The gondola and the speedboat

摘要

On 21 March 1945, Wing Commander George Westlake led the one and only authorised Second World War air raid on Venice. Operation Bowler had been planned by Air vice-Marshal 'Pussy' Foster. He named it so because he knew that if the city itself was damaged, he and Westlake would be 'bowler hatted' or returned, that is, to civilian life. The target was the docks that - now that the RAF had made key northern Italian railway lines and major roads impassable - were the one seemingly sure way the Germans could supply their occupying armies, along canals lined with villas by Palladio.