Unsere Mauern brechen, aber unsere Herzen nicht! �Our walls are broken but not our hearts.�
Berlin, 1943: an engulfed in flames building after a British night raid. 26 million of German people lost their home during the war, just in Berlin half of all houses were damaged and around a third uninhabitable, as much as 16 km² of the city was simply rubble.
THE OFFENSIVE
STARTS. A German Luftwaffe Heinkel He 111 bomber flying over Wapping and the Isle of Dogs in the East End of London at at the start of the Luftwaffe’s evening raids of 7 September 1940. PHOTO: Imperial War Museums.
“RAF BOMBER COMMAND ATTACKS BERLIN.”
D
uring Battle of Britain in the Summer of 1940, Germany bombed British RAF bases and their defences. Suddenly, on the night of August 24th, some Luftwaffe bombers drop, probably by mistake, some bombs over London. Next day, Prime Minister Winston Churchill ordered an action to revenge the honor of the British citizens. Bomber Command sent 95 bombers to attack Berlin on the night of 25-26 August 1940 to bomb Tempelhof Airport near the center of
4
BERLIN LuftTerror
Berlin and Siemensstadt (a factory). 81 planes managed to reach the city and dropped their bombs. and while the damage was slight, the psychological effect on Hitler was greater. The bombing raid on Berlin prompted Hitler to order the shift of the Luftwaffe’s target from British airfields and air defences to British cities, at a time during the Battle of Britain when the British were critically close to collapse. It has been argued that this action may actually have saved Britain from defeat.
Winston Churchill inspecting a Vickers Wellington Mark II bomber and its ground crew during a visit to an RAF bomber station, 6 June 1941. PHOTO: War Office official photographer Horton (Capt). Imperial War Museum.