The book I got the info from, Dave, is called "A History of Bombing", written by Sven Lindquist, a Swede, translated from the Swedish into English by Linda Haverty Rugg, published by Granta Books 2001 in the UK, also published by The New Press in the USA 2001.

It's not a book devoted solely to WWII, but is a comprehensive study of the entire history of aerial bombing from its earliest inception, including some examples of non-aerial bombardment of cities by naval forces, etc.

It is a look into the psychological assumptions that underly the decision to bomb people. These assumptions are of several types, and they are all tremendously self-serving and inhumane.

The book spares no one. It's not partisan, except in the sense that it is passionately antiwar. It favours neither England, for example, nor Germany, nor America, nor Russia, but simply tells what happened in chronological order. It's a fascinating and very disturbing book to read, quite apart from what it may contribute to a debate on decisions made in WWII.

Check it out if you get the chance. It also has an extensive bibliography to provide backup for what Lindqvist has to say.

I think the reason we're disagreeing about the timing is this: the first OFFICIALLY ANNOUNCED British raid on Berlin was, as you say, on 25th August 1940, after German bombs had fallen accidentally on London due to bad navigation. However...the decision was made by Churchill in May 1940 to begin bombing numerous rail centers and communications centers in Germany. Those rail and communications centers were located in the densest metropolitan centers of German cities, and the bombing done was inaccurate night bombing...area bombing...of what were German civilian centres. That is strategic bombing...but it was not officially announced as such to the British public, who got a very different impression of what was going on. As for Hitler, he didn't officially blow his top about it until after the official British raid on Berlin in August. Then he went berserk, made a fiery speech to the party faithful vowing to retaliate on London a hundredfold, a thousandfold...and away went the German Blitz. Ironical, because it may have cost them the Battle of Britain. Adolf was psychologically outplayed that time by the British...or else they just got "lucky".

So, when does strategic bombing begin? When it actually begins?...or when it becomes official and is done officially to an enemy's capital city?

In the end, it's the general impression of what happened that speaks loudest in people's collective memory...and that impression is generated by media coverage more than it is by specific facts.

Apparently, both the German public and the British public were of the firm opinion that the other guys did it first! This doesn't surprise me at all. :-) That's almost always how it goes in wartime.

- LH