recording in it’s original form copied to CD under RAF BOMBER COMMAND AT WAR 1939-45 (VOL 1) CD41-013 £10

TRACK 27 : RAID ON KLEVE 7/8 FEBRUARY 1945 5.30
This extract is taken from a recording made by Richard Dimbleby during a bombing raid on Kleve in February 1945, in a Lancaster of 153 Squadron. The raid involved 295 Lancasters and 10 Mosquitoes, in preparation for the attack by the British XXX Corps across the German frontier into the Reichswald, although the damage caused by the 1,384 ton of high explosive served to hamper the advance on the ground. By the end of the war Kleve claimed to be the most badly damaged German town of its size. Towards the end of the recording anti-aircraft fire causes the cutting head to jump on the recording disc. This is not a technical fault on the CD.

Richard Dimbleby was the first BBC war correspondent to accompany an operational RAF bomber raid, flying to Berlin on 6 January 1943 in a Lancaster piloted by Guy Gibson. The broadcast proved a success, and by the end of the war Dimbleby had completed twenty such missions, despite the fact that he was frightened of flying and frequently sick. In 1944 he was appointed head of the BBC War Reporting Unit. Dimbleby was a passionate advocate of the bomber offensive, in spite of the fact that the BBC laid down firm (if optimistic) guidelines about how the bombing of Germany should be reported: “It is a scientific operation, not to be stunted, to be gloated over, or to be dealt with in any other way than the most factual reporting arising from the communiqués and from material obtained from Air Headquarters of Bomber Stations.”

153 Squadron was formed as a Lancaster squadron in 1 Group in October 1944, and operated from Scampton.