Figure 1.--Allied aircrft could not reach Austria until the last year of the War. But by this time the Luftwaffe could provide resistance to the massive wave of Allied bombers. Here is what large areas of Vienna looked like as a result of the American bombing.

For the most part the German public (including the Austrians) were spared the horrors of war. Occupied countries were exploited to keep the Reich fed. The war was fought primarily on the territory of other countries. The War finnally came home to Austria in the final year. First with the Allied strategic bombing campaign and then with final month of the War and the arrival of the Soviet Red Army in Vienna and the east and the Americans in the west (April 1945). The resulting damage in the last year of the War was enormous, much of it was due to the Allied statrgic bombing campaign. Austria was not a heavily indutrialized country like Germany. The principal target for the Allied strategic bombing campaign was German war industries . Austria was bombed, but not as heavily as German cities because of the lack of heavy industry. The primary target was Vienna. Vienna was bombed 52 times during the War, primarily by the United States Air Force. Some 87,000 houses were destroyed about 20 percent of the city. Only a handfull of vehiles survived the bombing. An estimated 3,000 bomb craters pocketed the city. The famed Schwarzenberg Palace was bombed but rebuilt after the War. Bridges were destroyed and sewers, gas and water pipes had badly damaged. The other major target of the strategic bombing cmpaign was the transport system which was largely wrecked. Allied bombers hit Innsbruck in western Austria before Vienna (December 1943). Innsbruck was an importnt transport hub where four rail lines (Arlbergbahn from the west, Mittenwaldbahn from the north, Westbahn from the east and Brennerbahn from the south), converge. Innsbruck was a railroad supply center for German forces fighting the Allies in Italy. The strategic biombiung also targeted the transport system. The damage to Austrian farms was minor, althoug the War losses affected the rural workforce. The destruction of the transport system. however, meant that supplies needed by the farmers could not be delivered. The damage to infrastructure meant that it was also difficult for farmers to get their food harvest into the cities. The NAZI war economy operated by seizing food from occupied people. As the occupied countries were liberated this was no longer possible and in the last year of the War serious food shortages developed throughout the Reich. The Allied bombing and damage to the transport system only worsened the food situation. Austrians survived on a 'near-starvation diet' with daily rations remaining below 2000 calories (1945-46). [Lewis, p. 142.] Austria is one of the foremost producers of hydroelectric power in Europe. Austria had small oil fields. There was also some coal production and coal was the primary fuel for industry and home heating. The country's coal was mostly imported from Germany. The destruction of the transport system cut off Austria from neeed coal imports. The Americans who occupied southern Germany had to restore the rail routes and ship in German coal on easy credit terms.

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Created: 9:12 PM 12/7/2018
Last updated: 9:12 PM 12/7/2018