Hamburg air offensive

Hamburg air offensive. Employing WINDOW for the first time, to confuse German radar defences (see also electronic warfare), the RAF committed over 3,000 bombers to four area bombing night raids on this German port: 24, 27, and 29 July and 2 August 1943. Additional nuisance raids were mounted and the US Army Air Forces also launched daylight raids on 25 and 26 July.

The second night attack, which used high explosive and incendiary bombs alternately, caused the first man-made firestorm which affected an area of 22 sq. km. (8.5 sq. mi.). It rendered helpless the city's fire-fighting force and altogether it is estimated that the raids killed 44,600 civilians and 800 servicemen, compared with the wartime total of 60,595 British civilians killed in German raids. It reduced half the city to rubble and nearly two-thirds of what remained of the population had to be evacuated.

Although the raids were aimed primarily at the civilian population, 580 industrial and war production firms were destroyed or damaged and the British Bombing Survey Unit concluded that the loss of war production was equivalent to the city's normal output over 1.8 months. The U-boat yards were not badly damaged, but it was estimated that as many as 27 U-boats were never built because of the raids. Output returned to 80% of normal within five months, but full recovery was never achieved.

The introduction of WINDOW forced the Germans practically to abandon the Kammhuber Line of air defences and begin using the highly successful Wilde Sau night fighter tactics. See also strategic air offensives, 1.

Bibliography

Middlebrook, M. , The Battle of Hamburg (London, 1980).