DRESDEN, Germany, Feb. 13 – Thousands of neo-Nazis and skinheads marched through the heart of this meticulously restored city on Sunday to protest its incendiary destruction by Allied forces 60 years ago in the biggest effort yet by fringe groups to portray Germans as equal victims of World War II.
Later Sunday, more than 10,000 people were expected to meet by candlelight in the city's baroque center to remember the war but also to acknowledge Germany's responsibility for unleashing it and the abuses of the Nazi regime. City leaders also temporarily reopened the Church of our Lady, the largest Protestant church in Germany and for three centuries the most visible symbol of the old town's baroque skyline. The sandstone church was reduced to rubble during the firebombing but has been pieced back together over the past 12 years.
"Here in Dresden, genocide took place in 1945, just like it did in Hiroshima," said Franz Schoenhuber, a former Nazi SS officer from Munich and a longtime far-right politician. "We're not afraid to call them war crimes."
The U.S. ambassador to Germany, Daniel Coats, joined dignitaries who laid wreaths at a mass grave of those who died in the fire bombings. Most historians estimate that 25,000 to 40,000 people were killed, though extremist groups and a significant number of Germans insist that the number exceeded 100,000.
"Today we grieve for the victims of war and the Nazi reign of terror in Dresden, in Germany and in Europe," Gerhard Schroeder said. "We will oppose in every way these attempts to reinterpret history. We will not allow cause and effect to be reversed."
Here's a snippet from Wikipedia on the carpet-bombing of cities, i.e. Operation Thunderclap (Dresden bombing camapign):
"The purpose of the area bombing of cities was laid out in a British Air Staff paper, dated September 23, 1941:
The ultimate aim of an attack on a town area is to break the morale of the population which occupies it. To ensure this, we must achieve two things: first, we must make the town physically uninhabitable and, secondly, we must make the people conscious of constant personal danger. The immediate aim, is therefore, twofold, namely, to produce (i) destruction and (ii) fear of death."For one of the greatest fictional works ever associated with the atrocities of war, try out "Slaughterhouse-Five" by Kurt Vonnegut.
Then the hard questions come up.... is it right to murder thousands of innocent civilians in order to injure your enemies' supplies? To take the lives of women and children to get a leg up on the opponent?
