Bangkok--17 Nov--Image Impact
Title: Battleplan: Strategic Bombing
Channel: HISTORY on TrueVisions A23 and D48
Date & Time: Tuesday, November 17, 2009 at 8.00 p.m.
The ultimate aim of Strategic Bombing is to win wars without fighting on the ground ... It takes war to the heartland of the enemy, striking not just at military targets, but at industry, infrastructure, and civilians. It seeks to destroy not only an enemy’s ability to wage war, but also its will to fight on at all.
As World War 2 began, the potential of Strategic Bombing alone to win a war was still just a theory. This programme examines the two great campaigns which put it to the test:
The British and US ‘round-the-clock’ assault on Nazi Germany which devastated its cities; and the US fire bombing which burnt out Japan’s. Both campaigns seriously reduced the enemy’s ability to resist, but the awful truth is that they were never enough to bring them to surrender. Only the atomic bomb could do that.
New technologies such as GPS and ‘Smart Weapons’ have brought renewed attempts to prove that Strategic Bombing can win wars on its own, but the reality remains that while a conflict cannot be won without air superiority, the Battleplan cannot achieve victory on its own.