Additionally, I believe the altitude of 500 feet was wrong too. LeMay brought the B-29s down from their lofty 30,000 feet to 8,000 feet for incendiary bombing. At 500 feet the tail end aircraft would have caught fire from the whirlwind started by the first aircraft. And I believe some of those aircraft still carried some high explosives to break targets up. You usually do some kind of mix, not 100% incendiaries. I think this was some 'creative' writing by some of the war correspondents with some flavoring added to make it sound better rather than the droll, "We dropped bombs, the target burned!"

Bob

yea, that would seem plausible...

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"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning." -Winston Churchill

Based on the 28 July 1943 entry about the bombing of Hamburg...

Erich said, "and the birth of Wilde Sau comes out of this mess..."

It was ironic that the Wilde Sau came into being during this time as the RAF first introduced "window", aluminum strips of foil used to clutter the German radar network of their night fighters and flak. Window put the regular night fighters out of service until a counter measure could be found.

Erich: I remember something about the British not actually finding out about the Wilde Sau until after the end of the war. The RAF didn't realize there were single-seat fighters in the night skies shooting down bombers by using the light from the searchlights. Is that correct?

Bob

July 22, 1942
Deportations from Warsaw ghetto to Treblinka begin

On this day in 1942, the systematic deportation of Jews from the Warsaw ghetto begins, as thousands are rounded up daily and transported to a newly constructed concentration/extermination camp at Treblinka, in Poland.

On July 17, Heinrich Himmler, head of the Nazi SS, arrived at Auschwitz, the concentration camp in eastern Poland, in time to watch the arrival of more than 2,000 Dutch Jews and the gassing of almost 500 of them, mostly the elderly, sick, and very young. The next day, Himmler promoted the camp commandant, Rudolph Hoess, to SS major and ordered that the Warsaw ghetto, (the Jewish quarter constructed by the Nazis upon the occupation of Poland, enclosed first by barbed wire and then by brick walls), be depopulated-a "total cleansing," as he described it and the inhabitants transported to what was to become a second extermination camp constructed at the railway village of Treblinka, 62 miles northeast of Warsaw.

Within the first seven weeks of Himmler's order, more than 250,000 Jews were taken to Treblinka by rail and gassed to death, marking the largest single act of destruction of any population group, Jewish or non-Jewish, civilian or military, in the war. Upon arrival at "T. II," as this second camp at Treblinka was called, prisoners were separated by sex, stripped, and marched into what were described as "bathhouses," but were in fact gas chambers. T.II's first commandant was Dr. Irmfried Eberl, age 32, the man who had headed up the euthanasia program of 1940 and had much experience with the gassing of victims, especially children. He compelled several hundred Ukrainian and about 1,500 Jewish prisoners to assist him. They removed gold teeth from victims before hauling the bodies to mass graves. Eberl was relieved of his duties for "inefficiency." It seems that he and his workers could not remove the corpses quickly enough, and panic was occurring within the railway cars of newly arrived prisoners.

By the end of the war, between 700,000 and 900,000 would die at either Treblinka I or II. Hoess was tried and sentenced to death by the Nuremberg Tribunal. He was hanged in 1947.

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

July 23, 1951
Petain, leader of the Vichy government, dies

On this day in 1951, General Henri-Philippe Petain, French national hero of World War I, who was convicted of collaboration with the German occupiers of his country during World War II and sentenced to life in prison, dies. He is 95.

A graduate of Saint-Cyr Military Academy, Petain served as a second lieutenant in the Alpine regiment, where he developed a reputation for camaraderie with the average foot soldier. He then went on to a controversial teaching career at the War College, where he propounded theories that were in direct conflict with commonly held ideas, especially his contention that a strong defense was the key to victory, not the "always be on the attack" strategy common to the French military at the time.

During World War I, General Petain distinguished himself at the Battle of Verdun, during which he successfully repulsed German attacks on the fortress city. He was an inspiration to his troops and successfully squelched near mutinies within the army after disastrous offensives led by General Robert-Georges Nivelle. Petain regained the confidence-and loyalty--of those soldiers when he was named Nivelle's successor, improving their living conditions and initiating open communication between command and troops.

After the outbreak of World War II, Petain was named vice premier by Premier Paul Reynaud. As Germany began to overrun more French territory, the French Cabinet became desperate. Reynaud continued to hold out hope, refusing to ask for an armistice, especially now that France had received assurance from Britain that the two would fight as one, and that Britain would continue to fight the Germans even if France were completely overtaken. But others in the government were despondent and wanted to sue for peace. Reynaud resigned in protest. Petain then formed a new government and asked the Germans for an armistice--in effect, surrendering. The man who had become a legendary war hero for successfully fighting off a German attack on French soil was now surrendering to Hitler.

In the city of Vichy, the French Senate and Chamber of Deputies conferred on the 84-year-old general the title of "Chief of State," making him a virtual dictator-although one controlled by Berlin. Petain believed that he could negotiate a better deal for his country-- for example, obtaining the release of prisoners of war--by cooperating, or, as some would say, appeasing, the Germans.

When Paris was finally liberated by General Charles de Gaulle in 1944, Petain fled to Germany. He was brought back after the war to stand trial for his double-dealing ways. He was sentenced to death, which was then commuted to life in solitary confinement. He died at 95 in a prison fortress. Ironically, the man responsible for saving his life was De Gaulle. He and Petain had fought in the same unit in World War I. Petain's bravery during that world war had not been forgotten.

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

July 24, 1943
Operation Gomorrah is launched

On this day in 1943, British bombers raid Hamburg, Germany, by night in Operation Gomorrah, while Americans bomb it by day in its own "Blitz Week."

Britain had suffered the deaths of 167 civilians as a result of German bombing raids in July. Now the tables were going to turn. The evening of July 24 saw British aircraft drop 2,300 tons of incendiary bombs on Hamburg in just a few hours. The explosive power was the equivalent of what German bombers had dropped on London in their five most destructive raids. More than 1,500 German civilians were killed in that first British raid.

Britain lost only 12 aircraft in this raid (791 flew), thanks to a new radar-jamming device called "Window," which consisted of strips of aluminum foil dropped by the bombers en route to their target. These Window strips confused German radar, which mistook the strips for dozens and dozens of aircraft, diverting them from the trajectory of the actual bombers.

To make matters worse for Germany, the U.S. Eighth Air Force began a more comprehensive bombing run of northern Germany, which included two raids on Hamburg during daylight hours.

British attacks on Hamburg continued until November of that year. Although the percentage of British bombers lost increased with each raid as the Germans became more adept at distinguishing between Window diversions and actual bombers, Operation Gomorrah proved devastating to Hamburg-not to mention German morale.

When it was over, 17,000 bomber sorties dropped more than 9,000 tons of explosives, killing more than 30,000 people and destroying 280,000 buildings, including industrial and munitions plants. The effect on Hitler, too, was significant. He refused to visit the burned-out cities, as the ruins bespoke nothing but the end of the war for him. Diary entries of high German officials from this period describe a similar despair, as they sought to come to terms with defeat

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!