Home
Creators
Search Recent Random
Posts
Search DMs Popular Hash Lookup Tags Random
Importer
Import FAQ
Register Favorites Keys Review DMs Logout
Community
Telegram ThePornDude
Home Creators Posts Import Register Favorites Logout

WW2: The Resource War - IV: Strategic Bombing - Extra History (Patreon)

Published:
2016-04-27 06:20:05
Imported:
2026-06
haven't archived this post yet. have a subscription? use the importer!

Content

We wrap up our series on WW2, the Resource War, with a look at the Battle of Britain and the concept of strategic bombing.

P.S. Sorry for the late post on this one, team! I went out today and expected to be home by 2pm but uh... it's 11.

Files

Previews only

WW2: The Resource War - IV: Strategic Bombing - Extra History

*Sponsored* Hearts of Iron IV comes out on June 6! Check out the game: http://pdxint.at/hoi4_coming_soon A series of missed airstrikes resulting in the death of civilians sparked the no-holds-barred Battle of Britain. Germany launched a Blitz to bomb London into submission, but inadvertantly sparked more resistance and gave British industry a chance to bounce back. --- (Episodie details below) Support us on Patreon! http://bit.ly/EHPatreon Grab your Extra Credits gear at the store! http://bit.ly/ExtraStore Subscribe for new episodes every Saturday! http://bit.ly/SubToEC Watch the WW2: Resource War series! http://bit.ly/1PRaI22 Play games with us on Extra Play! http://bit.ly/WatchEXP Talk to us on Twitter (@ExtraCreditz): http://bit.ly/ECTweet Follow us on Facebook: http://bit.ly/ECFBPage Get our list of recommended games on Steam: http://bit.ly/ECCurator ____________ Why doesn't this series use the Nazi swastika symbol? James explains: http://bit.ly/1Pzy1k5 ____________ On August 25, 1940, a group of German bomber planes got lost on a night-time mission over England. They wound up dropping bombs not on their industrial target, but on the city of London itself. Winston Churchill ordered a retaliatory strike against Germany, but this time it was the RAF who missed their target and hit civilians. Hitler was convinced this was intentional, so he rescinded his prohibition against targeting civilians. The Luftwaffe organized a massive attack against London, intending to break the British people's will to fight. The Blitz backfired in several respects. First, it diverted Germany's attention from strategic targets, which meant they were no longer putting real pressure on the British industrial war efforts. Second, they wound up bringing the British together and strengthening their will to fight on in the names of those who'd been lost to German bombs. Ultimately, the cost in men and material for Germany to wage the Battle of Britain exceeded the cost of damage they inflicted. ____________ ♫ Get the intro music here! http://bit.ly/1EQA5N7 *Music by Demetori: http://bit.ly/1AaJG4H ♫ Get the outro music here! http://bit.ly/23isQfx *Music by Sean and Dean Kiner: http://bit.ly/1WdBhnm

Comments

Aaron hutchinson

I enjoyed the exert from Winston Churchill's speech. The words are very powerful.

Robbie the Gnome

That black and white panel depicting the the German and English clash at the beginning of the episode (around the 1:20 mark) is just stunning, beautiful, and utterly effective. I paused the video for a few minutes just to look at it as I'm knew there was more there than a cursory glance would do justice to. The art style of EC/EH always delights in its simplistic complexity. I enjoyed the rest of the episode thoroughly as well. Churchill is one of the world's greatest orators. It's always a moving to hear his words.

ExtraCredits
>>1709113

Our artists take the water we give them and turn it into wine. This series was actually drawn by Scott DeWitt, who usually does Extra Credits for us, and it was fun getting to work on a different sort of project with him!

Robbie the Gnome
>>1709113

He did a top notch job with this series. I also like his EC work as well. Beanfolk are so entertaining.

paul staber

Wars have always been won by breaking the enemy's will to fight but so far n one has ever been able to do it from the air no not even with nukes that killed about 200,000 people combined and that was only because no one bothered to use there bomb shelters (it was only one plane after all) not even the most destructive air strikes of the war or month for that matter. but by then japan had lost maybe as many as 3,500,000 people and while it is not as sexy as BANG war over there was already large scale surrenders and other signs that japan was on the verge of falling apart the nukes as far as I am concerned where just the straw that broke the camels back though they where pretty big straws.

paul staber
>>1709097

The man was a walking quote machine. one of my favorites was "there is nothing more exhilarating than to be shot at and missed" though that was back in the Boer War.

Jakob
>>1709113

Beanfolk? I love it! This should be made the official name.

ExtraCredits
>>1709694

Yeah, modern history isn't my particular specialty, but I do remember reading an essay or two that described how Japan was already seriously considering their surrender when the nuclear bombs hit and made it a necessity. -Soraya

Robbie the Gnome
>>1709113

Correct. I play a lot of D&D so I'm used to the folking things: lizardfolk, catfolk, merfolk, folking hell. Hence Beanfolk.

RMS Oceanic
>>1709694

There's also the not-often-discussed-in-western-circles Soviet invasion of Manchuria which took place the day before Nagasaki. They took the lessons learned against the Wehrmacht and completely overran Japanese forces. That had to be a strong motivator. By the time they surrendered Russia had taken land area equivalent to most of Europe, including half of Korea, which is how that partition happened.

Alex Kyriacou

It's interesting that the British didn't learn from the Germans' mistakes and strived to break the German will to fight with strategic bombing that caused much more destruction than the Blitz. Once again, this had the opposite effect, and made the Germans more resolved to fight to the bitter end. Some would argue that Japan was broken by strategic bombing, but that's neglecting the role of the American blockade (that threatened Japan with starvation), the Soviet attack on Manchuria, the isolation of Japan's main army in China and of course nuclear weapons were a game changer. This lesson was ignored in Vietnam as well, and is being ignored by certain politicians who want to 'carpet bomb' Syria to crush ISIS . You can't bomb a country or a people into submission.

paul staber
>>1715141

While I have made similar points myself, the one undeniable bonus of the Allied Strategic bombing campaign was that it forced the germans to defend against it tying up about a million men (to include the last pope) and many thousands of FLAK guns and fighters and even bombers (used as night fighters looking at you Ju-88) that where desperately needed at the front.

paul staber
>>1709694

RMS Oceanic after fighting the Germans the Japanese army really was easy mode no AT guns worth worrying about no submachineguns, a handful of tanks but most of them could be destroyed by 7.62mm AP bullets let alone actual anti tank weapons(that the russians had no shortage of its kind of ironic the russians had all the Tank killers in the world but nothing worth shooting them at and the Japanese where "fighting" all the tanks in the world but had nothing that could hurt them). hardly surprising how one sided it was the soviets lost about 12,000 men the Japanese lost as many as 50,000 dead and hundreds of thousands captured or deserted.

Randall Norman Pick
>>1715141

But the strategic bombing campaign (in the sense of attacking industrial facilities that take a long time to build) had a definite effect on weakening the ability of Germany to wage war.

Alex Kyriacou
>>1715141

Of course bombing played an important role in Germany's defeat, but by itself it wouldn't have led to Germany's defeat, and the 'terror bombing' never broke the enemy's will to fight as it was intended.

Randall Norman Pick
>>1715141

I'm surprised a series on the economics of war focused on the terror portion of the Blitz without mentioning the Allied firebombing campaigns, at the very least.