The Firebombing of Dresden: War Crime or Justified Military Necessity?

[@jimmurphy6095]

Quote from Gen Patton: "The object of war is not to die for your country... It's to make the other poor bastard die for his." War sucks.

[@Orxbane]

Wars for small hats suck even more.

[@Chris_Garman]

The object is to control a location. Death is never the goal, unless you are a monster.

[@michaelw3927]

Yes, but there are rules.

[@jimmurphy6095]

@@michaelw3927 Like gassing millions of innocent people?

[@HellStr82]

The other poor bastard... that is a soldier. not a civilian.

[@MegaAloly]

My father was a prisoner of war in Dresden when the bombing was taking place , he spoke little of what he saw , he survived and lived , but appreciate the history thank you .

[@ayarzeev8237]

“We cried tears of joy as we saw the red glow in the sky. Dresden is burning, the allies are not far away.”

[@somethinglikethat2176]

​@@ayarzeev8237 I forget who said that but I do remember they were being transported to the unaliving camps at the time.

[@ben_brice]

My great grandfather was a POW also in Dresden during the bombing, one of his fellow POW’s after the war wrote an account of his experience on typewriter. During the lockdown I decided to type it up, so there’s a digital copy, over 20,000 words (yes I was bored)…but it is fascinating insight.

[@ayarzeev8237]

@ where can we read it?

[@somethinglikethat2176]

@@ayarzeev8237 it definitely saved a lot of innocent people over the camps.

[@silencehill3355]

I am from Dresden, Germany actually and grew up with stories of the Dresden bombing. I grew up with the peoples anger and grief over what had happened. I grew up seeing the ruins of what had been. I grew up fearing war, which likely was also an intented effect. i was not told back then, why it might have happened. people did not speak about such things. I only learned the very basic facts. So quite a few things you mentioned were new to me and food for thought. Personally I feel unable to judge. I still feel too close to this, even though my grandparents were children when this happened. I cannot be neutral. And i think the same goes for everyone whose family survived a bombing. Be it here of in Britain or anywhere else.

[@kaltaron1284]

It's also worth noting that the Soviets loved to point at the bombing of Dresden as an imperialistic-capitalist war crime. But in the end it was with cooperation from the UK that we were able to restore one if the last well-known ruins. I much prefer the latter view.

[@ejtappan1802]

Thank you for this comment. You have given me some deep things to think about.

[@JeremyPickett]

Jesus, I get into somewhat of a decent mood, then I watch a Simon WWII video drop. People fucking suck

[@JakeBiszop]

Justified Military Necessity

[@AnimeShinigami13]

Bruh, after experiencing a fire in the apartment below mine, coming out physically and materially unscathed but traumatized, my brain breaks trying to scale that up to an entire city, my current town, my childhood town, the city I went to highschool in, just imagining those all turned to ash... I can't even fathom it!

[@R005t3r]

Curtis LeMay, WW2 American Air Force General, famously said: "If we lost the war, we'd all been prosecuted as war criminals" In regards to his Japanese bombing campaign.

[@papaicebreakerii8180]

If you look at pictures it’s actually hard to tell the difference between firebombed Tokyo and Hiroshima or Nagasaki after the nukes. So yea, I would definitely say he’s onto something

[@claudiaxander]

Japan was free to surrender at any point in a war they started. This is the answer to all claims of this sort in any war begun by the other side.

[@throwback19841]

he also said "I have always tried to slaughter the fewest civilians possible"

[@vic5015]

Not to nitpick, but this does drive me a little nuts. The USAF did not officially exist until 1947. Before that it was the US Army Air Corps.

[@vic5015]

Yeah, probably.

[@chinosekai5969]

My great grandmother lived 20 minutes away from Dresden. Her Father fought in the first Worldwar and died in the second. She took care of me when I was a child and often told me about the traumas of war and the escape from the russians. Now I take care of her and only sometimes she still remembers the detais clearly. I hope the many hours of talking helped her ease her soul.

[@lewismantle3887]

I don’t know why your comment made me feel the way it did. I’m British, I was also raised by my grandmother, and I had great-grandparents who fought and grandparents who lived during the Wars, a couple from the south who were young during The Blitz - but by the time I became aware and interested in that period of history it was too late for them to share with me with their experiences, and so I make do with the experiences as told by others. On a human-level, I’m sorry for what your grandmother (and by extension, your family) had to go through, and (despite not being convinced on the idea of a ‘soul’) I’m honestly glad that the sharing of your grandmothers experiences with you has helped in her coming to terms with, and being at peace with, the absolute horrors which were inflicted upon the world all those years ago - from all sides of those terrible conflicts.

[@floyd0604]

War is Ugly indeed. Total war especially so. If a nation decides to unjustifiably start such a total war and in doing so acts so cruelly that the "gloves come off," then that nation needs to accept the consequences. War is indeed ugly. That's why starting one by being the aggressor is a f***ed up and criminal act. If you sew the wind, dont be surprised or shocked when you reap the whirlwind.

[@chinosekai5969]

@lewismantle3887 it is very sad how much generations after generations are still impacted by the war. And I think it is even more relevant to keep these memories and stories stored somewhere. Not to keep them alive but to not forget... sadly by the time I realized my Omas stories should be documented, she also can't rehearse them clearly anymore. But I collected other stories from other elderly people around here. Maybe it won't happen again, even tho there are constant wars on this planet somewhere. I just hope our grandparents never have to hear these war sirens again.

[@Andyman89.]

“Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster, for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.” -Friedrich Nietzche

[@foo219]

@@Andyman89. War tends to make monsters of men very quickly.

[@mpalfadel2008]

What did Clausewitz say?

[@tedthesailor172]

"These people crawled out of a sewer; you've got to get in the gutter to fight them..."

[@LarryDaLobstah]

“We sleep soundly in our beds, because rough men stand ready in the night to do violence on those who would harm us" - George Orwell

[@michael511128]

In its some 270 years of history, the US has not been at war for 20 or so years. Some US oligarchs have always been monsters starting with the Indians, Monroe Doctrine, Hawaii, black slaves, conquering Mexico, colonizing Philippines, Banana Republic, overthrowing Iran, Cuba blockcade, Indonesia massacre, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Latin America, Africa, ISIS, Al Qaeda, Gaza, Syria and counting.

[@sandhilltucker]

"War doesn't determine who's right, only who's left."

[@ChurchNietzsche]

Only the Dead have seen the End of War. -- Plato

[@eddiewallace3362]

​@@ChurchNietzsche well put.

[@EstanislaoSantino-xk8uz]

Sometimes War determined who is right and resilience.

[@johntherevelator2020]

​@@ChurchNietzsche I guess plato never met survivors in his day.

[@ChurchNietzsche]

@johntherevelator2020 Plato, has been dead over 1000 years. ... ... War, continues!!

[@marksellers4875]

Much as I'm LOATHE to quote W.T. Sherman... " War is all Hell, and you can not refine it" He said that in 1864...

[@WesleyAnderson]

"War is cruelty. It cannot be refined ".

[@patrickdillon5517]

It can and has been refined, yet you have some of the most technology advanced armed forces on the planet still engage in wilfully murdering unarmed innocent civilians. The problem is not the technology, it's the lack of humanity that is inherent in any military's training, where you have a need to dehumanise the enemy, you train people to kill, who they choose to kill in an environment where accountability is scarce or non-existent is ultimately up to whoever controls the weapon. When you train a person to become desensitised to an act that is unnatural to our species, they can become capable of untold atrocities. This has been shown again and again throughout history and even in today's information age, where almost anything is a click away, these things remain buried deep, hidden away from public scrutiny for reasons of 'national security'. If someone tries to break the veil of secrecy surrounding these war crimes, they themselves will be prosecuted and imprisoned. It's legally more dangerous to be a whistle-blower than it is to actually actually commit the killings. Our governments have done this and so soldiers who witness these atrocities cannot even speak out, for fear of imprisonment. (This is not directed at you personally, it's directed at the military industrial complex that creates these atrocities)

[@lastchips7638]

Thats quite convenient, isnt it? Specially for the US, since they never get held accountable, wether that be mass executions of POWs, fire bombing of civilians, or strafing runs on south korean refugees Not accountable, because "war is hell", so lets just ignore those deaths, lets just ignore the rapes, lets just ignore the soviet death camps in Poland The quote should really say "If you want to get away with war crimes, you have to win the war"

[@jasonvaughan6780]

Fishing....

[@Nathan-vt1jz]

@@patrickdillon5517 …Or instead of a millennia long conspiracy, perhaps it is the consistent result of human nature.

[@victoriaman117]

My grandfather took part in bombing Dresden, he made no bones about it that it was a genocide to make Hitler realize the allies could do this to every German city if they choose too

[@violetta47]

You must shame 😢

[@cuntontheweb2657]

Shame on you.

[@iniquity123]

​@violetta47 why ? He didn't do it !

[@captainspaulding5963]

​@@violetta47 you must learn to understand what you are reading

[@StephanieOrlowski-r5x]

One of my clients who recently passed away was one of the few people who survived when she was a small child. Everyone in her immediate family died in the bombing. She had some fascinating stories having grown up during WWII. She was a wonderful person.

[@hossosplitternacken7819]

my mother was born in Dresden Dezember ´44.. and my grandmother knew that Dresden will be bombed , so she packed her stuff inc my mother and had been gone before justice was raing down in february ´45 😉

[@Blalack77]

Slaughterhouse-Five is where I first heard about the Dresden firebombing. It goes into pretty gory detail. Probably my favorite book.

[@brianshanahan5274]

I'm surprised Kurt Vonnegut wasn't mentioned.

[@augiegirl1]

What I know about it comes from a piece of music that my high school band performed my junior year: Symphony #1 (Dresden Bombing) by Daniel Bukvich. It’s ABSOLUTELY CHILLING!!

[@taylorcoloske7366]

Kurt Vonnegut is one of those authors that the universe sent to me exactly when it needed to. I found a copy of Catch-22 on a seat in an otherwise empty airport terminal waiting on a redeye back home when i was eleven or twelve. His style of optimistically self-deprecating gallows humor really helped shape who i would eventually become

[@OlyChickenGuy]

Just came to the comments to see if anyone mentioned this book. From what I remember, that section of the book is based on Vonnegut's own experiences as a drafted soldier, and one thing he mentions is that the absolute devastation was an accident. Yes, they meant to destroy the city, but the way the bombs fell wasn't coordinated, and was a key factor in how the fires created that sucking vortex which created the absolute destruction and insanely high temperatures recorded in the city. According to Vonnegut, this bombing was studied and then replicated elsewhere in the war to create similar fire vortexes. What caused the vortex seems to be that the bombs just so happened to land in a circle (or semi-circle?) which alit a ring, depriving the inside of the ring of oxygen, thus creating the intense vacuum. I was introduced to Kurt Vonnegut through watching an actual theatrical production of Happy Birthday, Wanda June in middle school, then seeing a familiar name (including the book version of the play) on my high school art teacher's personal literature shelf, which she granted me access to. Obviously, his work made a huge impact on me, and I love seeing that others have also felt the same.

[@foo219]

Same

[@buckynick]

Same fire storm happed to Hamburg. It still wears the scars to this day.

[@JakeBiszop]

no now hamburg is islamic.... Justified Military Necessity

[@hossosplitternacken7819]

@@JakeBiszop "The peoples of Islam will always be closer to us than, for example, France...Had Charles Martel not been victorious at Poitiers ... then we should in all probability have been converted to Mohammedanism, that cult which glorifies the heroism and which opens up the seventh Heaven to the bold warrior alone. Then the Germanic races would have conquered the world." - Adolf H. .. you see everything goes as planned

[@Orxbane]

@@mrdarkside4071 Did the Germans intentionally create a firestorm and then come back with a second wave to kill the first responders to the original raid? It was a war crime and there is no excusing it. No more brother wars to enrich small hats.

[@JakeBiszop]

@@mrdarkside4071 MAYBE FIRST WHAT THE Y DID TO WARSAW???? netherlands were allies of hitler...

[@JayTide]

​@@mrdarkside4071 not even close in terms of scale and devastation.

[@ulin4226]

My mother was evacuated as a young child to the Harz Mountains. She told us that they could see the eastern sky glowing red at night when Dresden - about 200km away - was burning.

[@juicyfruit4378]

@@ulin4226 I highly doubt it as the topography between Dresden and the Harz Mountains is too far and mountainous. Secondly, Dresden lies in a flat basin also surrounded by mountainous terrain. It would be like people living in Nuremberg seeing the sky glowing red due to Frankfurt being bombed which is 220 kilometers from each other

[@ulin4226]

@ so you are saying my mother and my relatives were all lying when they related that story to us? They were at a high elevation on the east side of the Harz. As they said - the horizon was red like a sunrise. They didn’t say they saw the city burning!

[@juicyfruit4378]

@ listen carefully and leave your emotions on the shelf - the mere distance of 220 kilometers vis-a-vis flat to mountainous terrain ranging from the Harz over to Thuringia through the Erzgebirge and Ore Mountains would have mad it impossible to see ANY weather variation in that distance notwithstanding the numerous atmosphere changes from cities such as Halle, Leipzig, Jena, Erfurt, Gera Zwickau that were also bombed during the same time - one just needs to take a look on the map to see the urban and topographical variations to see that the distance is too far

[@euphoriaggaminghd]

​@@juicyfruit4378alright buddy, I'm sure you were there and could confirm 👍🏻

[@juicyfruit4378]

@@euphoriaggaminghd I‘m sure you don’t know geography - now take your C arse out of an A B conversation

[@gailkarran3395]

I'm British. 54F. I grew up listening to the stories from my grandparents. While the horror of war is universal, affecting all. The reasons for this war, and the one before it, should never be forgotten. Be careful who you vote for.

[@herrheerhairheryeah2310]

Agree , but need to add , without the versailles treaty , all of those horrific things would never have happend . Never Again Brotherwars !

[@markuslenzing7386]

„Be careful who you vote for” that is so true. As a german I feel ashamed and embarrassed looking at the map of the points where these V1 and V2 weapons hit. I was fairly sure social media platforms would connect people in a way, that would make future conflicts less likely, but Ukraine and middle east told me otherwise.

[@NeilLewis77]

@@herrheerhairheryeah2310 blaming the treaty for what they did is a cop out.

[@ginmar8134]

​@@markuslenzing7386Yeah, we have an orange dictator taking office in January.

[@colinevans8619]

@@NeilLewis77Agreed.

[@prfwrx2497]

If I recall correctly, during WW2 night bombing, the imprecise nature of the craft is such that if one wishes to destroy *a* singular factory or rail yard with certainty, one would have to drop enough bombs and incendiary devices to essentially wreck the entire city. The means for precision in the context of night time, long range aerial bombardment simply did not exist in the 1940s. Circular error probables (CEP - radius in which half your ordnance can be expected to land within) are measured at about 400 meters - for daytime bombardment using state of the art Norden bombsights. At night, this figure could've easily tripled when considering an entire sortie as an average. Then of course there's the matter of "dehousing" as a strategic aim against Nazi Germany. Simply put, a homeless population won't be able to contribute to war industry. But it's also important to note that such industries during the 1940s were so labor intensive in the first place precisely because lack of precision entailed orders of magnitude more production in warheads and propellants to deliver warheads to targets.

[@randall39]

True comment. Our bombing success was way overstated for propaganda reasons, but the fact was the Nordan bomb sight was terribly inaccurate, especially from high altitude. We could bomb a target many times without hitting it, so “area bombing” was adopted. Horrible outcomes, but war is horrible 😢

[@darthplagueis13]

I mean, even with the accuracy issues, there's a question to be raised about the use of the incendiary bombs.

[@randall39]

@@darthplagueis13 I tend to agree. It’s sad to end life in such a devastating manner, but the momentum of war tends to support the use of questionable tactics. War is bad, always bad but sometimes decisions made in the heat of war can be seen as too aggressive during peacetime. 🤕😓

[@Britton_Thompson]

I think it's important to keep in mind that WW2 was still the "Wild West" in the arena of aerial combat where anything could go. WW2 was the first time airplanes carried large bombs to drop on ground based targets. There were no rules in place at the time for air forces to adhere to the same way there were for ground and sea forces with treaties such as the Geneva Convention. As a result, generals urged aerial commanders to crank it up when bombing the enemy in an effort to save infantrymen since they could still get away with it with no ROEs in place for air forces. Obviously, WW1 was the first time airplanes were used as weapons of war, but they primarily only shot at each other in dogfights or were used for aerial reconnaissance of the enemy's position below. They weren't really used to bomb troops on the ground or munitions factories since the technology still hadn't advanced enough for planes to be used as "heavy bombers" just yet. Aerial bombing was still in it's nascent infancy stages during WW2. As a result, all of the leaders of the major belligerents' air forces poured it on when attacking the enemy because there was still the belief you could simply bomb the enemy into submission if you pursued it heavily enough. All of them believed this- Goring, Harris, LeMay, Novikov, Yamamoto, etc. Combined with there being no Geneva Convention for air forces, everyone turned it up to 11 whenever they got the chance to do so.

[@kaltaron1284]

The Spanish Civil War was the first taste of what planes could do. The Allied strategic bombing was the next step. Funnily the Allies charged the Germans with crimes that became crimes after the war but omitted their own actions.

[@diggernash1]

Anything will go today in a world struggle. The rules of warfare will fall by the wayside if a large enough conflict erupts. We will never evolve beyond this fact.

[@adoredpariah]

That's a pretty weak excuse to be honest. Basically saying "we didn't know any better because it was a new form of warfare" doesn't really square up to the obvious outcome of dropping firebombs onto cities.

[@jordanchermen2393]

There are no rules to war. People can sit on their high horse and create this rules for war but when war comes and the gloves are off, anything goes. Scream and cry war crimes this and that but each side will do what it takes to win. There isn’t a moral victory in war, only what and who is left.

[@adoredpariah]

@@jordanchermen2393 So, are you saying we shouldn't have punished the people responsible for the holocaust?

[@elbcoastnative7638]

This happened not only in Dresden but in many other large cities. Hardly anyone talks about - Millions of Germans were expelled from Central and Eastern Europe (e.g., Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Yugoslavia). These actions were partly based on the decisions of the 1945 Potsdam Conference, where the Allies agreed on the "orderly and humane" resettlement of Germans. During the expulsions, massacres, rapes, expropriations, and other severe human rights violations occurred. Estimates suggest that between 500,000 and 2 million people died, either due to direct violence or as a result of hunger, disease, and exhaustion.

[@matthewk6522]

Nobody talks about it because Germany brought upon orders of magnitude more suffering. Germany brought everything it suffered upon itself and deserves no sympathy.

[@elbcoastnative7638]

@@matthewk6522 It's clear to me that guys like you have no compassion for people who couldn't do anything about it. But I also think that we are holding an entire people hostage for the crimes of their regime. Then what happened in Gaza is completely okay. Then you should list how many innocent victims the USA has on its list. The only nation to drop atomic bombs on cities. We can continue the list with other regimes and nations. But I find it crazy how Dresden or other Allied actions are viewed as completely ligitimate. Absolutely disgusting...

[@Wartrain762]

War crimes are only war crimes if you lose.

[@skycloud4802]

In fairness, only a forward country of free thinking democracy would have the inner introspection to look into it's own atrocities. If the Nazis had took over the world, then entire races would be systematically erased without any trace or evidence. The only reason we even have the freedom of free speech to make these very comments, was because it was won over by generations of people fighting for the liberty to criticise governments and nations.

[@rickappling5470]

No, for a recent one is the genocide of the Palestinians. Should we not label that as a war crime whether or not they win. By the way I believe that like Russia, their wars destroyed their economy. Neither can stop their wars. In one case it would likely involve something like a firing squad. The other prison.

[@somethinglikethat2176]

@@Wartrain762 not really. It was within the law of the time. And there are cases like Dönitz who wasn't prosecuted for unrestricted submarine warfare, because everyone did it and it was the only real way to do it.

[@Wartrain762]

@@somethinglikethat2176 lmao you just proved my point 😆

[@polybius2175]

​@@Wartrain762 How does that prove your point? The guy he's talking about is german, the guys who lost lol

[@mapratt]

I agree that, now that we have seen the results of modern weapons, trying to agree to limit their use to military targets is the wise goal. We might also argue that living together, working through differences, letting others be, is wise. Unfortunately, humanity does not appear to be ready to live that way.

[@douglasharbert3340]

As long as religion exists, so will war....

[@Steuben1978]

​@@douglasharbert3340 Its not religion alone that causes war. Us vs them....Homo sapiens evolved that way. War and killing each other is in our nature.

[@1965Grit]

​@douglasharbert3340 religion is not what starts wars, instead, religion is often used to justify war!!

[@mapratt]

@@douglasharbert3340 Yes, although I don't think that is behind the conflict in Ukraine, or in China's desire for Mongolia.

[@aaronmcconkey1062]

​@@maprattyeah the 2014 maidon coup was

[@ben1895]

A balanced twist to this video would have been to have a similar quote from someone from Coventry describing a similar same experience.

[@simonkevnorris]

Or someone from Guernica (The Germans bombed the city during the Spanish Civil War).

[@juicyfruit4378]

@@simonkevnorrisor Warsaw which made Coventry look like a playground

[@czoborarpi]

I know it is not a numbers game but Coventry suffered mildly compared to this. Also the British killed like 10 times more civilians then the Germans eith bombs.

[@juliaforsyth8332]

Coventry had a firestorm? I didn't know that.

[@juicyfruit4378]

@ the entire heart of Coventry was destroyed by fire from Luftwaffe bombings

[@ceebee491]

An,important moment in history to document. It highlights how, once a war starts..it's who survives rather than who wins. 🇧🇪🇬🇧 ❤

[@SeanBZA]

Do not forget the writer who survived it, Kurt Vonnegut, who incorporated that as part of his writing style.

[@fallowed]

As a Pompy kid, who's town was levelled during the war. i think we should all understand it's not 'which' kids, But any kids that felt the brunt of that war. As far as I'm aware, there aren't any adults without a compassion for them.

[@joshuabaker5712]

The entity of the Nazi regime had no compassion for anyone who wasn't a Nazi, child or adult.

[@JJONNYREPP]

The Firebombing of Dresden: War Crime or Justified Military Necessity? 0649am 30.12.24 then let's whittle it all down to warfare being a repugnant justification of might is right or a desire to laud it over another people with historical revisionism...

[@theOwnuts]

I lived in Dresden for four years, near a landmark called "Trümmerberg" which translates to something like Rubble Hill. It is one of the sites where rubble from the bombing was piled up after the war. Its now overgrown and a spot for people to take walks or barbecue in summer. Its pretty big, I don't know how big exactly, I'd say about 25m higher than surrounding areas and a few hundred meters across. It provides a bit of a scale of the amount of destruction Dresden faced. There are Trümmerberge in basically all big german cities.

[@Britton_Thompson]

Dresden had strategic wartime value to justify bombing it, but Allied Air leaders Curtis LeMay and Arthur "Bomber" Harris rejected the idea of 'overkill' in a war. They encouraged excess.

[@diggernash1]

If one enemy soldier remains, how can it be overkill?

[@Britton_Thompson]

@@diggernash1 When you're hamstringing your own society to have to pay for and rebuild everything you destroyed while fighting the war. You break it? You buy it.

[@Britton_Thompson]

@@diggernash1 When there's not actually any enemy forces there. Weren't you paying attention? He said there was no enemy forces in the city defending Dresden that night. There were just some factories; a railway hub; and was merely the place where German reinforcements heading to the Eastern front would have to pass through to reach the Eastern front. It held strategic value, but it wasn't the site of enemy troop concentrations. Do you really need to burn down an entire city just to sever some rail lines and stop reinforcements heading east? It's risky to take this approach when you're trying to pose as the good guys and liberators. If you're Germany or Japan and you're openly declaring a "war of annihilation" for land and resources, then sure. Go crazy. But you can't really do that if you're trying to be the side representating law and order. When you engage in overkill as a "liberator", you may kill all of the enemy forces there at the time, sure, but you're not actually solving anything long term because subsequent generations will be outraged over it and continue the fight as they grow up. It plants the seeds of retaliation and revenge.

[@harryhanz1690]

Two terms for the same outcame.

[@dylanram4653]

i mean, largely there is no overkill in war, if there is, then "overkill" is just the damage you overdo from that nation not existing anymore

[@mlfett6307]

My parents, now in their 90s, tell me that children were moved from large urban centres to smaller cities or even farms to protect them from possible targets. My father, born and raised in Hamburg was moved a few times with his classmates. What haunts them is that Dresden was considered a lesser risk for bombing, so a number of other large industrial cities moved their children there. To them, this made the horror of the fire bombing even more gut-wrenching - kids their own age, moved there for safety, endured a nightmare if they survived at all.

[@stevenburkhardt1963]

Yes, this would be considered a war crime today. However, every county involved in the war committed war crimes, including the US

[@dafyddthomas7299]

So did Germany commit similar and more war crimes

[@YraxZovaldo]

@@dafyddthomas7299yes. Germany committed a lot of war crimes. That doesn’t justify war crimes against German civilians.

[@kaiser5910]

@@dafyddthomas7299 I agree. But does one crime make another crime right?

[@dafyddthomas7299]

@@kaiser5910 Not really; war the rule book is thrown out the window and the innocents are the one that suffer ( on both sides),

[@d3fc0n_]

we just have to look at this was nearly 80 years ago, and now we would see it posted all over which ever platform, pretty much all counties did war crimes in WW2, obviously the losers get tried, and the winners don’t. “history is written by the victors.” if all was fair, there would’ve been war crimes tribunals in many countries, like the double nuking of japan seems a bit over the top and insane, but the japanese were very proud people and would happily die for their country and their emperor, same with the germans for hitler, there’s way to many nuisances at play, just sad that the civilians who died. and a lot of soldiers who were just fighting for their country.

[@garyclark3843]

It often seems like there is no way to win a discussion on Dresden, because all sides get too defensive to listen. And yet, discuss it we must. War is ugly. This stands high on the evidence of that.

[@dat581]

Many do not want to hear the facts and just scream war crime. Take everything you hear from them and many of the Germans with a large grain of salt. What is rarely mentioned is the German air defence for Dresden utterly failed and everything went right for the RAF and the USAAF raids. Most of the time they did not, especially for a raid at what was considered such a long range almost to the Czech border. Both Bomber Command and the 8th Air Force were shocked at the very light losses they took from the Dresden raids. Had they known the German air defences were going to fail the raids would not have required so much effort but of course this can never be predicted beforehand.

[@Orxbane]

@@dat581 Take everything you hear from the small hat controlled media and academia with sack fulls of kosher salt.

[@foo219]

@@dat581 It kind of seems like you're blaming the German air defences for the Allies deciding to fire bomb the city. Deliberately targeting civilians is a war crime. Using weapons that kill in an inhumane way (such as incendiaries) is a war crime.

[@JayTide]

​@@dat581ok but they kept bombing Dresden for about a week continuously so I fail to see your point. If it was a one off then your assertion would be viable.

[@Nephale]

@@dat581 Might aswell blame US air control for 9/11 with that logic.

[@roelofschuldink4177]

History is written by the winner.

[@greendragonspirit1646]

That says everything 😓.

[@Rednecknerd_rob9634]

That's a lie.

[@roelofschuldink4177]

@ No, it’s true. When is the history written by the losers, I ask you. Is it written by the native Americans?

[@thatonelocalauthority2809]

No it is not? This is a dumb phrase. History is written by historians. Historians who have different interpretations of contextual events. That’s why secondary sources differ so much in their overarching arguments and presentation?

[@Rednecknerd_rob9634]

@@roelofschuldink4177 "When is the history written by the losers, I ask you." One example comes to mind, The Lost Cause myth about the American Civil War. As for "Is it written by the native Americans," I'm sure there's histories written by Native Americans, and I would be interested in any history written by Native Americans.

[@TomM1173]

For the end of the video, you could have quoted Erich Kästner, a quite famous native Dresden author (especially of childrens books). He wrote that „Dresden doesn‘t exist anymore“ in an quite moving article, when he visited Dresden in 1946 for the first time after the war.

[@jokodihaynes419]

"one would like to be both the one and the other but because it is difficult to combine them it is far better to be feared than loved if you cannot be both"- Machiavelli

[@gabriellashimone6546]

The quote too many have made their unspoken platform motto.

[@geoffreylee5199]

The firebombing was the centre of the book Slaughterhouse Five. That’s where they were held as PoWs and sheltered during the incident.

[@angelogarcia2189]

"We cried tears of joy at the sight of the red glow in the sky. Dresden is burning; the Allies are not far away." - survivor of Theresienstadt Concentration Camp

[@philgeorge1003]

Of course a jew would be happy about this. They still want it.

[@shaunsmusicreviews]

Ah yes, because the citizens of Dresden were responsible for what was happening in the concentration camps

[@JakeSezz]

Goddamn. That’s a perspective not mentioned in this video and is a helluva perspective.

[@ayarzeev8237]

My favorite quote on the topic

[@churchilltank659]

Do you have a source for this? I’d be interested to read a book or article about it

[@wikedkarana]

I would love to watch a into the shadows, on medical gaslighting. I myself have an invisible chronic illness, and have been dismissed regarding severe injuries....because I wasn't "displaying enough pain".

[@lianagheorma92]

I learned about Dresden in high school (~15 years ago), in Southern California, in English class, when we read Slaughterhouse five by Kurt Vonnergut. Although the class was taught by a conservative teacher, we were told that the Dresden firebombing was a war crime.

[@sirbonobo3907]

Its still is

[@axnyslie]

Less than a month later the Allies did it again on Tokyo with 100,000+ dead, and they still had two atomic bombs waiting for them. Japan was also on the verge of defeat. One positive is the Japanese and Germans never went to war again and became two of the most prosperous nations today.

[@SoulsOnly]

The issue and contrast is that Japan's military leadership was fanatically fatalistic, to the extent of wanting to oust the Emperor in a coup and continue the war. There are a few good examples of the extremes of this thinking, when they found old Japanese soldiers years after the war ended who had to be convinced by their former commanders that yes, Japan had officially surrendered and the war was over. America's estimated casualties were so high that the very same Purple Heart medals that they made in preparation for the invasion of mainland Japan, awarded to those injured in the line of duty, are still being handed out today. The brutal calculus of war dictate that sacrifices have to be made to minimise suffering. Perhaps necessary. Whether something is necessary or not can only be accurately observed after the fact. The hellish reality of the tragedy of war.

[@Orxbane]

Funny how one of the atomic bomb targets was Japan's largest Christian populations. Small hats hate Christians.

[@Obospeedo]

It’s wasn’t just Tokyo. Nearly every major city in Japan had been firebombed by July 1945. Kokura, Nagasaki and Hiroshima plus a few others among the few being “spared” only to be used as potential atomic strike locations

[@fjashfcsahds]

They aren´t doing as well anymore as you would like to think.

[@karlheinzvonkroemann2217]

71 German cities were firebombed. Japan got the same treatment. Together over a million were killed. This guy can be such an idiot. He turns his rant into an attack on 90 year David Irving. Very sad.

[@RandomPersonOnTheLine]

As someone in the US military , the idea that anyone can see either Dresden or Munich as anything but a war crime is disturbing imo.

[@alliedmastercomputer5407]

amazes me so many clowns actually hit like on this video.

[@mary-janejenkins9560]

My father born 1915 fought in WW2 said it was just a terrible waste of life that has solved nothing and to look at the world

[@Orxbane]

Yes, the small hats clearly won that war.

[@Notsogoodguitarguy]

@@Orxbane it's because of people like you that Dresden was bombed. You're the problem. Literally.

[@kumabear3529]

Name a modern war where war crimes WERE NOT committed

[@michaelholt8590]

My grandfather was a Korean War vet. He told me once that there is no such thing as war crimes because war itself was a crime against humanity

[@duncancurtis5108]

Dresden in particular rankled for decades afterwards for various reasons, culturally and morally as to why civilians themselves were targeted allegedly on purpose. Good to know the city's back from the bleak postwar image.

[@skycloud4802]

I remember reading a history book on WW2 and came across this bombing. It was absolutely flattened. Churchill himself criticised "Bomber Harris" for excessively bombing for the sake of increasing the terror.

[@yolandabrinkman2653]

My mother witnessed first-hand the bombing of Guernika by the German airforce on 26th April1937. It was an exercise in perfecting their terror technique later used on Warsaw. The effect of the bombing was so extreme, a house 11kms away in Mundaka, imploded. Whenever dresden was mentioned, my mother's words resonated throughout the house " No haber empezado" (Shouldn't have started it) Many basques volunteered with the allied forces. Check out the roll at the Tower Hill Monument London. Look for Empire Mersey (41). My maternal grandfather is listed

[@jasonstab6453]

If Dresden did lead to the shortening of the European conflict, the hypothetical question should be, if Dresden was not bombed and war continued, which city would the atomic bomb be unleashed on?

[@geodkyt]

Dresden is a complex issue. Balanced right on the razor edge between "legitimate military necessity" (and thus "awful but lawful") and a terror attack against civilians rising to the level of deliberate atrocity. The importance of Dresden as a transportation hub argues for "necessity" (Inwould have to agree with the evaluation that the total manufacturing output of the city at that point was pretty irrelevant, strategically and tactically). I tend to fall money the side of "atrocity" myself, with the decision tipping factor being the deliberate choice of tactics and weapons to *maximize* civilian death and suffering (as part of an openly admitted general bombing strategy of horror and terror to "break the civilian will"... something of little military utility in an autocratic state run by a psychopathic dictator and his sycophants). The choice to drop HE generally on the city (including exclusovely residental areas) to break up gas lines so that the follow up incendiary strikes would maximize the fires and create an *intended* firestorm calculated to be intended enough to defeat bomb shelter protection was, in my mind, severely disproportionate to the military necessity of making Dresden useless as a transport hub and typing up German military resources. It didn't even have the fig leaf of the atomic bombings, with a *credible* belief that it might induce a general surrender quickly.

[@adoredpariah]

The nuking of Japanese cities was just as bad really (they were dropped on cities, not military bases for one), it was a similar argument about breaking the will of the people so they would be outraged at their leaders. Let's not forget that the nukes weren't the only bombs dropped on Japan either, we had been firebombing their cities for quite a while before the nukes. Historians have pointed out that Japan was on the brink of surrender after we had destroyed the bulk of their naval and air power. And it's a good point because, if they were this unflappable force that would have apparently never surrendered, what difference would the nukes have made to that supposed resolve? It's just more excuses to justify our own atrocities.

[@MrTexasDan]

@@adoredpariah The Japanese were nowhere near surrender before the atomic bombings. They had just moved hundreds of thousands of infantry and civilians with crude weapons into positions to meet the inevitable allied landings. All of the transcripts of their cabinet meetings and meetings with the emperors concerned defense of the home islands.

[@skitzoemu1]

​@@adoredpariahyour bit about Japan being on the brink of surrender is simply untrue. Japanese leaders had been building bunkers and depots for weapon and ammo storage. They intended to draw out the war as long as needed to get surrender terms they found favorable. The records of many meetings show Japanese plans to hold territory for as long as possible. The nukes were equal parts of scaring civilians and intimidating Japanese military planners. From a planning perspective how do you create a defensive line when your enemy has a weapon that can tear a 1-2 kilometer hole in it at will. The choice of those cities is where it gets a bit dubious. There were more strategic cities that could have been hit, but they were already severely damaged so would not create the shock factor that was being pushed for.

[@Notsogoodguitarguy]

@@adoredpariah the emperor literally cites the atomic bombs as one of the reasons for surrender. The US had basically unleashed the wrath of God onto Japan. However you might cope, the Emperor didn't make a speech to surrender after the Soviets began the counterattack, he didn't make a speech to surrender before OR after the bombings of Tokyo and other cities, he didn't call for surrender when armies were literally marching on their shores. They threw untrained, underequipped men into suicide missions until the last moment. They armed their civilian population. They were ready for all-out war. Japan was not ready to surrender.

[@JB-kt9dx]

It's not no complex issue bruh wtf

[@michaelw3927]

It was a war crime. I’m a retired Army officer, and even for the rules in place at the time, it was an unforgivable war crime.

[@accomuk]

The decision to use the Atomic Bomb was that the devastation from it would force the Japanese to surrender thus saving lives. The allied bombing of Germany was using the same thinking. The Germans had used that reasoning in their attacks on London, Coventry and other cities, but it didnt have the desired outcome. That lesson was ignored by the allied leaders. In Britain there was a mood of giving the Germans it back.

[@joshuabaker5712]

Except that it worked in Japan.

[@dat581]

@@joshuabaker5712 It didn't as much as has been portrayed. What most fail to realise is the two atomic raids were not on the level of destruction that the standard firebombing raids inflicted on Tokyo and other large Japanese cities. Not even close. The Japanese surrendered because the firebombing was extremely effective, and the Soviet Union entered the war against them in China. Japan knew it was utterly finished at this stage.

[@MrTexasDan]

@@dat581 Transcripts of Japanese cabinet meetings, meetings with the Emperor, and others show you are wrong. The Atomic bombings certainly did bring the Japanese to surrender.

[@dat581]

@@MrTexasDan They are ONE of the factors. The Japanese military did not want to surrender.

[@accomuk]

@@joshuabaker5712 had the Manhattan Project concluded earlier it might have worked in Germany as well, but the Americans felt it would be a waste to use it on Germany because they were already on the verge of total defeat, unlike Japan.

[@slipfox1364]

We were no better than our enemies in that regard for wanton destruction and the suffering of civilians as a tool for war

[@TrueOpinion99]

War is hell. Hitler had mobilized the civilian population as a tool of their war-making machine, and the most effective way to defeat an enemy is to destroy its ability to make war...including the people who man the machines that make the bullets, bombs, and bandages.

[@jonyemm]

Speak for yourself

[@aaronmcconkey1062]

​@@jonyemmthe us government has been speaking for you since the korean war.

[@SafetySpooon]

We didn't have extermination camps. And we didn't start this.

[@slipfox1364]

@@SafetySpooon I don't see how that's a justification

[@cazador7131]

Basically, war is messy and brutal and ultimately everyone suffers regardless of their nation.

[@aaronmcconkey1062]

No. The rulers don't. The serfs always suffer.

[@Shado_wolf]

Dresden is actually so obvious in its lack of old buildings!! Was there a few months ago and our friend was showing us around. I believe there are only a few pre-war buildings left. Quite sad really, on so many avoidable levels!

[@Patricia-zq5ug]

I asked this very question of a lovable old fellow who had been a British airman in the war. He said, when you go into war, you have to go all in. He was married to a German woman who had been a young girl when the bombs started falling. Life, and war, is way complicated. Countries need to find a better way.

[@Orxbane]

Did he ever explain why they had to go into the war in the first place, and why they didn't end the war when they lost in 1940?

[@jaimeosbourn3616]

@@Orxbane Until Hitler could dictate terms in London, they hadn't lost

[@dan3162]

Another consideration is the US was near broke financially, the manpower and equipment being destroyed in Asia with fanatical warfare, the US needed to end the war quickly while we still could.

[@DiscoD69]

I live in Dresden , for the last 12 years. It's an amazing city and a standard of how old architecture cab be rebuilt with modern techniques.

[@cmhoax6951]

While not in specific reference to this event, are we just going to ignore that Chuck Yaeger, who said that he was ordered to strafe cicilians?

[@Elecat1996]

Good point

[@bullron8784]

my granny was shot at by a british low-flying aircraft on her way to school. there was nothing important to the war nearby, no railroad line, no factories, just a farm.

[@cmhoax6951]

@@bullron8784That's what I mean. I find it highly unlikely that it happened everywhere else, but in this one specific instance didn't happen. I doubt it

[@brucek4524]

We as the rest of the world can be horrified at the civilian death in Dresden. However the people of Germany during ww2 showed next to zero outrage when the German government kiIIed thousands of civilians in Dresden before the Allie’s dropped a single bomb-namely the 6,000+ Jews that lived in Dresden that were kiIIed by the German government with enthusiastic support of the people. So they (the people of Germany during ww2) have no moral ground to stand on when they claim to be horrified at civilian death in Dresden when they clearly were not horrified by civilians being kiIIed in Dresden only civilians who were not Jews were worthy of horror.

[@kaiser5910]

My Grandma worked a Circus Krone when the city was bombed. I have never seen her as haunted as when she talked about when the circus' lion ran around with his mane aflame and then burning to death.

[@Ubique2927]

The final quote could just as easily have been made by a survivor of Coventry.

[@Orxbane]

No, it couldn't.

[@Ubique2927]

@ Don’t be an ass.

[@Ubique2927]

@@Orxbane Why not? They were victims of more than one massive bombing raid aimed purely at civilians causing death and destruction on a huge scale.

[@strychnyne3530]

As an American of german descent I've asked the same question.

[@tassilostelter6465]

The fact that there even is a question about whether it’s not a war crime worries me. It was clearly targeted at civilians. Hows that not a war crime????

[@tassilostelter6465]

History is written by the victors I suppose

[@shafsteryellow]

It’s not

[@davehopkin9502]

Due ti the inherent inaccuracxy of WW2 bombing all raids by definition targetted civilians, from Warsaw, Rotterdam, London, Coventry, Hamburg, Berlin and Dresden, PLUS the act of targetting civilians was NOT defined as an illegal act if war until 1949 so at the time it was certainly NOT a crime

[@Orxbane]

Because small hats don't see goyim as human. So it can't be a crime.

[@GregPodster133]

Like October 7th was not a 'War Crime' in Some people's eyes. Both Examples need only one question. Who Started this?. Reap What You Sow.?

[@UnimpressedGoose]

One of the last flying Lancaster bomber is in Hamilton Ontario n it still flies around the whole area a couple times a year. You can always hear when it’s above. It’s one of the few noises that will actually wake me from a dead sleep. I can’t even fathom how loud it would be if there was hundreds of them above you. It had to be utterly terrifying

[@kennyw907]

Thanks for the heads up imma keep my eyes out for it

[@UnimpressedGoose]

@ if you check the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum website you can see the flight schedule for 2025 and if you have enough money you can even pay to fly in the Lancaster lol

[@MrLeo2A6]

Germany sowed the wind and they reaped the wind

[@jaimeosbourn3616]

Whirlwind

[@ravenfeader]

There are only ever two things in war you worry about , win or lose because nobody plays nice .

[@SomeDude518]

It pays to not open the gate for everyone to walk through. Once one side does something, it generally becomes fair game for the other side, especially if the tactic is effective. No one wants to play nice if it makes winning harder. Its easy to open a gate, much harder to close it and get everyone to stop.

[@ravenfeader]

@@SomeDude518 Victori spolia ire that includes the writing of history .

[@b1646717]

FAFO?

[@JollyRoger-be6cf]

Absolutely!

[@keithspillman]

100%

[@schnetzelschwester]

My mother survived the bombing of Ruhr Area as a 12-13 year old child. She told stories how to survive on the streets, looting burned houses - never take food in glass jars, only in tin cans! - and putting out burning phosphorus with sand - never use water! When USA started the war against Saddam Hussein, they showed big bombing planes on the TV. At a sudden she panicked from that sound, screamed and trembled. I never saw such big fear at a human.

[@crazedvole]

Dresden and Hamburg were used as models for what to do in Japan. Tokyo was burned to the ground. More people died there then during the A-bomb attacks. I never hear anybody agonizing over that.

[@Orxbane]

Those were also war crimes.

[@svr5423]

@@Orxbane basically everything was a war crime in WW1 and 2. It was just the culture of the day. People need to get over it. We're all friends now.

[@Orxbane]

@@svr5423 Of course we are, we are all brothers. My hatred is for the small hats responsible for both of those wars, and so many other crimes against us.

[@Jayjay-qe6um]

The Hague Conventions, addressing the codes of wartime conduct on and at sea, were adopted before the rise of air power. Despite repeated diplomatic attempts to update enacted international humanitarian law to include aerial warfare, it was not updated before the outbreak of World War II. The absence of specific international humanitarian law does not mean that the laws of war did not cover aerial warfare, but the existing laws remained open to interpretation. Specifically, whether the attack can be considered a war crime depends on whether the city was defended and whether resistance was offered againts an approaching enemy.

[@fjashfcsahds]

ICJ is a sham.

[@olivermalter2673]

True, up to a point. But even then deliberate attacks on civillians were considered crimes. And attacking a strategic target in the middle of a city, with weapons that are so inaccurate, that more than 95% of them will miss and land in civillian quarters might be technically allowed, but definitely goes against the meaning of the law. And considering, that the weapons used were selected to create the maximum possible civillian casualties it is most definitively a crime. For those who don't know: Bombs specifically designed to destroy building-blocks and remove the roofs in a wide area. Firebombs intended to ignite the rubble (and any damaged houses). And bombs with time delay fuses, that were intended to kill firefighters, rescue workers and people returning to their houses! The latter weapons are a problem even today, whereever they were used. Not that the germans were any better...

[@mapratt]

The quote at the end... The bombing of Dresden was near the end of the war. Did it lead to a swifter end? What is the best way to end such a horrible conflict, one that has affected so many for so many years? What is the best thing to do when a nation tries to take over another with force? Will the artificial limits obeyed by one side but not the other lead to the "right" outcome? Yes, i understand history is written by the winners, but, objectively, should the Nazis have been stopped or not? Should the allies have kept losing their own civilians and civil infrastructure and prolonged the war a bit longer? Should Moscow live normally while Ukraine burns?

[@duncanglen3452]

You realise that nazi Germany could have fire bombed London and didn't?

[@kaltaron1284]

"Should the allies have kept losing their own civilians and civil infrastructure and prolonged the war a bit longer?" At that point allied civilians and infrastructure wasn't really at risk any more.

[@InquisitorXarius]

@kaltaron1284 Your missing the point

[@kaltaron1284]

@@InquisitorXarius You have one? Also it's "you're" or "you are".

[@jaybee9269]

Dresden was a demonstration for the Soviets.

[@samuelwilliams3130]

My Grandmother was a 6 year old schoolgirl in Liverpool when Germany tried to flatten it, she saw the corpse of her hest friend sticking out of the rubble of her house as she walked to school one morning. Her father, my great grandfather was a 1st world war veteran and a fire spotter in the Liver building during the second. He watched his city burning from the top of the Liver building with a telephone so that he could direct the fire services where they were needed without knowing if his wife and children were safe. I'm not crying over Dresden, don't start what you don't have the guts to finish. Dont be mad because we did it better than you.

[@pgbrown12084]

Just one more example of how so many people died in such horrific means because of 2 or 3 peoples insane ideology and cult of personality.

[@goldbug7127]

70 million Germans joined that cult.

[@hossosplitternacken7819]

nobody fights a war for ideas he doesnt believe in, the nazis didnt wear a invisible force who came out of nowhere, the nazis were the german people! .hitler and co were merely just some clowns in the middle..still to this day the biggest misconception and lie spread by western allied forces.. secondly to "D-day" which happpened when the war was already over, because of russia.

[@N911GT2]

@@goldbug7127 'joined' just like all Russians now 'joined' Putins cult. Just like all Turkish people 'joined' Erdohans cult. Just like all North-Koreans 'joined' Kim Jong Uns cult...

[@Orxbane]

@@goldbug7127 Then clearly it wasn't a cult and we haven't been told the truth about it. Small hats lie.

[@9169enjoi]

Hearing you talk about that poor baby elephant really hurt. People truly are evil. What we do to eachother and pretty much all other living beings makes me think we really dont deserve a place on this beautiful planet. We are the only living thing that knows what evil is, and still choose to be it. Animals dont know how to be evil, they deserve SO much better from us and how we treat them. I have no faith in humanity whatsoever. Its a damn miracle that we are a living species still and havent caused our own extinction.

[@jamesricker3997]

Dresden was a manufacturing hub and had become a supply hub for the Eastern Front. There was also a Luffwaffa command center their. Dresden was a legitimate military target

[@reversalmushroom]

*there

[@lastchips7638]

No, those hubs were legitimate military targets, that doesnt make the entire city a legitimate military target Thats common standard, even during WW2

[@N911GT2]

No it was not...

[@Orxbane]

And yet they targeted the city center to intentionally murder civilians.

[@jaybee9269]

Of course it was. After the terror bombings of London and Coventry, which were also legitimate targets, it was going to happen. It’s unfortunate that civilians became targets in total war.

[@pyromagic7113]

History is written by the Victory, we don't want to admit that the death toll was way higher than was recorded. You can still condemn what the Germans did whilst also acknowledging the atrocities that we also committed.

[@ChurchNietzsche]

Dredsen "thought they were safe" ... that was the POINT. The Allies -NEVER- flew that far inland ... they never dropped that many bombs. ... Dredsen was untouchable, until it wasn't!!

[@KaybeCA]

It's really simple: Was the bombing of Dresden necessary? Possibly yes. Was the *fire-bombing* of Dresden necessary? Fuck no. People are often willing to ignore the war crimes of the good guys. Americans and Brits LOVED their napalm. People often point to the war crime that was the two nukes dropped at the end of the war, but few take a look at the sheer horror and number of casualties inflicted by napalm on many large Japanese cities prior to that that. And if you take into account that the Soviets were allies too, I don't think anyone can argue that what the Soviets did to Berlin's civilian population prior to the arrival of the American and British could be considered anything less than utterly totally vile.

[@Gwion-x8w]

We've been using "scorched earth" since Sherman. Works wonderfully. If that's a problem, don't start a fight.

[@jayvinwilliams8508]

you better hope where ever you live doesn't "start a fight" then

[@MemphisKennedy-xy5ye]

Question: Who killed 13 million Germans before the beginning of WW2? Solve that and you understand a lot more.

[@JamesBannon-fz6qo]

Deliberately targeting civilians is a war crime, even when said civilians are involved in war production, therefore Dresden was a war crime, as was the fire bombing of Tokyo. By the same token, the bombing of London, Glasgow, and so forth were war crimes, as was Pearl Harbour, though the latter was more by accident than design as the Japanese had intended to deliver a declaration prior to the attack. It is therefore hypocritical of Axis apologists to claim Dresden and Tokyo as war crimes, but to deny the same treatment to Allied civilians when targeted by Axis forces. The same argument applies to Allied apologists. War, almost inevitably, involves criminal actions by the belligerents, and so there is no such thing as a “guilt free” war.

[@caseyo6033]

The more one argues for "necessity" the further they get from morality.

[@armlegx]

I'd rather win with a guilty conscience than lose and die because we weren't willing to win.

[@JakeBiszop]

ttypical left side weak bs

[@caseyo6033]

@ fine, who are you going to get to kill the women and children? Would you serve knowing that is what is expected of you? What about chemical warfare and nukes? If winning is all that matters why do we keep beefing with North Korea? What was the problem with Sadam? They are all just doing what it takes to win right? Does this also mean that you support the way Russia has conducted itself in Ukraine?

[@kieranororke620]

Very well expressed and well argued.

[@telfordguy34uk]

The reason we bombed Dresden was that the Soviets were preparing to enter Germany proper , and Stalin asked the Allies to destroy Dresden to clear it in preparation . We bombed it , and the Russians attacked . The fire storm was unfortunate , but war is hell .

[@jamesricker3997]

Dresden had become a major logistical hub for the defense of the East. It's destruction shortened the war

[@adoredpariah]

Ah yes, "war is hell", that ultimate cover for any and all war crimes your side commits. Funny how people don't really say "war is hell" in regards to; 9/11, or Pearl Harbor, or the Holocaust, or the Normandy beach landing, or 10/7 etc etc etc. Those that get deemed immediately as atrocities that must face consequences... I guess they must be different somehow, I wonder why...

[@Orxbane]

Why were we allies with an evil, murderous regime that also invaded Poland?

[@Notsogoodguitarguy]

I tried to look for the claim that Stalin had asked for the bombing of Dresden, but can't really find a source. I know it was beneficial to the Soviet army, because every other siege of a major city involved tens or hundreds of thousands of casualties from the Red Army, while Dresden saw basically 0. But I don't think Stalin ordered it. I would be happy to see a source about that, cause I've heard that claim multiple times already.

[@alliedmastercomputer5407]

So trying to blame Russia again?

[@buknekkit3084]

I'm pretty sure Kurt Vonnegut wrote about being a POW in Dresden during the raids in "Slaughterhouse 5"

[@cheretodd9949]

Holy shit, I had no idea! This was a horrific, disgusting display of what poeple are capable of doing to each other.😞

[@jimslancio]

There's a famous quote by Winston Churchill, that I don't remember well enough to quote accurately. The gist of it is that, if we don't preserve our cultural heritage in war, then what are we fighting for?

[@theemissary1313]

When irving says the lack of military targets in the city led to the placement of an administrative centre. That makes it a military target.

[@Tab1300]

That logic is what causes hospitals to be bombed

[@SafetySpooon]

When Irving says anything, he's LYING.

[@theawesomeman9821]

I'm no expert but I was taught that actions are only considered war crimes if you lose the war.

[@Tab1300]

This was what influenced the Genova conversations, it wasn't a crime when it happened it was made one after.

[@andreasmuller4666]

Adendum to it at best. The conventions existed since the end of WW1.

[@Iskelderon]

@@andreasmuller4666 And most of the WW1 entries can be traced down to things the Canadians committed.

[@N911GT2]

If it is the reason it became a crime, itself was a crime already.

[@Copelion]

My grandmother used to tell me how they viewed the orange shine of the burning city on the horizon from 80 kilometers distance.

[@ninehundreddollarluxuryyac5958]

It didn't become a war crime until 1980 with the conference on conventional weapons. You can still use fire as a weapon if civilians are not present.

[@davehopkin9502]

1949 in part, then updated in 1977

[@Ducky-face]

Not a war crime in the strictest sense of the term. You could argue that it was a war crime that was committed to stop the commission of a war crime already in progress. Dresden was one of the few towns in Germany where you could not claim ignorance about the holocaust. The primary industry of the town was the rail yards; through those rail yards in Dresden passed every inmate who was executed at Auschwitz. Auschwitz was liberated two weeks before the bombing of Dresden, but that rail line was still active transporting prisoners to other camps in the concentration camp system, as well as German troops and materiel to the eastern front. Although Dresden was not a military city in and of itself, it was a legitimate target because of the role it played supporting the Wehrmacht and the SS in military transit and the death camp system.

[@PaulDee-k4p]

I am British but my mother was German. As it happens when Dresden was bombed my mother was on a train with her family fleeing Berlin by train, but the train halted in the outskirts of the city. For some reason they could go no further. It was this bombing of Dresden that halted her progress. Some may see this bombing as a war crime and morally wrong but I point out the systematic bombing of London by V1 and V2 rockets and prior to this many many German bombers. Some say do unto others as they do unto you. So yes this action by Britain was justified and was only done in response to many many previous attacks on UK civilians by German forces. War is hell and many many innocent people die. The only way to stop this evil cycle is to end all war. I do not think that man has it in him to do this so until human kind is at an end this dreadful cycle will carry on.

[@scottwebb4722]

perhaps you should pick up Nietzsche, according to him mankind's original sin was to mark out land and say this belongs to me, which unfortunately invented hierarchies and status in the process, the chief source of conflict between individuals as it allows control over resources.

[@N911GT2]

Ah yes the strongest case of whataboutism ever leads to the annihilation of a complete city... "but they started it" No England started the war with Germany, not the other way around.

[@olivermalter2673]

@@scottwebb4722 Theres are much better saying by Nietzsche, that fits what happened during WW II: "Those who play with the devil's toys will be brought by degrees to wield his sword." Or maybe even better: "Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you." From my point of view, that is what happened to the Allies. They tried to fight the Axis and became (almost) as bad as the people they were fighting.

[@scottwebb4722]

​@@olivermalter2673 you're missing the last point made by the OP in trying to end all war. conflict is going to be inevitable on the individual level because of the desire to gain status. It's a simple case of have's and have not's, which became a problem when our ancestors made the transition from hunter gatherers to farmers, thus increasing the value of possessing land to the point it conferred status. What is called the rise and fall of empires is just basically low status outsiders displacing the high status incumbent powers then falling prey to the cycle again. I'll put it in the most base terms for you to understand: gaining more status allows more control of tradable resources, allowing us to gain the one resource that isn't gold or silver (i.e. one's heart's desire). Even evolutionary biology backs me up. The higher status male mammals attract more females, becoming a target for any challenger in the process. This has been well documented in chimpanzees, our closest cousins among the primates. Before you say the solution is to make everyone's status equal, doesn't there have to be a group of people with more status and power that is able to forcibly make everyone equal? All that system does is create the likes of Stalin or Mao, both of whose policies in peacetime resulted in millions perishing.

[@exnihiloadnihilum5094]

As Harris had said: "[Nazis] sown the wind and now they reap the whirlwind."

[@jannikbruckner7531]

It literally Burned people down to black goo in the cellars and They stuck to the rubble on the streets. By this you can‘t actually know how much people died there Because you estimate this by lists and the remains but when there Are non it becomes difficult. My great-grandmother lost half of her family in this hell.

[@jeffree9015]

That's why the allies signed the Geneva convention afterwards.

[@Adiscretefirm]

They were signed before WW2

[@sortasapien]

Geneva suggestions. Nobody actually follows them.

[@LavitosExodius]

They existed and were signed before however since it had industry supporting the war effort it was a legitimate target. Whether that makes it ok or not is a separate argument.

[@sortasapien]

@LavitosExodius Everything is an acceptable target in war

[@jimslancio]

War seems, by its nature, to take with it a certain amount of the human culture that both sides try to defend. Other commenters have written about Slaughterhouse Five. Both Kurt Vonnegut's book, and the movie, evoke tears for Dresden. Another testament is written in Barbara Tuchman's book The Guns of August, the prizewinning depiction of the beginning of World War 1. The chapter titled "The Flames of Louvain" describes the senseless destruction of the Belgian city and its irreplacable library. Perhaps we can be glad that printed and electronic copies are so ubiquitous today, that priceless writings can no longer be lost so easily.

[@gecila1]

Justified. Absolutely. They sewed the wind...

[@KevinRudd-w8s]

It shouldn't be forgotten that the Allied air forces suffered relatively high casualty rates (RAF bomber command lost over 50% of those who served with them over the course of the war) My dad, who served with bomber command said he thought some of the targets that were bombed weren't worth the loss of the crews that didn't return from the raids. Dresden was unusual in that there were few if any allied losses. That couldn't be said about the raid on Nuremberg where over one hundred aircraft failed to return.

[@colinevans8619]

Your channel did justice for this topic.

[@alliedmastercomputer5407]

it was awful propaganda

[@jamesroachjr4074]

How many channels do you have Simon?

[@rafanifischer3152]

It's great to see all the hindsight comments here. But just remember who started all this.

[@aaronmcconkey1062]

The us funded and have oil to Hitler. Yeah the us did start it.

[@scottwebb4722]

@@aaronmcconkey1062 can you please stop being a terrorist supporter

[@lightdampsweetenough2065]

Who started what? Britain and France declared war on Germany...

[@N911GT2]

@@lightdampsweetenough2065 Out of fear too. If they had done nothing it would have ended with Poland, which historically already was Germany...

[@jaimeosbourn3616]

@@lightdampsweetenough2065 After Germany attacked Poland

[@danuk-]

Dude how many channels you got. Cant get away from you.

[@flufffycow]

It's up for the winner's to decide if something is a war crime.

[@matthewsmith7502]

Please could we have a video about David Irving? Not just about his historically revisionistic nonsence, but also the Holocaust Denial trial with Deborah Lipstadt. Truly the Andrew Wakefield of historians

[@ripley7222]

An immense intellectual and amazing researcer and writer.