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Hello and welcome to Battleground 45 with me, Saul David, and Patrick Bishop. Patrick, you've been away for a few weeks. It's very good to have you back. Nice to be back, Saul. Now, this story is one of the most astonishing of the Second World War. It took place on the 25th of April 1945. So we've just got a week or so before the end of the Second World War. Hitler himself is going to commit suicide on the 30th of April.
of April. But on the 25th was launched a massive airstrike against his Bechtersgaden mountain eyrie. That's both the Berghof, which is his personal residence, also the Eagle's Nest above it and the SS barracks guarding the Berghof.
Patrick, it's a mission that some of the listeners might be wondering, why on earth didn't they try earlier in the war when Hitler was actually there? Do we have an answer for that? Well, yeah. I mean, the answer is that they thought they probably would not succeed. It's a pretty small target. You've got the Berghof, which is the much added to, sort of as a modest villa. Hitler used to go there in the 20s and brood, dream his dreams, look out over the
the Ubersalzburg mountain and the great mountain ranges beyond the Bavarian Alps.
But as time passed, it got built up into some grandiose sort of mountain retreat. But it was very well defended. It was honeycomb with bunkers and all the rest of it. So the feeling was, okay, we could get to it, okay. We could probably blow it up, but we might not kill Hitler. And the propaganda value of not killing him would be much greater to the Germans than the effort was worth. So it was only at this point, they kind of knew Hitler wasn't there, but they thought,
why not? Let's just have an overwhelming show of force. And it'd be a kind of feel-good raid, which everyone wanted to be on, of course. One of the disappointed airmen was the commander of 617 Squadron, the famous Danbusters, a guy called Johnny Fokier. Well, he was actually, he'd done too many tours to be allowed. He was the superior, said you can't go on this one, done far too many. So he was mightily disappointed.
annoyed about this and said to the guy who was actually replacing him, Squadron Leader John Brooks, I'd like to have this target on my logbook. In fact, I'd like to have this target tattooed on my arse that you have to go instead. So, you know, it's a great prestige thing to be on. And it was a massive display of Allied air power and all in all a wonderful propaganda exercise.
359 bombers flown in this attack, Patrick, all RAF, and they included, and you mentioned 617 Squadron, the famous Dam Buster Squadron, which also featured in your book about the sinking of the Tirpitz, but also Number 9 Squadron. And they had very different histories, didn't they? 9 Squadron had existed since the start of the war, and so it was a real veteran organization by this point.
Yeah, well, it went all the way back to 1914. I think it was founded in 1914. And they were all, because of the glamour of the Dam Busters, they were always rather overlooked. And the kind of jokey resentment persists to this day. I once took part in a debate up at 9 Squadron's headquarters with the audience consisting of 617 veterans and serving airmen and their equivalent in 9 Squadron about who actually sank the turbo. It's a great debate about which
bomb which Tallboy bomb actually sent the Tirpitz to his doom and it was you know it was a very this was many many years after the event of course this was only about 10 years ago
But it was still, you know, it's still kind of very lively feeling that it was good nature, but there's certainly a bit of needle impulse as well. Can you give us a sense of how the RAF has been transformed during the Second World War? And I suppose this story of nine squadron kind of, you know, is all part of that, isn't it, Patrick? I mean, at the beginning of the
Second World War, biggest bomb they had was a 500 pounder, I think I'm right in saying, you know, relatively unsophisticated. It hits something and explodes. And yet for this mission, particularly the key targets, which is the Berghoff and the Eagle's Nest, they've got an astonishing bit of kit, haven't they? The Tallboy. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
bomb, but also something about how the RAFs developed. Yeah, well, the bomb is a good way of kind of looking at the symbol, if you like, or a metaphor for the massive acceleration and sophistication, capacity, skill, and
planning, everything, every aspect of an operation of war. By the beginning of the war, 9 Squadron was one of the first into operations. And literally the day after war broke out, it took part in a raid across the North Sea, trying to sink German shipping at Brunsbüttel. Now, this was very much a sort of typical RAF bombing operation of the period. They arrived there, miraculously found the target area, which was covered in cloud, and
bombed through the cloud, didn't hit anything, and two of their aircraft were shot down, the loss of everyone on board. So that was pretty much kind of the standard operation of the day, utterly ineffective, costly, generally a sort of complete amateur effort. By now, everything is superbly organized, amazingly planned down to the final detail,
And so you've got the actual operation itself is by now it's a fairly routine actually, but you've got hundreds of aircraft coming from numerous different bomber stations, all of them free-for-all bomber stations built in the east of England, coordinating, coming together from all different directions.
by now escorted, of course, by long-range Mustang fighters, which weren't there for most of the war, but now there to protect them against Luftwaffe, who in fact aren't seen at all during the entire course of the operation. Not a single German aircraft is seen. Another example of how complete the German defeat has been in the air and how total the Allied air superiority has become.
So they arrive on time, on target, and they actually hit the compound very successfully. The Berghoff itself is hit by one of these enormous new bombs. This is the 12,000-pound Tallboy bomb. It's called an earthquake bomb because it's beautifully aerodynamically designed. It looks like a pencil on this. It's long and thin with fins that put a spin on it, which give it even more accuracy. It buries itself in the ground and then explodes, creating this earthquake bomb.
In fact, one of those actually landed on the Berghof, what would you call it? A mountain court, I suppose is how it would be translated. We'll say something about that later on because it is a hugely symbolic monument to Nazism and to Hitler's ego and his fantasies.
Yeah, I mean, only six years earlier, as you make the point. I mean, you've got a wonderful chapter in your book, Air Force Blue, Patrick, which is the story of the RAF in the Second World War. And you make the point that just six, six and a half years earlier, this was, of course, the location for the infamous meeting, the infamous Munich agreement between Chamberlain and Churchill, which pretty much sold out the checks.
and leads relatively inexorably, or a year or so later, to the start of the Second World War. So it is hugely symbolic. But it does remind me that, you know, it's kind of strange that they haven't tried this before. You've made the point, well, technologically, maybe it was going to be very tricky to do it before, and they had many more important targets to hit. There was, however, the possibility that Hitler might be there. Is that the case? Did they know the guys flying towards the target?
whether or not Hitler could be there. I think the intelligence was pretty clear that he wasn't there. But for morale reasons, it was left to the squadron commanders to actually either encourage their men to believe that they had a pretty good chance of whacking the Fuhrer or be a bit more realistic. So I think they played it by ear. But everyone loved the idea. Everyone had heard about it. Everyone had heard about the Eagles. And they're still this famous idea
observation point further up the mountain of this grandiose mountain court. So the idea of hitting Hitler in his own, literally in his own backyard, was, of course, tremendously exciting. Hitler may not have been there, but Goering was there. If we remember, Goering is just a leftist
Berlin, leaving the Fuhrer to his fate. He tried to persuade Hitler to come with him down to the Burghof, but Hitler had dismissed him contemptuously, saying he was going to
meet his Götterdämmerung with Eva Braun at his side in Berlin. And of course, when Göring got there, he then started sort of trying to take over what was left of the Reich under some agreement that he believed he had with Hitler. If Hitler was incapacitated or dead, he would then be his successor. Word of this got back to Hitler and said he was actually about to be arrested by German security services and
when the raid happened. So the Burghoff itself was surrounded by villas of leading Nazis. On the principle that the closer you were to the Fuhrer, the more chance you had of favor and of influencing and all the rest of it. So Martin Bormann, who's the kind of slimiest of the reptiles around Hitler, had managed to get Isabella right next to the Burghoff. Goering had one there as well. So when the raid came in, Goering was actually there with his wife, Emmy, and their
children. And he very insouciantly actually was shaving when the raid began. And Emmy pleaded with him to come down to the shelter underneath the house and
He said, oh, no, no, I'm fine here. But she then immediately grabbed him and forced him to come downstairs. And for him, it was just as well. Well, it was an arguable point. He might well have been killed in the raid because the villa was very badly damaged. On the other hand, he might have been saved the Nuremberg trials and death by suicide. You mentioned Bormann. I think his villa also was badly damaged, wasn't it, Patrick? And listeners can imagine, of course, you've got Hitler's house and the Eagle's Nest above it. You've
but also got a number of other compounds, including the SS barracks. So talk us through the damage that was actually done by the bombers, but also give us a sense of the skill that was required to hit these targets at what, Patrick? They're bombing from about 14,000 feet? Yeah, 14,000 to 16,000 feet.
Even with the accuracy of a tall boy and pretty good bomb sights and all the rest of it, it's a tiny target set in a hillside. So it's quite an achievement to actually hit anything with any great accuracy. I'll just read you a little account from Flight Lieutenant G.J. Campbell, who was with 9 Squadron. Now, he was the bomb aimer and his pilot was a Flying Officer Buckley pilot.
And so Buckley brought him up, he said very accurately, almost dead ahead of the Berghof. He said, I had a perfect run up and released my £12,000 bomb with the house dead in the sight. Now, the tall boy he was dropping was fused at 25 seconds.
And as they flashed over, Lancaster flying close behind saw what happened. As a flight sergeant cutting said, he saw a 12,000 pounder land about a hundred yards from Hitler's house. Now that's, that's enough to actually do quite a lot of damage. He said, there's a terrific flash. And then we were flying pretty high. We could hear the explosion above the roar of our engines and the whole plane seemed to rock. Then great powers of earth came shooting up high into the sky and
I thought to myself, well, even if that's a bit short, it must have damaged that place. But just at that moment, there was another flash followed by a huge explosion. And one of the other aircraft had planted its 12,000 pounder bang on the target. So it was one direct hit, which is pretty good shooting at that range and in those circumstances. Now, it's an astonishing achievement, really, frankly, when you think about it. So two tall boys either in or very close to the Berghoff. They also damaged, as you point
pointed out a number of the other houses, including Goering's. What about the SS barracks? Because that was actually the target of the main force squadrons, who I suppose in some ways were kind of less skilled, were they, Patrick, than 617 and 9? The 617 and 9 squadrons were so-called sniper squadrons. They were highly...
highly skilled. They got the best equipment, the best aircraft. And so the main force, the kind of workaday squadrons, did not get quite the same attention, certainly. And they were basically more in the business of area bombing. So their target was the SS barracks.
which is only about 100 yards from the Berghof. Now, they weren't carrying the bombs Wallace designed, tall boys that are carrying 4,000, 1,500-pound bombs. So they're really in the volume business, raining down bombs on this SS barracks. As you said, that's when one of them fell, or several fell on the below, Martin Bormann.
And, of course, this was the raid in which Goering's villa was hit. I said earlier that it was his children. It was just Emma, his wife, and their daughter. So, yeah, they kind of scatter bombs, really, around there, killing some SS people, but also...
As is always the case, I'm afraid, in these air raids, also civilians, but also more tragically, perhaps, foreign slave workers who were everywhere in Germany at that time. Now, the losses on the RAF side were very small, but significant at the stage of the war. There was over two Lancasters were brought down.
One crash landed. This was shot down by flak. One was shot down without any casualties. But another very illustrative story of this is F. Freddy from 619 Squadron provided a last...
story of heroism from the RAF's war. The machine was fatally damaged and the pilot was a Canadian called Wilf DeMarco. Heroically, he ordered the crew to jump while he held the aircraft steady for them to do so. Three of them got out alive
The other three went down with their skipper. So it's a tragic little end note to that story. Presumably, Patrick, some of the last RAF, certainly some of the last bomber crew to die in the Second World War, were they British bomber crew? Yeah, I don't think entirely the last ones, but among them for sure. Now, when you were talking earlier, sort of about why now, why haven't they done it before and the rest of it, I think one of the things, the points I make is that
It's in a way, I think it was a kind of demonstration of the one thing that British had done really well in the war, which was to develop an air force that was
as good as anything that took part in the whole conflict, arguably the best. And I think this was something they were right to be proud about because the British Army got off to a very shaky start, as did the Air Force itself. But they learned by their mistakes. By the end, they were pretty good. But there was something about the RAF achievement, I think, that went beyond just the simple military contribution. It was a kind of indication of...
of how Britain had risen to the challenge of the Second World War, had adapted to
had learned, had abandoned large chunks of its past, which were really a hindrance to a successful war effort, and were beginning to, not beginning to, they had embraced thoroughly the new. And that's one of the themes of the book, this idea that the RAF was a kind of harbinger of the new Britain, a more equal Britain, a more efficient Britain, hopefully, and one where all the old class obsessions were
the depriving of vast sectors of the population from the chance of bettering themselves, the opportunities that are available only to the privately educated, to the upper class, that was beginning to crumble away. And the proof of it really was, to some extent, the efficiency and the achievements of the RAF. Okay, we'll take a break there. Do join us in a moment when we'll be hearing more from Patrick about the extraordinary air raid on Vector's Garden.
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Welcome back.
Patrick, that's a fascinating point about the development of the RAF and the change this affected in British society too. Tell us a little bit more about that. One very interesting aspect is that the Americans really appreciated the RAF. And I found in the archives a document written in the spring of 1944,
So this is well before the Berkley's Garden or the Berghoff raid, written by the chief information officer who was with the RAF permanent delegation in Washington, D.C. Now, he reported back to London on how the British Air Force was regarded on the other side of the Atlantic. He said, we cannot hope to enhance the prestige of the RAF. Throughout the world, it is a household word. And in the United States, its reputation is so high
that in some quarters it's almost regarded as something apart from and superior to Britain. So the Americans took some impressing, didn't they? They were pretty American army chiefs and indeed naval chiefs, took a pretty dim view of their British counterparts. They regarded them as hidebound. Some of the things I was saying about the British society in general, they were not really...
In the current world, they were kind of living out a kind of Victorian way of doing things, but not so with the RAF. So the USAAF was always got a tremendously well with its RAF counterparts, by and large, anyway. And they saw the world through the same lens, if you like. And so they thought, the Americans thought, they are much more like us than the army, like our army guys. And is that praise? I suppose it is. But what it does tell you is that the Americans appreciate results better
And that's what the RAF were delivering very much from 1943 onwards. Now, beyond that, it is also, as I was saying, an indication of what happens when you actually allow talent-free reign. You encourage people not from the social classes that run the military historically in Britain, but from the lower orders. Now, the reason the lower orders were given a crack at the whip was that
it's a very highly technical service. So you can't just rely on people who've been to Eton and Winchester and have been brought up on the classics. You need people who actually know how a machine works. This is a machine age. The young, no matter what background you came from, were fascinated by flying, were fascinated by machines, and they had their technical abilities too. So anyone who had those skills could not really be excluded from higher office. So, okay, the people at the top still were, even at the end,
products of the old order, but those just below them increasingly get this breakthrough of technocrats, if you like. And this, as I said, is a harbinger of the Britain that people are hoping for. They're hoping that war is going to put all that effort, all that bloodshed
Blood, toil, tears and sweat is going to produce a new society, a better society. And of course this then comes to pass with the 1945 general election when, against all the expectations, Winston Churchill's reward for leading the Britain to victory is to be...
thrown out on his ear. Fascinating stuff, Patrick. And we should also mention to listeners the fact that the tall boys miss the Eagle's Nest, that's the viewing platform above the Berghof, is actually good news if you want to have a look at it today, because there are tours that you can do to the Eagle's Nest. They're also taking the Berghof ruin, Hitler's headquarters compound, and various other bits and pieces that are obviously of great interest to anyone.
who is fascinated by the history of the Second World War. And it's also quite surprising to me, I don't know if it is to you, Patrick, that they've left the eagle's nest, because you might have imagined that it would become a bit of a shrine to neo-Nazis, mightn't you? I think that's where Alternative for Deutschland are having their annual conference this year. Is that true? Are you serious? That's a joke, is it? I wouldn't be surprised. It's a joke. It's a joke. Great stuff, Patrick.
But, I mean, you're right. I mean, it is a magnet, one would have thought, for Nazi sympathizers the world over. I think there was an attempt, well, it was demolished. What was left of the Berghof was meant to have been demolished by the Bavarian government in 1952, precisely for that reason, to prevent it becoming some kind of shrine.
But clearly there's enough of it left for it still to be a tourist attraction. I must say the town of Burgdysgarden has had a very lucky history because it was virtually untouched by, it was untouched until this raid throughout the war. It's a pleasant little market town, very much a destination in the 30s and earlier in the century for people who loved the mountains and going walking, lots of little guest houses and things there.
And now, I suppose, is people who want to go and view the Eagle's Nest and the SS barracks and all the rest of it. Yeah, and you can actually get a bite to eat at the Eagle's Nest because it is now a restaurant. The views, I have to say, having looked at a couple of pictures online, are absolutely spectacular. So it might well be worth it. It's obviously a fair way up the Ober Salzburg mountain, but it might well be worth the trip if you've got the wherewithal and the energy to do it.
I'll put it on my bucket list. I have to say, I mean, look to the pictures and in all seriousness, I'm quite tempted to go and have a look at it. I mean, not least because it will sort of get me into the swing of thinking about Hitler's. There's nowhere else you can go, really, that's kind of obviously connected to Hitler, is there, that exists? Well, I suppose the Wolfschanze, the East Prussian headquarters, but you're right. I mean,
You know, there's nothing in Berlin that would give you any sort of sense of what Hitler's existence was like there. Do you know what's at the Wolfshahn? Are there still any of the buildings there? It's presumably just a ruin, is it? Yeah, well, Roger, when I was in Poland last year with my family...
Well, Roger said, do go and see the Wolf Center. I didn't want to inflict that on my wife and daughter, but he said it's really worth a visit. So clearly there is something to be seen there. I might go to the Oberst Salzburg with Lou, actually, because it just looks absolutely spectacular. Obviously, there's the historical connection, but it does look like a good little spot to visit. Great stuff, Patrick. That's fascinating. Just last...
thought for me. You note in your book that the press, of course, were all over this. In the next day's newspapers of the headline in the Times, Hitler's chalet wrecked. I think it was a little bit, you could consider a little bit more than a chalet, actually, with all the building work that had been done on the Berghof. And the Daily Express lead announced Hitler bombed out five tunners right on de Führer's house, adding, Bechtel's garden was the target that every bomber pilot had longed to attack.
for nearly six years and had finally been allowed to. And it's interesting that when the American paratroopers, the 101st Airborne Division, finally get to this location and head
head out towards the Berghof, hoping to get a good look at the house that Hitler's lived in, in the mountains. They're pretty disappointed, I seem to remember, from Band of Brothers that it's been destroyed. It's just a burnt out wreck. But that was, of course, because just a few days before this bombing raid had taken place. Yeah, interesting history, the Berghof, because it was, of course, the place you wanted to go and to have your picture taken, wasn't it, in front of the famous picture.
picture window is an enormous window which looks out over a mountain range where Hitler would sit there brooding, looking out over this range of mountains which was meant to be the birthplace of Barbarossa, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. And the legend was that he died in the 12th century, that he lay there sleeping inside the Untersberg. This is the mountain you could see through this enormous picture window.
and that when the hour came, the fated hour came, you rise again and build a German empire that would last for a thousand years. Well, as the Third Reich was meant to, but...
That's the RAF. The Patriot Winter War is no more. And the Thousand Year Reich was also in ruins. So yeah, I mean, wonderful symbolism there for sure. Great stuff, Patrick. Well, that's all we have time for. Do join us on Friday for another episode of Battleground Ukraine and also next Wednesday when we'll be returning to the events of the end of the Second World War. Goodbye.