Frederick Taylor, Dresden Tuesday, February 13,1945 (2004) Harper Collins
As soon as I saw this book, I had to buy it; the most terrifying fire bombing of this famous German City has left untold numbers of people shocked by an apparent Allied act of Brutality, the likes only surpassed by bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Only all is not what it seems in this once beautiful city of culture and famous Meissen porcelain.
To paraphrase one endorsement, " Anyone who believes World War II Dresden manufactured just chinaware will be greatly surprised that the City was in fact a Nazi industrial and rail center, and dispels the long held myth of Dresden as example of Allied brutality."
The authenticity of the narrative is supported by 39 pages of appendices, endnotes and source material including interviews and correspondence, plus bibliography of works used in text.
The book, though disturbing in more than a few parts, includes the real reasons, Arthur "Bomber" Harris , RAF Bomber Command Chief, chose to include bombing civilian sectors of German cities. What's more interesting and told in great detail is exactly what was manufactured in Dresden during the war years. Furthermore, the book exposes the utter disregard of civilian safety in Dresden by Nazi government leadership, as manifested by the utter lack of air raid shelters. The eyewitness accounts are the most telling.
