Was the bombing of Dresden a war crime?

The nature of the bombing of Dresden has made it a unique point of contention and debate. Critics of the attack come from across the political spectrum, from far left to far right.

Some of the critics of the bombing of Dresden argue that there should have been prosecutions brought against RAF Bomber Commander Arthur Harris, and even Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. These critics argue that if Japan and Germany had won the war, bombings like that of Dresden would certainly have been prosecuted as a war crime.

Both the view that Dresden's bombing was a war crime, and the view that there should have been prosecutions for it, even if it did not rise to that level, are strongly disputed. Critics of both views argue the necessities of war, and the danger and horror of the Nazi regime were reasons for the attacks. At the time, there were no prohibitions in the Geneva Conventions addressing indiscriminate carpet bombing of civilians, let along nuclear attacks, these all came in 1949 or so.

Total war meant using all the weapons at your disposal to break the opponent's will, the British high command saw it as retribution for the Blitz of London, and other Nazi atrocities.

Responses to the bombing

Dresden, and later Hiroshima/Nagasaki, rapidly became potent symbols of the effects of area bombing, and the ability of military technology to inflict death and devastation beyond that which had been possible even a short time before. Decades later, it's easy to pin moral indignation on these acts of war, but at the time, total war meant winning at all costs. And technically speaking, they were not war crimes at the time of the bombings.

Books on WWII