‘Over the Reich: The total air war’. A project for the digital mapping of the air war over Germany during the Second World War

Lecture by Professor Patrick Major, University of Reading, UK

4 March 2025, 7.00 pm,
Municipal Archive Dessau-Roßlau,
Heidestraße 21 (Alter Wasserturm)

7 March 2025 marks the 80th anniversary of the destruction of Dessau city centre by Allied bombers against Nazi Germany. This 19th Allied bombing raid on Dessau was part of the large-scale air war over Germany during the Second World War. The lecture ‘Over the Reich: The total air war. A project for the digital mapping of the air war over Germany in the Second World War’ by Professor Patrick Major on 4 March 2025 at the Dessau-Roßlau City Archive, Heidestraße 21 (Alter Wasserturm), will take a look at this air war from the perspective of the Allies. The event starts at 7.00 pm.

The air war over occupied Europe during the Second World War represented a huge theatre of war stretching over 3,000 kilometres from Trondheim to Palermo. To provide an overview, a digital online map was launched in 2020 to illustrate the parallel targets of the Allied air forces: on the one side the industrial targets of the American USAAF, on the other the city centres targeted by the British RAF. Dessau offers a case study of both complexes: the city was home to the Junkers Group and was the victim of a devastating RAF air raid on 7 March 1945. Dessau was also the hub of an entire production system of Junkers branches and underground relocations. The whole thing increasingly came under the control of the SS Economic Administration Main Office. What did the Allied air intelligence services know about this armaments network? Interrogation records of captured Dessau Junkers employees show the extent to which London was kept fully informed. And how did the fateful decision in spring 1945 to inflict a similar fate on Dessau as on Dresden come about? The lecture will be illustrated ‘live’ using the online map.

Patrick Major is Professor of Modern History at the University of Reading. He has published on topics including the history of the GDR and BBC broadcasting policy in Germany during the Second and Cold Wars. The Dessau-Roßlau Municipal Archive and the Association for Anhalt Regional Studies invite you to this event. Admission is free.

Contact:
Stadtarchiv Dessau-Roßlau
Heidestraße 21
06842 Dessau-Roßlau
Phone: 0340/204-1024
E-Mail: stadtarchiv@dessau-rosslau.de