a documentary about the bombing of dresden during the 2nd world war remember you can keep to date with all the latest news and information around the clock on our website w dot com i'm told me a lot of thought that's all from me the news continues at the top of the hour thanks for joining us. it's all happening coach of british. tour linked to news from africa and the world your link to exceptional stories and discussions genuine will come to the african program line from funny to me from our news a visit our i would say do don't do construction africa join us on facebook j w africa.

dresden for centuries a world renowned center of art and culture destroyed in a single line it was on february the 13th 1945 just 3 months before the end of world war 2 and while every year groups continue to commemorate the event facts surrounding those dark days a still being debated just how many lives were lost that night was it several 1000 the hundreds of thousands to the anglo american allies consider the city as strategically significant target if not what was the purpose of carrying out such a devastating attack. the city's old town dressed in council displaying a palace the found kershaw. the church of our lady to take short treasures that

were reduced to rubble in a matter of hours. this american news reel described one of the 2 british raids on tristen. big 101 to ask why 650002 100 bombs on transportation lands in germany's 7th largest city. but the german side reported things differently saying that the attack targeted a cultural center that had no military value. the pleasures of a little bit with diabolical intent our enemies annihilated this flourishing city dressed in his dead it's beautiful rock landmarks a lot of by residents and visitors alike has been destroyed. a kind of i might have i knew go. and several of the british air attacks on germany during the

war were carried out exactly as the plan as had intended hamburg was one castle was one and also dresden height but such tactical perfection was the exception rather than the rule lynched the bombing of dresden was considered a most a piece of military planning jeff ekta. gift to us and just draw. the shock. these are among the very few photographs taken on the night of the attack a silhouette of the tracks addressed since main railway station in the background blurred by the heat of flames. the pictures were taken by 15 year old hans joachim dietz who lived near the station at the time. plots the train station was on veena plots. across the way on the corner there was an enormous building that housed rather ironically the offices of the

local fire insurance company. that was my neighborhood and hog with its fancy shops and leisure establishments. and just a few doors down the city's gestapo headquarters which could be considered a legitimate target was also in this district it was from here that the deportation of tristen jews was organized large quantities of military supplies will also sent to the front from the railway station refugees who were fleeing the soviet offensive to the east pass through the station as well. what happened. this is through the plane scored direct hits on some of the buildings behind the train station. but those who were trapped for several hours in the basement in one of those buildings surrounded by dead bodies. and feelings toward the

more than $600.00 people were killed only the tried station alone suffocated. vanished the central issue was not the casualties it was the damage to the water mains the gas lines the electrical system and the streets that required amount of personnel and material to repair. and that weaken the military effort. from a tactical standpoint it's much more effective to destroy a city's infrastructure than it is to wipe out of the barracks for example those they could get up and running again in 36 hours but when an entire city is torched takes time for the survivors to find shelter. so why did the americans and the british launch such a huge right on dressed in. were the specific intended targets. this is the historic new moms district which includes the famous found commission. get

how cinnamon was foreseen when the church and his home nearby were destroyed in the attack. as children cinnamon and some of his friends had carved their nations into the sandstone edifice of the arctic cademy across the square this is jewish it is hard to see there are that's me jeezy but some of the letters have faded. verses that's well contest and off the tout was here. that one of them lived in a house that was hit by a. good hard cinnamon and his family lived in a building behind this hotel within view of the fountain show. little hint of that in the 3rd back courtyard there was one corridor and then another the toilets were outside we had to walk

a long way to get water. so there was always a bucket of water in the apartment. or it will and there was a space above the hallway where the call for heating was stored just imagine how well that coal burned in the fire after the bombing and we could go to. this is happening mark district looked before the attack. behind splendid the rock facades working class families lived in modest quarters. there were no military or industrial targets here but noirmont was flattened anyway. as 1st as for the mine looked like only 3 children in my class at school survived the rest were killed. for us there's no such thing as a class reunion in the park. for decades much of the area lay in ruins but more recently

a lot of new construction projects are filling in empty spaces but before these projects are realized archaeologists explore the cellars and foundations of the original buildings. susannah shona is leading an excavation near the found trisha in these ruins she often finds relics of life interest and before the bombing. in a machine we found a sewing machine and a sign saying this facility was authorized to make uniforms for all nazi party organizations so this was likely a tailor's workshop much like a game it's an art school and that's what i wanted to hear some shoulder boards from a uniform that was probably made here. look at all of. the artifacts include bottles and other glass objects that would have formed in the high heat generated by the fires on the night of the attacks. glass starts to

change shape at around $600.00 degrees centigrade. sandstone was often used in the construction of these buildings and it too shows traces of the intense heat. build a common options in here you can see some of the beautiful original sandstone without going yellow color. and you know it but in high heat it starts turning orange and red doesn't. this or this sandstone was likely exposed to temperatures up to 1000 degrees and it's very red and some of it has broken away that's. thousands of people took rich. huge enticements only to die there. the 1st big allied attack on light seek in nearby industrial sites took place in december $943.00 only after that to do your thought is interesting start taking

civil defense measures. for transport because there were no materials available to build a bomb shelters on that scale everything was reserved for the war effort civil defense wasn't a top priority as we can read in official documents from that time. some measures were taken but it was haphazard due to having to deal with the various responsible party and state bureaucracies and put it so i flew along. with. a campaign of saturation bombing against german cities had been approved by the british government in 942 the attacks were carried out by the royal air force bomber command headed by air marshal arthur harris. that a lot of people. well that never been tried yet. so.

a cynic might say it wasn't about trying to destroy the weapons factories which were very hard to hit but about killing the people who worked in those factories and destroying a city's infrastructure. which in turn would reduce its importance to the military . court and in that regard the plan proved successful. in early february the leaders of britain the soviet union and the us met at yale to discuss their war strategy. prime minister churchill agreed to support the save the spence into germany by stepping up air raids on cities the idea was to disrupt germany's economy even further and to try to break the morongo of the civilian population. church. together at the weekly and then watch films of the bombing where it. and these

attacks turned german cities into a smoldering funeral pyre. at that point bombs were being trapped on german cities almost daily dresden was considered a legitimate target but there were also specific technical reasons for the attack on the night of february the 13th. the weather forecast called for cloudy skies over much of eastern germany but some clearing was predicted around interest and ideal conditions for a successful air strike. churchill not only wanted to make good on his promise to increase the number of bombing runs he also wanted to demonstrate to stalin the destructive power of the royal air force bomber command. for the letter was finished and it was. clear that the real victor in europe was going to be stalin he had enormous military resources at that time either put in

syria and if i didn't get but britain and the united states wanted to prove their own might only they had the power and ability to reduce cities to dust. evos this amounted to a struggle for post-war political power and it is in my opinion the reason behind the attacks on dressed in and later hiroshima. the people of dresden were completely unaware of the strategic political considerations when the 1st and raid sirens went off at $915.00 that night most thought that the attack would talk at an industrial center nearby as it happens so often in recent months. she hunts in if kristen had so far been fairly untouched by the war from the sea

sure there were major bombing raids on leipsic but that didn't really raise fears among the people here neither there were rumors circulating that churchill had an aunt living in reston so it would never be attacked again you know and be able to leave us by oracle would slur. for me the vein in early january or so the woman who owned our apartment house had a new staircase put in since then that's something that maoists for ration lassen the old sandstone and steps were torn out and replaced with tara. and a few weeks later it was destroyed. it. credible scuppered. kristoff adam was 14 years old in february 945 in his family lived in the district of your hunch that need to europe plants far from the city center in the main train station this way it was a popular meeting place for locals february the 13th was

a choose day and the day before one ash wednesday the highlight of the carnival season in germany lots of children dressed up in questions just like every nora lung was one of them that's. from dual flights i remember celebrating with my friends from the area. being us highland all and i dressed up as a dutch girl because most of you had my mother and grandmother made the custom for me complete with a blue and white dress a starched white apron and the traditional hat. romford feel if we hung paper streamers and lanterns from the 4th floor window and i joked at the time that i wasn't going to take them down the next day i was just going to set a match to them that would be quicker that will push my 1st line of this pond the other side to go. nora long and her friend anita gone were both 12 years old like christopher dodd and they and their families lived in your hunch that. when anita yawn heard the 1st air raid sirens she knew exactly what to do. she

grabbed a suitcase and went down into the basement with her parents. skull all by own snitched and the air raid shelter wasn't really a room more like a corridor but even that was not finished with cement it was constructed out of cobble stones these were old houses. so each was required to have a container of sand and buckets for sand and water down there the whole. it sudden i am all so rich in these were stored in old disused bathtubs or other containers. caused by old mr it was. here and is exposed cellars in front of the front you can see some of the city's rudimentary civil defense measures. as the trucks must not whenever possible basements here interest in were connected to each other by

a network of makeshift passageways that crossed over property lines. and spaces. that way if people found themselves trapped underground and couldn't get out they could escape by going through another building. so that they go. in. just before 10 o'clock on the night of february the 13th the civil air defense office reported that enemy aircraft being spotted of the town of penne are a few kilometers southeast of dresden american bombers had struck the city's railway yards in october 1944 and january 19th $45.00 but those rates were comparatively small now the aircraft was targeting. the 1st british aircraft dropped magnesium parachute flares referred to as christmas trees by the germans to eliminate the target area the up front. view of the sky became as bright as day as the planes drop those christmas trees in the lawyers. there were cascades of

light off. him and. it was an amazing sight to see. what city or influence was your but that was the 1st time that any of us had seen a bombing raid of such magnitude of peaceful if you thought. these reconnaissance photos of dresden were taken by the r.a.f. in may 944. the target area clearly included the neuer markt district and surrounding streets in this war neither side seemed that interested in cultural landmarks or monuments when it came to planning bombing raids. the area warfare began with the german daytime attack on london in september 940 little fluff assume switched to night raids and targeted numerous other cities

during this phase of the german air campaign which lasted until may 941 an estimated 43000 civilians were killed and more than 1000000 buildings destroyed. on nov 14th 1940 the germans launched a devastating attack on the industrial city of coventry about a 3rd of the local factories were destroyed the residential areas were also cheat more than $500.00 civilians were killed in this attack. coventry's cathedral was reduced to rubble. in june $944.00 germany started firing missiles including the v 2 a targets in britain. friend if of a 2 missile struck a residential street $200.00 people would be killed instantly as in childhood mentioned after stroke took. the last of the 2 to hit britain landed on kent in late march 9455 weeks after the annihilation of tristen.

really. do. even though it was clear the law was coming to an end it was difficult for the british government to make a case for stopping the bombing of germany out of concern for civilian casualties when v. 2 rockets were still hitting london. forts again. to the people of britain the men who flew for the royal air force bomber command we hear a casualty writes one high than 57000 crewmen were killed during the war. the total of the entire force. but in the closing months of the conflict german defense systems no longer posed a serious threat crossfield was in short supply and the anti aircraft guns to be

moved east to counter the soviet offensive dresden stood alone against the british promise. the raid that went horribly right. just got out us and sent the bomber crews had a clear view of the target area. there were no anti aircraft guns. the city was completely exposed and couldn't defend itself against this attack. so fred tried to get dressed and with its 3 train stations was an important transport haitian center and there were several large military barracks in the district all of these were targets but none was seriously damaged during the ride. you do via. the planners had a specific strategy in mind that was to disrupt the infrastructure and cause panic

in the city center. and in that way but character of the attack on dresden was somewhat unique. and. similar tactics had been used by bomber command in a joint u.s. and british attack on the began on july the 24th 943 and continued for several days the devastation spread out over an area of more than 30 square kilometers during the course of the rights an estimated 250000 buildings were destroyed and a total of more than $42000.00 people killed at the time it was the most destructive attack in the history of aerial warfare. on the night of july 27th blazes started by a massive bombing raid on hamburg combined with hot dry weather conditions to create a tornado of flames known as a firestorm bomber command used similar techniques in attacks on darmstadt castle

braunschweig and starting on february 13th $945.00 tristen. $100.00 experimental u.s. military build replicas of german apartment houses in the utah desert and calculated the amount of things like books clothes toys found in a typical german home to determine the optimum mixture of explosives and combustible. goodenough experiment fires in a german city were burned differently you the notion of japanese where many of the buildings were neighborhood warden paper. and those are supporters. are facts recovered interest in the decades after the attack a stored in the saxony state archaeological archives. thousands of objects that bears silent witness to the devastation of the attack.

there are glass bottles walked by the strange heat plus coins books i glasses and various documents. even toy tanks and other military toys evidence of the nazi regime's effort to promote the popularity of the german military among children. who start out of most often given items like these for christmas. at least should be a choice. we've got start from 0 to replace war as a country with for example we had toy artillery pieces that used contact fuses. you would load the cannon fire and a stream of flame came out before all of us were in the us on the other hand when the show had a target it made a loud noise which i know you will assure i also have toys soldiers and of course alone hitler figurine with attachable here. i had

a lot of fun shooting hitler's head off it will go portable treason. several weeks before the attack on tristen hitler had moved into a heavily fortified bunker beneath the chancery in central valley in the residence of dresden on the other hand could only seek shelter in their basements nor a long record of the sound of the 1st bombs falling. as of my invite all of a sudden there was this incredible roar. you can't even imagine the racket. up the dock i said to myself this is the end of the war and now the tanks will come and roll over us i was just a child i thought it was the end of the world or. us could our hearts and i thought we'll no one help us. instant kind we haven't done anything

wrong. this cash register was found in the ruins of his shop interest on. the coins are hardly recognizable. the 1st attack began at 10 13 pm over the next 15 minutes british aircraft dropped a total of $881.00 tons of high explosive bombs and in centuries. fires broke out everywhere as bombs lodged roofs an ash makes furniture balconies household objects everything was in flames in an area of about 2 kilometers long and 3 kilometers wide. a 2nd wave of bombers arrived about 3 hours later the flame started by the 1st attack were visible up to 100 kilometers away the clouds of

smoke rose more than 4000 meters into the night sky. both the hotel near the church and the zimmerman family his apartment survived the 1st race nearly unscathed as the clamor died down there had zimmerman decided to leave the selma. had not others i was the only boy living in a building i was 14 years old at the time i covered all the windows with cardboard up into the north with the french for evil then i wanted to go to the train station to help. i was in the hitler youth. we all were. fortunately my big sister came after me and took me back. north and then the 2nd wave started it my sister hadn't done that i'd have been at the train station when it was wiped out in the 2nd attack but of to for they should. have been a platts 15 year old hans joachim dietz and his family had already moved down to

the basement to sit out the 1st attack. dates or brought a camera with him he still had when later he stepped out onto the street and was overwhelmed by the sight of the city engulfed in flames he captured the moment on film. should i inform those i just wanted to take a picture of our apartment ok so i press the shutter release to view that that was the 1st picture and then others followed it. maybe i was just in shock at suddenly being confronted with the horror of what war was really like. it this krieger's. this is a function of the building at kristen's technical university dietz's spent 2 hours taking pictures from 11 pm until 1 am when the 2nd attack began air raid wardens

knew to round the area with portable sirens and told people to get off the streets . hilton pieces of the sirens made a soft whining sound we thought they can't be bombing us together. fires were like a tornado and that's when we heard the rumbling noise of the planes again troika. more than 500 lancaster aircraft now approach central tristen from the west over a period of just 24 minutes they dropped more than 1800 tons of bombs. and fought and on about rushed the 2nd raid caught the people in a silos completely by surprise it was too old and complicated the destruction of dresden was now complete the firestorm continued to spread there was no way to stop it the fires were raging in so many parts of the city where you can flush and have

to stop and plant because it's water. this footage was shot by a british air crow entire sections of the city were in flames. the fires tore through older densely built up housing blocks finding a way out was next to impossible. thus is. those people had one option and that was to find some way to escape this living hell. a huge notifier had fallen on the city and there was hardly any way for people to get out of it. and it's not even us but suppose you were sick and had asthma or young children with you but as i'm horrified you were elderly or disabled. your chances of survival were pretty slim.

wouldn't it. these again hot simmons family records show that he was baptized in the fountain now both the church and his parents hymen are fine. there were flames everywhere. and there was so much smoke in the cellar that we could hardly breathe. there was a barrel of water. it had been sitting there since 1939 so you can imagine what the water was like. but we went our handkerchief held them to our mouths and ran out while bombs were still dropping. when you feel. do your hench that district where i need to gone. and christophe out of left was

a residential area far from the city center. these pictures show the aftermath of the fire storm there are few buildings in your hands that were left on skates by the 2nd attack. and fall the minimal to hide and my father and mother thought they could save us my father picked me up and i felt i had a mission of all i'm going to but the firestorm was just too big too powerful it's my fault as a video if it hadn't been for him i wouldn't be here today a little. key ordered us to get back get back into the basement. that was our attempt to escape but it didn't work. school there was so much wind and fire sparks were flying everywhere i remember that very well and we couldn't get away up to. the intensity of such a breaking fire can be seen in this footage of the humble fire storm it sucks up

all the oxygen making it hard for people to brain and they've gone describes how her father tried desperately to save his family. i remember it very well i was right in front of my parents. and i fell down and i just said i'm going to lie here. in the last i heard of my parents is when my father said to my mother . wants to stay here. my mother replied then we will too and that was that. consciousness as she survived. thanks to a bomb threat she put her head. in the shelters flames and smoke moved through the labyrinth of rooms at incredible speed survivors of the attack tell heartbreaking stories about some of the things i saw.

a young woman and her child were pulled out of the cellar just before us. someone was shouting don't go to the right that's where the fire is. the entire hall of the main train station was on fire the buildings are and framework was glowing red. i were those of a fire storm was moving in that direction to the right of us for a walk through and i saw how that woman and her child did not crawl to the left like we did. they ran to the right wing's and suddenly the woman and her child were lifted off the ground like angels. and they just floated away from us all we saw was the glow of the flames they were gone in victory after. on the morning of february the 14th the city center was blanketed in heavy smoke the vam

barracks had survived the 2 air raids and 2000 soldiers from the facility was sent to help in the rescue and recovery effort it was dangerous work buildings weakened by fire could collapse at any time and unexploded bombs post a serious threat. and then the residents of tristen once again heard the roar of aircraft engines shortly afternoon more than 300 american b. 17 flying fortress a small watched 3rd attack. the official target was the rel yards in the free to district in the western part of the city. over the next 30 minutes the be 17 strops more than $700.00 tons of bombs including in sentries but they did not hit the main target. like

under fire and there were 3 major bombing attacks in less than 24 hours of finding and the people of dresden had no experience with anything like it so they had no idea how to deal with the situation. they skipped. and there's a limit to how much psychological stress people can handle. and i think that by the afternoon of february the 14th most of the people of dresden were beyond the limit for the lust and drizzly bush but. now the main task for the civil defense authorities was to dispose of the dead. prisoners of war and forced laborers were brought in to carry out this gruesome task. the corpses were brought out of the rubble and laid out in rows in the streets to

be registered 12 year old anita yon who had managed to pull herself out of the rubble now had to identify the bodies of her parents. and all my parents were lying there as though they were asleep they weren't disfigured at all. you saw in. the hall of on if their hair was a little messy and so with their clothes on join over the yvonne but i was able to identify them and that gave me some comfort. and she seemed in principle schtick they basically suffocated when a man handed me their wedding rings that was the worst experience of my life. because in that moment i knew i was all alone. crews worked quickly to dispose of the corpses not least because of the fear that disease could spread through the city. in early march troops set up huge metal grates in the district up to 500 bodies at

a time were piled onto the structures doused with petrol. by mid march a total of 18375 victims had been recovered dressed and police chief reported to officials in berlin that the death toll could rise to 25000 but the propaganda ministry did not publicize these figures the government planned to use the bombing of dresden as part of a last ditch effort to fuel the moral indignation of the german people. nazi propaganda minister joseph goebbels encouraged the circulation of rumors that as many as 200000 people had lost their lives some foreign newspapers picked up and also reported this wildly exaggerated claim. this was the beginning of the meat of trenton. kind of stuff but diabolical and criminal display of our enemy's

intent to destroy the city. the hatten. by early 1945 the propaganda ministry had almost nothing left in its arsenal to rally the german people so the ministry decided to spread fear and hope that this tactic would work until something miraculous could happen that this. regime come. but that was not to be germany surrendered in may 945 during the war as many as 500000 german civilians were killed in allied bombing attacks few of the country's major cities was spain but the destruction of tristen continues to generate controversy to this day. there is a shrine many germans believe that there was no reason to attack the city the attack was unwarranted they say that dressed in was

a cultural center there was no involvement in s.s. war crimes no extermination of jews it had museums full of art by old masters like caught a lot of for example. after the war the myth of dress didn't continue to be propagated on both sides of the iron curtain the false consciously figures were repeated again and again the east german government used the anniversary of the bombings to denounce it as a war crime committed by the western allies and getting crockett's of we mourn the victims and condemned those who carried out this senseless mass murder in those unless. i may become a sort of british an american aircraft attacked an open city full of refugees and wounded official reports say 45000 were killed but there were more many more you may have. in 2004 the city of dresden commissioned

a group of experts to carry out a systematic an objective study of the casualty figures. the panel released its report in 2010. based on comprehensive research that relied on official documents the experts concluded that the number of people who died in the attacks on christian was between 18025000. by comparison so she 5000 civilians died in the allied air rides on hamburg in july 943. but dresden remains a powerful symbol of the destructive power of modern warfare. and i missed a lot better traces of the city of dresden will always be unique in one regard as the events that took place there in february 1905 have been used to spread propaganda in east germany east west germany elsewhere in europe and around the

world and of it. for decades the ruins of the found caches stored as a reminder of the bombing attacks. it was not until 994 that reconstruction work began in the church which was completed in 2005. few of those who survived the bombing ever thought they would see the church restored to its former glory. you had plenty of time to get off no one believed it would ever be rebuilt but people got organized i was made to todd and after years of work there or. the thought the mannish revolt of them my daughter in law asked me what i thought of the reconstruction and i said it's beautiful thought but then it always was an overt swathe of oil so.

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