Okay, "only" 18000 people were killed in Dresden, but isn't that bad enough?

For more than 60 years Britain's Bomber Command led by Arthur 'Bomber' Harris has been vilified for causing up to 500,000 deaths in the carpet bombing of Dresden during World War II.

But now, after a four-year investigation, a panel of German historians has said that the true number of dead from the Allied air raids in January 1945 was between 18,000 and 25,000.

They reached the figure after combing through death certificates, hitherto sealed eyewitness reports, registration cards for people made homeless and hospital records.

It now emerges that the high number of deaths from 'Operation Thunderclap' was a myth invented by the Nazis, perpetuated by Communists and re-born in the past decade to serve the aims of ultra-nationalists.

The myth took form barely after the vapour trails of the bombers disappeared in the skies over the city. More...

See also:

1. Operation Keelhaul or How Stalin, FDR, Truman and Churchill Conspired to Murder Millions...
2. Not closing our eyes to the war in Iraq...
3. Images of the war in Georgia. Warning: very graphic...
4. On Aug. the 6th. 1945, the U.S. dropped a bomb on Hiroshima...