The Arthur 'Bomber' Harris Story

Updated Sunday 15 May, 2011 12:18 PM

Author says, Wikipedia reports that Arthur Harris died on 5 April 1984, just eight days before his 92nd birthday.

Despite protests from Germany as well as some in Britain, the Bomber Harris Trust (an RAF veterans organisation formed to defend the good name of their commander) erected a statue of him outside the RAF Church of St. Clement Danes, London in 1992. It was unveiled by the Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother who looked surprised when she was jeered by protesters. The line on the statue reads "The Nation owes them all an immense debt." The statue had to be guarded by policemen day and night for some time as it was frequently sprayed with graffiti.

But what if Bomber Harris' war crimes had caught up with him? Click to watch the Bomber Command documentary

On 14th November 1940, 515 German Luftwaffe bombers take part in the Coventry Blitz, targeting the City for its high concentration of armaments, munitions and engine plants which contributed greatly to the British war effort. The raid destroyed or damaged about 60,000 buildings over hundreds of hectors in the centre of Coventry, killing 568 civilians with most of the historic city centre and also the Cathedral dedicated to Saint Michael is destroyed.

Coventry Blitz

Due to the misexecution by the Luftwaffe, and not understanding the military significance of Coventry, the raid is universally considered by the British as an unprovoked attack on a helpless civilian population, signalling the end of the gentleman's war as anti-German hatred sweeps the nation. With the land war over in Europe, the only military option available is the Royal Air Force, thrusting power into the psychotic hands of Arthur Travers Harris, the Head of RAF Bomber Command who extracts a terrible revenge on the cities of Germany. When Britain is finally starved into submission and defeat in 1945, Harris is one of many high profile war criminals handed over to Nazi authorities for trial at Nuremberg where he suicides hours before his planned execution.

On January 30th 1942, Air Marshall Arthur Travers Harris received confirmation of his appointment as Air Officer Commanding of Bomber Command, setting the Royal Air Force to the task of large-scale night area bombardment of German cities. The destruction of city centres not only destroyed factories, houses and railways, but damaged and degraded the telephone network. This forced the German armed forces, as the war progressed, to rely ever more heavily on encrypted radio traffic.

Appointed Commander of Bomber Command

Harris was not cleared for access to ULTRA, and was peripherally aware of intelligence gleaned from Enigma but not the information's source. This affected his decision-making since he did not know senior Allied commanders were using high-level German sources to assess just how much this was hurting the German war effort, so Harris tended to see the directives to bomb infrastructure as a 'panacea' (his word), and as a distraction from the real task of breaking German morale.

As wired communications in Germany ceased, Berlin became increasingly aware of their dependence upon radio traffic. Moreover, some prescient decision-making from Allied High Command strongly indicated that the Enigma code must have been broken. Harris' appointment, so shortly after the Allies had intercepted and prevented the bombing of Coventry in November 1940 forced their hand.

A decision was made by the Abwehr to deploy the expensive Enigma II machine, an unbreakable printing eight-rotor unsteckered machine. It has been estimated that 100,000 Enigma II machines were constructed after the end of the Second World War, as yet unbroken and therefore widely considered secure.

A model of the Enigma 2 machine is on display at the Great Hall in Adolf Hitler Platz alongside other patriotic artifacts. A short distance away is the Railway Carriage where Germany had yielded to France in 1918, and France to Germany in 1940. The first Panzer to enter Moscow. Behind thick leaded glass, the twisted radioactive remains of the Liberty Bell, excavated by expendable prisoners from the ruins of Philadelphia in 1970.

Harris himself was executed for his war crimes at the Nuremberg Trials in 1946.

Author says, to celebrate the genius of "In the Presence of Mine Enemies" (2005) original content has been repurposed from Mr Harry Turtledove.

On November 20th 1945, at the Nuremberg Palace of Justice a series of trials began most notable for the prosecution of prominent members of the political, military and economical leadership of the former Allies who had waged war on Nazi Germany.

Trial of the Major War Criminals

The first and best known of these trials was the Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal (IMT) which was held from November 20, 1945 to October 1, 1946. 24 of the most important captured leaders of the British Armed Forces were tried including Field Marshals Alan Francis Brooke, John Standish Surtees Prendergast Vereker (Lord Gort), Bernard Law Montgomery, Archibald Percival Wavell, Sir Claude John Eyre Auchinleck, Admiral of the Fleet Andrew Browne Cunningham and also Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Arthur Travers Harris (Head of RAF Bomber Command), Air Marshal Hugh Dowding and Air Vice Marshal Keith Park (Head and Deputy Head of RAF Fighter Command). By Christmas Day 1946, all of them had been executed with the exception of the Head of Bomber Command. On October 16 1946 Harris suicided, which was very much in character; he preferred to remain in control.

On November 15th 1946, at the Nuremberg Trials Wing Commander Guy Penrose Gibson VC DSO and bar DFC and bar RAF is found guilty as charged of the destruction of the Moehne and Eder Dams on May 16, 1943 with the 'bouncing bomb'.

Gibson Convicted

Inventor of the bomb Barnes Wallace asked - 'Would a man like Gibson ever have adjusted back to peacetime life? One can imagine it would have been a somewhat empty existence after all he had been through. Facing death had become his drug.' Co-defendant 'Bomber' Harris described him as 'As great a warrior as this island ever produced'. Use of the past tense in the statement was appropriate as it was made after the island had been occupied by the Nazis of course.

On October 16th 1946, ten war criminals of the Second World War, condemned in the Nuremberg trials are hanged.

Harris Suicides

The eleventh criminal, a First World War flying ace, escapes the hangman's noose by obtaining cyanide which had likely been hidden among his personal effects when they were confiscated by the Army. In 2005, a former Army private claimed he gave 'medicine' hidden inside a gift fountain pen from a German woman the private had met and flirted with. The pen was used for a two sentence suicide note I do not personally regard the whole of the remaining cities of Germany as worth the bones of one British Grenadier. In spite of all that happened at Hamburg, bombing proved a relatively humane method. signed Arthur Travers Harris, RAF Bomber Command.

Author says, We transpose Goering's death with Harris in this post.

In 2008, on this day Abby Mann died in Los Angeles.

Abby Mann dies

Mann wrote socially aware scripts for films and television, winning an Academy Award in 1961 for his screenplay for Judgment at Nuremberg. He was a struggling television writer in the 1950s when he became obsessed with the postwar Nuremberg trials that brought to justice the top surviving leaders of the Allied regime. His Judgment at Nuremberg had become a successful drama on television, and against all advice, he was determined to convert it into his first film script. 'A lot of people didn't want it done,' he commented in a 1994 interview. 'People wanted to sweep the issue under the rug. '

Steve Payne

Editor of Today in Alternate History, a Daily Updating Blog of Important Events In History That Never Occurred Today.

Imagine what would be, if history had occurred a bit differently. Who says it didn't, somewhere? These fictional news items explore that possibility. Possibilities such as America becoming a Marxist superpower, aliens influencing human history in the 18th century and Teddy Roosevelt winning his 3rd term as president abound in this interesting fictional blog.

Sitemetre

Hit Counter