Is it ever right to target civilians in a time of war? Or do the ends sometimes justify the means? The twentieth century - the age of `total war` - marked the first time that civilian populations came to be seen as legitimate military targets. At this policy`s most terrible extreme came the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki but it is an issue that remains relevant today with the needs of the `War on Terror` used to justify the use of drone strikes. In Among the Dead Cities, A.C. Grayling explores these moral issues in all their complexity with a detailed examination of the Allied bombing of German cities during World War 2. Considering the cases for and against the area bombing and the experiences of the bombed and the bombers, Grayling asks: was the targeting of civilians in Germany a crime? Now available in the Bloomsbury Revelations series, the book includes a new afterword by the author considering the issues in light of later conflicts up to the present day.

Table of contents
Acknowledgements
Picture Credits Maps Preface 1. Introduction: Was It A Crime 2. The Bomber War 3. The Experience of the Bombed 4. The Mind of the Bomber 5. Voices of Conscience 6. The Case Against the Bombing 7. The Defence of Area Bombing 8. Judgement Postscript Appendix Afterword to the Bloomsbury Revelations Edition Notes Bibliography Index

A. C. Grayling is Master of the New College of the Humanities, UK. He has written and edited numerous works of philosophy and is the author of biographies of Descartes and William Hazlitt. He believes that philosophy should take an active, useful role in society. He has been a regular contributor to The Times, Financial Times, Observer, Independent on Sunday, Economist, Literary Review, New Statesman and Prospect, and is a frequent and popular contributor to radio and television programmes, including Newsnight, Today, In Our Time, Start the Week and CNN news. He is a Fellow of the World Economic Forum at Davos, and advises on many committees ranging from Drug Testing at Work to human rights groups. - See more at: http://bloomsbury.com/author/ac-grayling/#sthash.omJSTi5p.dpuf