The Bombing War: Europe 1939–1945

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The Bombing War: Europe 1939–1945 Page 108

by Richard Overy


  131. IWM, Italian Series, Box 3, E2489, Liaison officer of XII Fliegerkorps, ‘Protocollo della riunione, 9 June 1943’; Box 1, E2476, Comando Supremo to Superaereo, Superesercito, Supermarina, 13 Mar 1943 ‘Difesa contra-aerea’; Comando supremo, memorandum for Gen. Addetto, 10 Mar 1943.

  132. IWM, Italian Series, Box 2, E2485, Relazioni critiche mensili dei reparti intercettori, Maggio 1943, 1–2.

  133. IWM, Italian Series, Box 3, E2489, maps of ‘Nuovo progetto di schieramento di caccia notturna’, 9 June 1943, July 1943, 15 Aug 1943; Castioni, ‘I radar industriali italiani’, 1,250–51, 1,254.

  134. IWM, Italian Series, Box 1/E2470, Anti-aircraft CoS to Gen. Presso, 20 Feb 1943; Gen. von Pohl to Italian Army Staff (Air Defence), 15 Mar 1943.

  135. Natalini, I rapporti tra aeronautica italiana e tedesca, 157–61. Night-fighters in IWM, Italian Series, Box 3, E2489, Ministero dell’Aeronautica, ‘Appunto per il Duce’, May 1943, 4.

  136. Natalini, I rapporti tra aeronautica italiana e tedesca, 162–4; IWM, Italian Series, Box 3, E2489, Ministero dell’Aeronautica, ‘Appunto per il Duce’, May 1943.

  137. IWM, Italian Series, Box 10/E2528, Italian Embassy, Berlin to the Minister for Air, 25 July 1941; Italian Embassy to Minister for Air, 23 July 1941, encl. ‘Collaborazione industriale aeronautica fra Italia e Germania’.

  138. Nicola della Volpe, Difesa del territorio e protezione antiaerea (1915–1943) (Rome: 1986), 194–203, doc 17, ‘Istruzione sulla protezione antiaerea’.

  139. ACS, MdAe, Busta 82, Ministry of War to all ministries, 18 Feb 1939; Volpe, Difesa del territorio, 36. Active air defence was allocated 252 million lire in 1938–9 but civil defence only 20.8 million.

  140. ACS, MdAe, Busta 82, Gen. Valle to Mussolini, 23 Apr 1939, encl. Air Staff memorandum, 18 Apr 1939.

  141. Volpe, Difesa del territorio, 209–10, doc 18, Army Council meeting, 8 May 1939.

  142. ACS, MdAe, Busta 82, Ministry of War to all prefects and regional military authorities, 10 June 1940.

  143. Baldoli, Knapp, Forgotten Blitzes, 54; Volpe, Difesa del territorio, 46–8.

  144. Baldoli, Knapp, Forgotten Blitzes, 71–3.

  145. ACS, MdAe, Busta 82, War Ministry to all ministries and prefects, 29 May 1940; Interior Ministry to Air Ministry, 2 Oct 1940; Comando della 3 Zona Aerea to Air Ministry, 11 Nov 1940; note from secretary to the Duce to the Air Ministry, 16 Nov 1940.

  146. TNA, AIR 20/5384, Genoa prefect to Interior Ministry, 18 June 1940.

  147. ACS, MdAe, Busta 82, Commissariat for War Production to the War Ministry, 24 June 1940.

  148. Franco Manaresi, ‘La protezione antiaerea’, in Cristina Bersani, Valeria Monaco (eds), Delenda Bononia: immagini dei bombardamenti 1943–1945 (Bologna: 1995), 29–30.

  149. Carlotta Coccoli, ‘I “fortilizi inespugnabili della civiltà italiana”: La protezione antiaerea del patrimonio monumentale italiano durante la seconda guerra mondiale’, Scienza e Beni Culturali, 26 (2010), 410–12.

  150. Marta Nezzo, ‘The Defence of Works of Art in Italy during the Second World War’, in Baldoli, Knapp, Overy (eds), Bombing, States and Peoples, 104–6.

  151. ACS, MdAe, Busta 56, Telecommunications inspectorate report for Air Ministry, ‘Danni di guerra a stabilimenti ausiliari’, 9 Feb 1943; Director General of Construction, Air Ministry, 15 Jan 1943; TNA, AIR 20/5387, Italian Ministry of Public Works, ‘Damage Caused by Air Raids on Piemonte – October and November 1942’; report from Prefect in Genoa on air raids of 13–14 and 15–16 and 18 Nov 1942 (both translations from Italian originals).

  152. ACS, MdAe, Busta 46, Ministry of War to all ministries, 15 Nov 1942; memorandum for the Comando Supremo, 19 Nov 1942, 1–2.

  153. ACS, MdAe, Busta 46, Air Ministry memorandum for Mussolini, 10 Dec 1942, ‘Dislocamento dell’industrie aeronautiche’; Air Ministry, ‘Appunti per il Duce’, 15 Dec 1942; Office of Air Ministry Inspectorate, minutes of meeting with Ministry of Corporations, 14 Dec 1942.

  154. ACS, MdAe, Busta 56, memorandum, ‘Ripresa produzione officine Alfa Romeo, Pomigliano’, 14 June 1943.

  155. Cited in Leonardo Paggi, Il ‘popolo dei morti’: la repubblica italiana nata della guerra (1940–1946) (Bologna: 2009), 108–9.

  156. Iris Origo, War in Val d’Orcia: An Italian War Diary 1943–1944 (London: 2003), 28–9, entry for 30 Jan 1943.

  157. ACS, MdAe, Busta 55, Air Ministry minute, 18 July 1943; Busta 46, memorandum by Col. Galante, 30 Nov 1942.

  158. ACS, Ministero dell’Interno, Busta 21, Police HQ Genoa to Ministry, 14 Nov 1942; Prefect of Turin to Ministry, 19 Dec 1942; sticker samples, ‘Merda!’.

  159. Elena Cortesi, ‘Evacuation in Italy during the Second World War: Evolution and Management’, in Baldoli, Knapp, Overy, Bombing, States and Peoples, 60–62.

  160. Paggi, Il ‘popolo dei morti’, 107, 110–11; Cortesi, ‘Evacuation in Italy’, 62–3.

  161. Paggi, Il ‘popolo dei morti’, 110–12; Manuela Lanari, Stefano Musso, ‘Un dramma mal calcolato: sfollamento e istituzioni nella provincia di Torino’, in Bruno Maida (ed), Guerra e società nella provincia di Torino (Turin: 2007), 14, 24–6, 28–9.

  162. TNA, AIR 19/215, Sinclair to Churchill, 4 Dec 1942.

  163. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 72, OSS Bulletin, 7 Apr 1943; OSS Report, 19 Apr 1943 (from Bern).

  164. TNA, FO 898/175, ‘Report on Colonel Thornhill’s Mission on Political Warfare in General Eisenhower’s Command’, 16 Nov 1943, App 10 and App 14.

  165. ACS, Ministero dell’Interno, Busta 21, Office of Carabinieri, Genoa, to Ministry of Interior, 16 Nov 1942.

  166. TNA, FO 898/175, Allied Force HQ, Algiers, PWB memorandum, ‘Combat Propaganda – Leaflet Distribution’, 15 June 1943.

  167. Cesare de Simone, Venti angeli sopra Roma: I bombardamenti aerei sulla Città Eterna (Milan: 1993), 266. On Fascist propaganda see Claudia Baldoli, Marco Fincardi, ‘Italian Society under Anglo-American Bombs: Propaganda, Experience and Legend, 1940–1945’, The Historical Journal, 52 (2009), 1,032–4, 1,037.

  168. ACS, Ministero dell’Interno, Busta 21, Appunto per il Duce, 7 July 1943.

  169. TNA, AIR 2/7397, Air Ministry to C-in-C Bomber Command, 28 Oct 1940; Air Ministry to C-in-C Bomber Command, 29 Oct 1940; Sinclair to Churchill, 24 Feb 1941; Churchill to Sinclair, 28 Feb 1941.

  170. TNA, AIR 8/436, HQ RAF Middle East to Air Ministry, 4 Sept 1941; Sir Miles Lampson (ambassador in Cairo) to the Foreign Office, 17 Sept 1941; AIR 2/7397, Air Ministry to HQ RAF Middle East, 27 Mar 1941; Air Ministry to HQ RAF Middle East, 5 Sept 1941.

  171. TNA, AIR 8/436, Portal to Cadogan (Permanent Secretary, Foreign Office), 26 Oct 1941.

  172. TNA, AIR 19/215, Note for Sinclair, ‘Bombing of Targets in Rome’, Dec 1942; Sinclair to Churchill, 4 Dec 1942, 1–2.

  173. TNA, AIR 19/215, marginalia on ‘Bombing Targets in Rome’, Dec 1942; Sinclair to Churchill, 4 Dec 1942; Sinclair to Portal, 11 Dec 1942; Foreign Office to British Embassy, Bern, 17 Dec 1942.

  174. CCO, Portal papers, Folder 4/File 2, Eden to Churchill, 14 July 1943; TNA, AIR 19/215, Portal to Sinclair, 3 Dec 1942; Portal to Churchill, 13 July 1943.

  175. Warren Kimball (ed), Churchill & Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence, 4 vols (London: 1984), vol 2, 234–5, Churchill to Roosevelt, 10 June 1943; 250–51, Roosevelt to Churchill, 14 June 1943.

  176. TNA, AIR 19/215, RAF Delegation, Washington to Air Ministry, 26 June 1943.

  177. Ibid., Archbishop Temple to Sinclair, 9 July 1943; Note by the assistant chief of the air staff (ACAS) (Information), ‘Air Attacks on Objectives in Rome’, 4 July 1943; Minute by ACAS, 15 July 1943; Sinclair to Temple, 17 July 1943.

  178. LC, Eaker papers, Box I.36, North-West African Strategic Air Forces (NWASAF), Report and Evaluation, Rome, 19 July 1943: Rome Railroad Yards, Mission Report.

  179. Claudia Baldoli, ‘Bombing the Eternal City’, History Today (May 2012), 11; Simone, Venti angeli sopra Roma, 262–4.

  180. Marco Fincardi, ‘Gli italiani e l’attesa di un bombardamento
della capitale (1940–1943)’, in Labanca (ed), I bombardamenti aerei sull’Italia, 239.

  181. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 33, CCS to Eisenhower, 25 June 1943; Eisenhower to War Dept., Washington, DC, 18 July 1943.

  182. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 72, OSS Bulletin, 30 July 1943; Fincardi, ‘Gli italiani e l’attesa di un bombardamento della capitale’, 233–4, 242–3.

  183. Raymond Klibansky (ed), Mussolini’s Memoirs 1942–1943 (London: 2000), 51–55.

  184. TNA, FO 898/175, Report of Col. Thornhill’s Mission, 16 Nov 1943, App 14.

  185. LC, Spaatz papers, Box 94, Total tonnage dropped Aug 1942–May 1944.

  186. TNA, AIR 20/5387, Ministry of Public Works, Statistics on Bomb Damage, 10 June 1940–31 Mar 1943. The list did not include buildings lost in Milan, Genoa and Palermo.

  187. Paggi, Il ‘popolo dei morti’, 114–17.

  188. Cited in Gloria Chianese, ‘Quando uscimmo dai rifugi’: Il Mezzogiorno tra guerra e dopoguerra (1943–46) (Rome: 2004), 35–6. On Naples see Gabriella Gribaudi, Guerra totale: Tra bombe alleate e violenza naziste: Napoli e il fronte meridionale 1940–44 (Turin: 2005), ch 3.

  189. See Gabriella Gribaudi, ‘Tra discorsi pubblici e memorie private. Alcune riflessioni sui bombardamenti e sulla loro legittimazione’, in Labanca (ed), I bombardamenti aerei, 315–18; Marco Gioannini, ‘Bombardare l’Italia. Le strategie alleate e le vittime civili’ in idem, 92–3.

  190. Claudia Baldoli, ‘Spring 1943: The Fiat Strikes and the Collapse of the Italian Home Front’, History Workshop Journal, 72 (2011), 183–6.

  191. TNA, AIR 20/5383, Report from the Comune of Rome, May 1943; province of Genoa, ‘Situation during the Month of May 1943’; province of Turin, ‘Situation during the Month of May 1943’; province of Palermo, ‘Report for the Month May 1943’.

  192. Origo, War in Val d’Orcia, 35, 39–40, entry for 1 Apr 1943.

  193. Paggi, Il ‘popolo dei morti’, 119; the prayer in Origo, War in Val d’Orcia, 36. The best account of the role of religion in Italian efforts to cope with bombing is Claudia Baldoli, ‘Religion and Bombing in Italy’, in Baldoli, Knapp, Overy, Bombing, States and Peoples, 136–53.

  194. TNA, AIR 19/215, VCAS (Air Marshal Evill) to Sinclair, 31 July 1943; CCO, Portal papers, Folder 3/File 3, Portal to Tedder, 30 July 1943.

  195. TNA, FO 898/496, leaflet, ‘Fuori i tedeschi – oppure ferro e fuoco’, 29 July 1943; leaflet, ‘Il governo’, 14 Aug 1943.

  196. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 33, CCS to Eisenhower (n.d.); message for the President from Gen. Marshall, 2 Aug 1943; Churchill to Roosevelt, 3 Aug 1943; memorandum for the President from Admiral Leahy, 16 Aug 1943; CCS to Eisenhower, 15 Aug 1943; Simone, Venti angel sopra Roma, 301.

  197. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 72, OSS Bulletin, 3 Aug 1943; Report, 17 Aug 1943, ‘Italy: Badoglio’s Position vis-à-vis the Germans’. Details of raids in Chianese, ‘Quando uscimmo dai rifugi’, 31; Gioannini, Massobrio, Bombardate l’Italia, 360–61, 365–6.

  198. The best guide to the complex web of command and the thicket of acronyms is Wesley F. Craven, James L. Cate, The Army Air Forces in World War II: Vol III, Europe: Argument to V-E Day (Chicago, IL: 1951), 326–35.

  199. AFHRA, Disc MAAF 233, American Embassy (Economic Warfare Division) to NAAF, 16 Dec 1943, 2, 4–5.

  200. Ibid., HQ NAAF (Norstad) to commanding general NAAF, 14 Nov 1943.

  201. Ibid., Cabell to Eaker, Bombing Directive, 1 Mar 1945.

  202. LC, Spaatz papers, Box 94, Total tonnage AAF-RAF, Jan–May 1944.

  203. Richard G. Davis, Carl A. Spaatz and the Air War in Europe (Washington, DC: 1993), App 10 and App 18.

  204. TNA, AIR 8/777, Harris to Portal, 13 Nov 1942.

  205. Harvey, ‘The Italian War Effort’, 41.

  206. TNA, AIR 20/283, Statistics on Bombing, Feb–Nov 1943.

  207. Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the German Air Force, 219, 258–60, 265–6.

  208. Davis, Carl A. Spaatz, App 24.

  209. Joseph Heller, Catch 22 (London: 1994), 55.

  210. Ronald Schaffer, Wings of Judgment: American Bombing in World War II (New York: 1985), 47–8; Solly Zuckerman, From Apes to Warlords: The Autobiography of Solly Zuckerman, 1904–1946 (London: 1978), 211.

  211. TNA, AIR 19/215, HQ MAAF (Eaker) to Air Ministry, 7 Apr 1944.

  212. Schaffer, Wings of Judgment, 49–50.

  213. TNA, AIR 19/215, Slessor to Air Ministry, 29 Feb 1944; Ismay to Churchill, 1 Mar 1944; conclusions of CoS meeting, 2 Mar 1944.

  214. AFHRA, Disc MAAF 233, Norstad to Allied Tactical Air Forces, Bombing Directive: Florence Marshalling Yards, 2 Mar 1944.

  215. TNA, AIR 19/215, Slessor to Sinclair, 7 May 1944.

  216. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 33, Marshall to Eisenhower, 27 Sept 1943; JCS to Eisenhower, 2 Nov 1943; TNA, AIR 8/438, FO to JSM, Washington, DC, 23 Sept 1943; CCS memorandum, ‘Rome Open City’, 24 Sept 1943; Osborne (Ambassador Holy See) to Foreign Office, 14 Oct 1943.

  217. TNA, AIR 19/215, Osborne to Foreign Office (War Cabinet distribution), 6 Nov 1943; Resident Minister Algiers (Harold Macmillan) to Foreign Office, 8 Nov 1943.

  218. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 33, JCS memorandum for the President, 4 Dec 1943; memorandum for the President from Admiral Leahy, 5 Dec 1943; Roosevelt to Cordell Hull, 7 Dec 1943.

  219. TNA, WO 204/12508, Maj. F. Jones, ‘Report on the Events Leading to the Bombing of the Abbey of Monte Cassino on 15 February 1944’, 14 Oct 1949, 7–13.

  220. Ibid., 20–23.

  221. James Parton, ‘Air Force Spoken Here’: General Ira Eaker and the Command of the Air (Bethesda, MD: 1986), 363–4.

  222. Peter Caddick-Adams, Monte Cassino: Ten Armies in Hell (London: 2012), 145–6.

  223. TNA, AIR 8/777, Wilson to the CoS, 9 Mar 1944.

  224. John Slessor, The Central Blue: Recollections and Reflections (London: 1956), 576–7.

  225. TNA, WO 204/12508, ‘Report on the Events’, 31–3; App 3, Doc 26A, HQ Fifth Army memorandum, ‘Monte Cassino Abbey’, 28 Feb 1944.

  226. Slessor, Central Blue, 574, reproducing his memorandum for Portal, 16 Apr 1944.

  227. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, 198, 210–11.

  228. Slessor, Central Blue, 566–8.

  229. AFHRA, Disc MAAF 233, MAAF Bombing Directive, 18 Feb 1944.

  230. TNA, AIR 20/2050, Summary of MAAF Effort, Operation ‘Strangle’, 15 Mar–11 May 1944.

  231. Ibid., Summary of MAAF Effort: Operation ‘Diadem’, 12 May–22 June; Parton, ‘Air Force Spoken Here’, 383–4.

  232. AFHRA, Disc MAAF 230, memorandum by Lt. Col. W. Ballard, Analysis Section, MAAF, 28 Sept 1944, 2.

  233. UEA, Zuckerman Archive, SZ/BBSU/1/49, Interview with Kesselring, 23 Aug 1945, 3.

  234. Paolo Ferrari, ‘Un arma versatile. I bombardamenti strategici anglo-americani e l’industria italiana’, in idem (ed), L’aeronautica italiana: una storia del Novecento (Milan: 2004), 401–2; Massignani, ‘L’industria bellica italiana’, 195; Natalini, I rapporti tra aeronautica italiana e tedesca, 165–6.

  235. Lutz Klinkhammer, L’occupazione tedesca in Italia, 1943–1945 (Turin: 1996), 78–84; Natalini, I rapporti tra aeronautica italiana e tedesca, 166–7.

  236. Andrea Villa, Guerra aerea sull’Italia (1943–1945) (Milan: 2010), 217–18.

  237. Achille Rastelli, Bombe sulla città: Gli attacchi aerei alleati: le vittime civili a Milano (Milan: 2000), 145–7, 184. The figure of 197 dead recorded from the other 17 raids is clearly an incomplete figure, but an indication that most raids at this stage of the war in a city with wide experience of bombing were relatively small.

  238. Villa, Guerra aerea, 219–20; Natalini, I rapporti tra aeronautica italiana e tedesca, 167.

  239. AFHRA, Disc MAAF 230, MAAF, Target Committee, minutes of meeting, 23 Feb 1945, 4.

  240. Villa, Guerra aerea, 226–7. For other estimates see Zamagni, ‘Italy: How to Lose the War’, 207–12.

  241. Ferrari, ‘Un arma versatile’, 397–9. Housing loss in Zamagni, ‘Italy:
How to Lose the War’, 212, who shows that because of additional housing built between 1938 and 1941, the stock of housing was almost the same in 1945 as in 1938.

  242. FDRL, Map Room Files, Box 72, OSS Bulletin, ‘The Situation in Italy’, Bern station, 27 Sept 1943.

  243. TNA, AIR 8/777, D’Arcy Osborne to the Foreign Office, 22 Mar 1944.

  244. TNA, AIR 19/215, Eden to Sinclair, 15 May 1944.

  245. Ibid., Sinclair to Eden, 17 May 1944; CCO, Portal papers, Folder 5, Evill to Churchill, 6 May 1944.

  246. Origo, War in Val d’Orcia, 71–2, entry for 1 Aug 1944.

  247. Corrado Di Pompeo, Più della fame e più dei bombardamenti: Diario dell’occupazione di Roma (Bologna: 2009), 107, 112, entries for 25 Feb and 25 Mar 1944.

  248. For a full account see Klinkhammer, L’occupazione tedesca, 318–66.

  249. Baldoli, ‘Religion and Bombing in Italy’, 146–7.

  250. Simone, Venti angeli sopra Roma, 301.

  251. Anna Scattigno, ‘Il clero in Toscana durante il passaggio del fronte. Diari e cronache parrocchiali’, in Labanca (ed), I bombardamenti aerei, 253–8.

  252. Franco Manaresi, ‘I bombardamenti aerei di Bologna’, in Bersani, Monaco (eds), Delenda Bononia, 47–8; Manaresi, ‘La protezione antiaerea’, in idem, 40.

  253. Ibid., 34–5.

  254. ACS, Ministero dell’Interno, Busta 106, memorandum for the Milan Prefect, 4 Mar 1943, ‘Ricoveri pubblici’.

  255. Baldoli, Knapp, Forgotten Blitzes, 188–9.

  256. TNA, AIR 20/5387, Province of Palermo, Report for the month, May 1943; Inspector of Air Raid Protection, Rome, ‘Report concerning Air Attack on Rome 13 August 1943’, 13–14.

  257. Cortesi, ‘Evacuation in Italy’, 65–6.

  258. Lanari, Musso, ‘Un dramma mal calcolato’, 28–9.

  259. Calculated from Mauro Maggiorani, ‘Uscire dalla città: lo sfollamento’, in Brunella Dalla Casa, Alberto Preti (eds), Bologna in Guerra, 1940–1945 (Milan: 1995), 376.

  260. Cortesi, ‘Evacuation in Italy’, 70–71.

  261. Baldoli, Knapp, Forgotten Blitzes, 144–9.

  262. The only full account is George Southern, Poisonous Inferno: World War II Tragedy at Bari Harbour (Shrewsbury: 2002).

 

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