The Nazis (called neo-Nazis now days) are at it again, this time in Dresden during the 60-year anniversary of the bombing of Dresden by the allies in WW II. About 5,000 Nazis have tried to disrupt the wreath laying ceremony that was attended by ambassadors of the US, UK, France and Russia. The BBC says the message of the day was "supposed to be one of remembrance for the dead, and hope that past wounds can be healed."

Initially, I passively listened to a "routine" newscast this past Sunday [mis?]informing us that on February 13, 1945, "The attacks killed 35,000 people and ruined the city's heart." And "35,000" seemed to be the figure that the world was using this past weekend in most of the reporting, but that's woefully undercounting the dead from that unnecessary and cruel attack on civilians. The truths are that the destruction of Dresden was the greatest single massacre in human history, and the most shameful allied "military" episode of World War II. On the night of February 13-14, 1945, just months from the end of the already won war, 773 British Lancaster bombers dropped 650,000 incendiary bombs on the essentially undefended city of Dresden. A murderous firestorm resulted from those night and day raids that could be seen for 200 miles. The British dropped bombs by night and the Americans, using 311 Flying Fortresses, raided the city the next day with high explosives, and all the while their fighter escorts were strafing those who were among the walking dead. The city burned for seven days and eight nights, and the true figure of the dead is more like 135,000. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were military-industrial cities, Dresden, a city of art and culture, more like Italy's Florence than any other city in Germany, contained no military targets vital to winning the war. The war against the Germans was essentially over by the time Churchill ordered Dresden destroyed as payback for "Coventry."

It's interesting to note that after the war, British and American commanders ducked for cover each time the question of Dresden came up. But a few brave souls like Ira C. Eaker, Lt. Gen., USAF (RET) wrote, "I deeply regret that British and U. S. bombers killed 135,000 [Note: Eaker did not use the ridiculously low number of 35,000] people in the attack on Dresden, but I remember who started the last war and I regret even more the loss of more than 5,000,000 Allied lives in the necessary effort to completely defeat and utterly destroy Nazism." General Eaker wrote that in 1964, he would be saddened today to learn that the Nazis haven't been "utterly" destroyed. By the way, the name "Eaker" should be familiar to us all. The 1940's style airbase at Blytheville was given a new task in 1959, and dedication ceremonies were held on January 10, 1960 for the "deployment of the BMW B-52G" bomber. In 1988, the base was renamed Eaker Air Force Base in honor of General Ira C. Eaker, the "first commander of the Mighty Eighth Air Force in World War II." [Source: Eaker Air Force Base veterans' web page]. It might be well to remember that General Eaker is frequently quoted when the subject of Dresden comes up: January 1, 1945, General Eaker had advised General Spaatz, the Supreme U. S. Air Commander in Europe, against sending heavy bombers to attack transportation targets in small German cities, for there would be many civilian casualties and the German people might be convinced that the Americans were barbarians . . . "we should never allow the history of this war to convict us of throwing the strategic bomber at the man in the street." [For further reading on this subject go to "The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany 1939-45," Vol. I thru IV, Prof R. Harrod, London 1959, and one can go to Judge Baker's Collection at the Dunklin County Library for more on the subject.]

Of course, General Eaker knew that the Nazi propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels wouldn't miss such a rich opportunity. He immediately launched a media campaign on Feb. 15, 1945, that tried to win some sympathy among other nations. Goebbels had leaflets dropped showing the pictures of the dead, especially the thousands of dead children, on one side of the paper, and on the other he "awarded" the Order of the White Feather (the symbol of cowardice among the military) to Lt. General James Doolittle (a name well known to the Germans and Japs) of the U. S. Air Force for "conspicuous cowardice, and for having turned into a murderer who enjoys his crime." [Goebbels' Diaries].

The German National Democratic Party (Neo-Nazi?) is very strong today in Dresden and in Saxony's state legislature, not by numbers, but by the "wink and smile" of some members of other parties who are "closet" Nazis? Too many main stream German politicians are too timid to admit their Nazi leanings, but nevertheless they are extremely helpful to the more vocal new Nazi beasts.

This past Sunday, the National Democratic Party of Germany successfully launched its latest effort to use the bombing of Dresden for extreme right wing political purposes, but that didn't keep the good people of Dresden from creating a safe harbor of 10,000 candles in the name of reconciliation, and on Sunday, February 13, 2005, church bells tolled a memorial in Dresden as they have done for sixty years, but the Neo-Nazis are deaf to church bells, and too stupid to see beyond their political harlotry, and too dumb to know that history has a message for them.

Finally, Dresden has a grim history with fire. In 1349, the Margrave of Meissen, Frederick II, had followed "tradition" by burning hundreds of his enemies at the stake in Dresden. Then it was the Jews, frequent scapegoats in European history, who were accused of having introduced the plague to Dresden in the Middle Ages, who were also burned at Dresden. The epicenter of the air raids of 1945 was in the Altmarkt square. The place of the "burnings" in the Middle Ages was also the very same Altmarkt square. And Shrove Tuesday, carnival day, by the cruelest coincidences, was the day of all the "burnings?"

Kenneth Kinchen is an independent writer with a background in international business and foreign service contracting.