The Daily Express are helping to raise funds for the Memorial

The Means of Victory

The absolutely crucial role of the men of Bomber Command in freeing Europe from Hitler’s tyrannical rule has never been properly recognised in Britain by medal, memorial or public declaration. Indeed, since Winston Churchill’s politically-motivated failure to acknowledge Bomber Command in his VE day speech, the British have been unique amongst the Allied victors in ducking the reality that a fight for survival and freedom against such a vicious enemy necessitated uncompromising offensive action. As Churchill himself declared in 1940: “The fighters are our salvation but the bombers alone provide the means of victory”.

Forgotten heroes

During the war, the men of Bomber Command, all volunteers, were unanimously regarded as heroes. The public appreciated that these extraordinary young men were daring to fly into the enemy’s heavily-defended territory and strike back at Germany for its unprovoked attacks on Warsaw, Rotterdam and other undefended civilian centres across Europe.

After the Allies’ disastrous defeat in France during May/June 1940 and the desperate rescue of British and French troops from Dunkirk, the British braced themselves for invasion. This was defeated both by the RAF fighters’ spectacular victory against the German Luftwaffe and the RAF bombers’ attacks on German shipping, logistics, troops and barges massing on the French coast. Forced to abandon their invasion, the Germans then launched their night time ‘Blitz’ on London, Coventry, Liverpool, Plymouth, Glasgow and many other British cities, killing 43,000 civilians. Britain had little defence against these night raids and would have been helpless to hit back without the RAF’s fledging bomber force.

Bomber Command gradually grew in strength and in 1942 began to strike truly heavy blows against Germany. But the risks to the young RAF fliers also mounted and by 1943 aircrews had just a 1 in 4 chance of surviving 30 missions. However, they were successfully disrupting German war industry, including secret weapon production. RAF raids also forced the Germans to divert a significant part of their war effort from the Russian front to defend their own country against air attack.

Many highly-trained RAF airmen were scarcely 20 when they flew their aircraft into the cauldron of German anti-aircraft fire and night-fighters. The youngest airgunners were 18 year old teenagers.

The debt we owe

The RAF Bomber Command Memorial will proudly commemorate the 55,000 bomber airmen who were killed. They died in blazing, crashing aircraft whilst fighting against the enemies of our free world. It is nothing short of a national disgrace that Britain has so far failed to properly recognise this brave and talented group of individuals who helped give us lasting freedom from the horrors the Germans inflicted across Europe.

Patrick Bishop wrote in his book Bomber Boys of the moral questions surrounding bombing:

‘Bomber Command, as I have said, attacked Bremen frequently. The first bombs killed thirteen people. They also burned down two warehouses full of furniture confiscated from Jews who had understood what fate awaited them in Germany and fled. Bombers were busy over the city on the night of 17/18 January 1942……The Nazi newspapers in the days following denounced the raiders as ‘terror fliers’. As they did so, sixteen Nazi bureaucrats met on 20 January in a villa at Wannsee outside Berlin to co-ordinate the extermination of the entire Jewish population of Europe.

The Nazis were to good as a black hole is to light. The effects of British and American bombing on Germany and the lands the Germans conquered were dreadful and it is right that they should be recorded and remembered. But the Allies’ real crime would have been to hold back from using any of the means at their disposal to destroy Hitler and those who sustained his war. The argument over exactly what Bomber Command achieved will never be settled. One undeniable success, an awkward one to acknowledge nowadays, is that it altered Germany’s personality. Saturation bombing may not, as intended, have broken the Germans’ spirit. But it helped powerfully to bring about their post-war conversion to peaceful democracy.’

To contribute now to the Bomber Command Memorial Fund
please send a cheque, payable to 'Bomber Command Association' to: