B - 29 ' s night attacks . The fleet included 279 bombers . The bombing was meant to burn wooden buildings and indeed the bombing caused fire that created a 50 m / s wind that is comparable to tornadoes . Each bomber carried 6 tons of bombs . A total of 381 , 300 bombs , which amount to 1783 tons of bombs , were used in the bombing . In addition , the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed over 200 , 000 people . Since World War II . The Cold War ( theoretical ) . During the Cold War , the threat of destruction of cities by nuclear weapon s carried on bombers or ICBM s became the main instrument of the " balance of terror " that deterred the United States and Soviet Union from open warfare with one another due to mutually assured destruction ( See RBS " Express " . ) Korean War . During the Korean War of 1950 - 1953 , United States and other countries of the United Nations ( UN ) coalition heavily bombed the cities in North Korea and the North - occupied South Korea , including their respective capital cities . There were also plans to use nuclear weapons against North Korea and the People ' s Republic of China . Vietnam War . From 1965 to 1968 , during the Vietnam War , the United States Air Force conducted an aerial campaign known as Operation Rolling Thunder . The campaign began with interdiction of supply lines in rural areas of southern North Vietnam but incrementally spread northward throughout the country . In 1966 , restrictions against bombing the capital city of Hanoi and the country ' s largest port , Haiphong , were lifted , and they were bombed by the USAF and Navy . The bombing of the city centers continued to be prohibited . However , the South Vietnam ese cities seized by the communists were bombed , including the former capital of Huế during the 1968 Tet Offensive . The Vietnam Air Force bombed contested cities in South Vietnam in 1968 , 1972 and 1975 , while the Vietnam People ' s Air Force attacked Southern cities ( including the capital city of Saigon ) in 1975 . Arab - Israeli conflict . The Lebanese capital of Beirut was attacked by the Israeli aircraft during the Siege of Beirut in 1982 , and during the 2006 Lebanon War ( using guided munitions ) . Israeli cities were bombed by Egypt ian , Syrian and Jordanian aircraft during the 1948 Arab - Israeli war and the Six day war . The bombing included attacks on some of Israel ' s largest cities , such as Tel Aviv , Jerusalem and Haifa . Israel also conducted air strikes targeting Palestinian targets during the Second Intifada , including against Hamas in Gaza . Wars in Afghanistan . In March 1979 , in response to an uprising the Khalq - control army of Democratic Republic of Afghanistan carpet - bombed the Afghan third - largest city of Herat , causing massive destruction and some 5 , 000 to 25 , 000 deaths . Herat was also repeatedly bombed during the following Soviet involvement in the Afghan civil war . Following the September 11 , 2001 attacks , the U . S . - led coalition attacked the urban targets in Afghanistan using mainly precision - guided munition s ( or " smart bombs " ) . The United States government maintains that it has a policy of striking only militarily significant targets while doing all possible to avoid what it terms " collateral damage " to non - military areas and persons during the US - led war in Afghanistan . Iran – Iraq War . Saddam Hussein ' s Iraq attacked civilian targets in Iranian cities in the " War of the Cities " during the Iran – Iraq War in the 1980s , with Iranians retaliating in kind ( both sides soon switched to ballistic missile attacks ) . Iraqi aircraft also bombed the Iraqi Kurdistan city of Halabja with conventional and chemical weapons in 1988 , killing more than 5 , 000 people in the largest aerial poison gas attack in history . Gulf War . The Iraqi Air Force attacked Kuwait City in 1990 and bombed their own cities during the 1991 uprisings in Iraq , targeting civilians with the use of bomb - carrying helicopter s ( use of airplanes was banned by the Coalition as part of the ceasefire agreement that ended hostilities of the Gulf War but not the war itself ) . UN - led coalition aircraft attacked targets in Iraqi cities , including in the capital Baghdad and the largest southern city of Basra during Operation Desert Storm in 1991 . Yugoslav wars . During the Yugoslav wars , the Yugoslav Air Force attacked cities in Croatia during the Croatian War of Independence in 1991 , most notably the besieged city of Vukovar which was destroyed by a range of explosive weapons , including air strikes and artillery . In the Kosovo War of 1999 , NATO warplanes bombed city areas , including the Serbian capital of Belgrade , killing several hundred people in Serbia and Kosovo . Chechen wars . Post - Soviet Russia heavily bombed the Chechen capital of Grozny from the air with mostly unguided munitions ( including fuel - air explosive s ) as well as bombarding it with a massive artillery barrage s ( 1994 – 1995 , 1996 and 1999 – 2000 ) , killing thousands of people ( some estimates say 27 , 000 civilians were killed during the 1994 - 1995 siege alone ) including civilians during the First and Second Chechen War s . Although the Russian pilots and soldiers are ordered to attack designated targets only , such as the Presidential Palace , due to their inexperience and lack of training , Russian soldiers and pilots bombed and shelled at random targets inside the city instead . In 2003 , the UN still called Grozny the most destroyed city on earth . Iraq War . In 2003 Invasion of Iraq , the U . S . - led coalition aircraft again bombed Iraq , including the Shock and Awe campaign of precision bombing of government targets in the city centers . Since then , coalition aircraft attack Iraqi insurgent targets , including in urban locations like Najaf , Fallujah , Basra and Baghdad . There are frequent reports of civilian casualties , though it is often hard to distinguish guerrillas and civilians . According to Iraq Body Count , thousands of civilians have been killed by aerial bombardment in the Iraq War , the majority during the invasion . Syria . Syrian MiG - 23s bombed the city of Aleppo on 24 July 2012 , the first use of aerial bombing in the Syrian civil war . Other conflicts . Budapest was attacked by the Soviet air strikes in 1956 during the Hungarian Revolution . In 2008 , the cities of Tskhinvali and Gori were hit by the Georgian and Russian aircraft during the war in Georgia . International law . Air warfare , theoretically , must comply with laws and customs of war , including international humanitarian law by protecting the victims of the conflict and refraining from attacks on protected persons . These restraints on aerial warfare are covered by the general laws of war , because unlike war on land and at sea — which are specifically covered by rules such as the Hague Regulations and Protocol I additional to the Geneva Conventions , which contain pertinent restrictions , prohibitions and guidelines — there are no treaties specific to aerial warfare . To be legal , aerial operations must comply with the principles of humanitarian law : " military necessity " , " distinction " , and " proportionality " : An attack or action must be intended to help in the military defeat of the enemy , it must be an attack on a military objective , and the harm caused to civilians or civilian property must be proportional and not excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated .