The Daily Mail is to excerpt Bomber Harris: His Life and Times. A major, exclusive feature from the book will appear in Britain’s leading, mass-selling quality daily. Air Commodore Henry Probert’s eagerly-awaited biography is generating a buzz of promotional activity, in advance of the book’s publication next month, and more than sixty thousand leaflets are being distributed by leading aviation magazines. The official launch party for the book will take place on the evening of 12 September 2001 at the RAF Club in Piccadilly, Central London. The guest list includes many friends and family of Harris, plus key personalities from media, military history and aviation circles. Air Cdre Probert plans to make appearances at a number of bookstores throughout England, where there has been considerable demand for lectures and booksignings. He has professed that he is particularly keen to re-visit his birthplace, Manchester, a city whose wartime plight he memorably evokes in his Preface to the biography. Finally, BBC2’s Timewatch will profile RAF Bomber Command during an edition to be screened on 23 August. Air Cdre Probert appears on the programme to give a balanced view of the decisions taken at Bomber Command HQ during World War II. Dresden: A ‘City Too Far’? Bomber Harris: His Life and Times , the major new biography of Sir Arthur Harris, examines Harris’s wartime leadership of Bomber Command in detail. Harris has been vilified by many for his role in the bombing raids over Germany; here his biographer, Henry Probert, sets the bombing of Dresden in context: “The destruction of the historic capital of Saxony - hitherto virtually untouched - on the night of 13 February 1945 has come to symbolise in countless minds all that was dreadful about the bombing of Germany in the Second World War. In particular the degree of devastation caused has since been widely perceived as unnecessary at a time when, it is claimed, the war was virtually won. ... While the rationale of Bomber Command’s campaign in earlier years is normally understood, Dresden is often seen as a ‘city too far’ and the finger of blame is all too frequently pointed at Harris, the man who directed the attack and was bound to be seen publicly at the time as responsible for it. What many of the critics fail to consider, however, is how the war situation actually looked to those involved in the key decisions and how those decisions were actually reached. In the second half of January the Allied leaders still had many anxieties. On the Western Front the Rhine barrier was uncrossed, the recent Battle of the Ardennes had shown that the Germans remained a far from spent force, and nothing was more certain than that their Army would fight bitterly in defence of the Fatherland. In the East the Red Army was just starting a new offensive in central Poland and encountering fierce resistance in its efforts to break through towards the German border. The enemy was still coming up with new weaponry which might be difficult to counter, notably the ME 262 jet aircraft and the schnorkel submarine. There was even the possibility of the Germans producing an atomic bomb, something which Harris himself thought might happen. ... From Germany were coming increasingly horrific reports of what was taking place in the concentration camps, coupled with desperate pleas to the Allied leaders for urgent action; Auschwitz was overrun by the Red Army on 27 January. Nor would victory in Europe even end the war, for in the Far East lay Japan and the prospect of further ferocious conflict. The Allies would win for sure, but how long would it take and at what cost? We, with the benefit of hindsight, know the answers. Those with the responsibility did not. ... It was in this atmosphere that on 22 January the complex discussions leading to the Dresden attack began ... It was Bufton who set the ball rolling by suggesting to Bottomley that the new Soviet advance might offer the opportunity to implement Operation Thunderclap, a plan originally put forward in August 1944 to deliver a catastrophic blow against either Berlin or some other major city hitherto largely undamaged. The Joint Intelligence Committee took up the theme on the 25th, stressing the value to the Russian offensive of the great confusion that would result from the sustained bombing of Berlin. Bottomley immediately discussed the JIC’s ideas with Harris, who suggested that not only Berlin but also Chemnitz, Leipzig and Dresden should be attacked; all would be housing evacuees from the East and were focal points in German communications behind the Eastern Front. There was nothing surprising about this proposal. These three cities, with others in eastern Germany, had long been on the list agreed with the Air Ministry for area attack when the circumstances were right and Harris was merely drawing attention to their significance in this particular situation.” Henry Probert explores the responsibility of Harris and others for the bombing of Dresden, and how it was viewed at the time and since. Bomber Harris: His Life and Times covers Harris’s leadership throughout the Second World War, as well as his childhood, his experiences in the First World War, family life and post-war years, and is the definitive biography of a great military personality. Back to Greenhill Military Book News No. 109 Table of Contents Back to Greenhill Military Book News List of Issues Back to Master Magazine List © Copyright 2001 by Greenhill Books This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com