5 Group of the Royal Air Force (RAF) carried out the most destructive of 42 attacks on Braunschweig (Brunswick) during World War II.

It caused a massive conflagration that developed into a firestorm, and resulted in Braunschweig, the city of Henry the Lion, burning continuously for two and a half days from 15 to 17 October.

The RAF first bombed Braunschweig on 17 August 1940, killing seven people,[2] and the 94th Bombardment Group earned a Distinguished Service Cross for an 11 January 1944 mission against the Mühlenbau und Industrie Aktiengesellschaft (MIAG)[3] components factory.

The first major British bombing of Braunschweig was in the night beginning 14 January 1944, when nearly 500 Lancaster bombers attacked in the face of strong defence by German fighters.

Darmstadt had been attacked on the night of 11 September 1944 using a new targeting technique: a fan-shaped flying formation, and the staggering of the use of explosive and incendiary bombs.

Braunschweig was to be largely destroyed, not only as an important centre of the armament industry, but also, and above all, as a place where people lived making it uninhabitable and useless.

The next day, Air Marshal Arthur Harris issued the orders to carry out the attack on Braunschweig and other cities.

[b] The main force of the group were 233 four-engined Mark I and III Lancasters heavy bombers, each with a bomb load of about 6 tonnes (13,000 lb).

The bombers bound for Braunschweig took a course that ran to the south to avoid the Ruhr area, which was heavily defended by anti-aircraft batteries and fighter aircraft.

141 training craft flew simulated attacks on Heligoland, 20 Mosquitos went to Hamburg, 8 to Mannheim, 16 to Berlin and 2 to Düsseldorf.

They were supported by 140 special operations aircraft of 100 Group RAF, which deployed electronic warfare measures against German night-fighter defences.

The feint against Mannheim, which German forces expected to be the main target, left the Braunschweig attack unopposed.

Given the clear night,[c] the problem-free overflight, and the flawless marking of the target, the conditions for the attack were optimal, from the British point of view.

The ruins of the city centre were littered with unexploded incendiary bombs, greatly hampering fire engines and rescue vehicles.

Within the 24 hours of Operation Hurricane, the RAF dropped a total of about 10,000 tonnes (22 million pounds) of bombs on Duisburg and Braunschweig.

[19] While these thousands of people waited in seeming safety inside their thick-walled but quite overfilled shelters for the all-clear signal, the many fires in the city centre quickly merged into one widespread conflagration.

The danger was clearly that the victims would either suffocate for lack of oxygen if they stayed in their bunkers, or be burnt alive if they tried to leave and escape through the firestorm outside.

Only at the Schöppenstedter Straße 31 air shelter did help arrive too late: 95 of the 104 people inside had suffocated by the time the fire brigade reached them.

A large part of Braunschweig's tightly packed city centre was made up of about 800 timber-frame houses, many of which dated back to the Middle Ages.

A British reconnaissance aircraft sent to take photographs of the bombing's aftermath for analysis had to return to England, as its mission had been rendered impossible by the opaque pall that hung over the town.

[20] These "light" losses – compared with those suffered in the great air raids on Dresden, Hamburg, Pforzheim and other German cities – according to expert[who?]

[citation needed] For one thing, Braunschweig lay on the direct flight path, that is, the "lane" leading to Magdeburg and Berlin, and right near the armament industry centres of Salzgitter (Reichswerke Hermann Göring) and Wolfsburg (Volkswagen factory), meaning that Braunschweigers were used to – even in a sense "trained for" – quickly responding to alarms (there were 2,040 warnings and 620 air raid alarms between 1939 and 1945).

They came from up to 90 kilometres (56 mi) away, and included not only members of city fire brigades from, among other places, Blankenburg, Celle, Gifhorn, Hanover, Helmstedt, Hildesheim, Peine, Salzgitter, Wernigerode and Wolfenbüttel, but also volunteers and members of plant fire brigades at the various factories in Braunschweig and the surrounding area.

On 22 October, one week after the attack, a memorial was held for the victims, both at the Brunswick Cathedral and at the Schlossplatz, the square in front of Braunschweig Palace.

From the effects of war (mainly air raids but also their aftermath, such as having to dispose of, or otherwise make safe, the duds that the Allies dropped) about 2,905 people died, 1,286 of whom (44.3%) were foreigners.

These foreigners were predominantly prisoners of war, forced labourers, and concentration camp inmates who worked in the armament industry, and who were forbidden access to air raid bunkers.

Sixty percent of the city's places of cultural interest, including the municipal buildings, were likewise destroyed, along with about 50% of its industrial areas.

As early as 1943, the Anglican Bishop and Member of the House of Lords George Bell was putting forth the view that attacks such as these threatened the ethical foundations of Western civilization and destroyed any chance of future reconciliation between former foes.

This is part of the debate on whether the destruction of other German cities and loss of life that occurred once the Allied strategic bomber forces were released from their tactical support of the Normandy landings and resumed the strategic bombing campaign in September 1944 (a campaign that would last without further interruption until days before the end of World War II in Europe in May 1945) can be morally justified.

[needs update] Among other memorials that took place was Benjamin Britten's War Requiem, conducted at the Braunschweig Cathedral in the presence of British Ambassador Peter Torry.