Search results
Operation Argument, after the war dubbed Big Week, was a sequence of raids by the United States Army Air Forces and RAF Bomber Command from 20 to 25 February 1944, as part of the Combined Bomber Offensive against Nazi Germany.
Heavy bombers from the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces hammered aircraft, engine, and ball-bearing plants by day, and RAF bombers attacked by night. Code named Operation Argument, it became known as “Big Week.”
The number of U.S. personnel killed, missing and seriously wounded totaled 2,600, but 75 percent of the buildings attacked in the German aircraft industrial system were destroyed. In addition, 600 Luftwaffe airplanes were claimed as destroyed in vicious air battles over Germany.
Timeline of events related to Big Week, the massive Allied aerial bombing campaign against German war-making facilities during World War II.
Feb 11, 2019 · During the week of Feb. 20-25, 1944, what became known as “Big Week” in Air Force history, Eighth Air Force and the Royal Air Force from England and Fifteenth Air Force from southern Italy conducted strategic bombing raids against German aircraft factories and other industrial targets.
Codenamed Operation Argument, “Big Week” (20- 25 February) would see the launch of consecutive raids on aircraft factories, engine, and ball-bearing plants by the Eighth Air Force, the Fifteenth Air Force, and the RAF.
In Big Week, acclaimed World War II historian James Holland chronicles the massive air battle through the experiences of those who lived and died during it. Prior to Big Week, the air forces on both sides were in crisis.
