Sixty-five years ago Tuesday, Bari was the target of a surprise attack by German bombers that has come to be called “Little Pear Harbor” and even the “Second Pearl Harbor.” Bari, then a city of about 200,000 people, was a principal supply port for the British Eighth Army and the U.S. Fifteenth Air Force, and that evening the harbor was jammed with fuel tankers and cargo ships (including some holding secret shipments of poison-gas bombs) waiting to be unloaded.

From Wikipedia: “The Air Raid on Bari was an air attack on Allied forces and shipping in Bari, Italy by Nazi German bombers on December 2, 1943. In the attack, 105 German Junkers Ju 88 bombers of Luftflotte 2, achieving complete surprise, bombed Allied shipping and personnel operating in support of the Allied Italian campaign, sinking 17 cargo and transport ships in Bari harbor. The attack lasted a little more than one hour, but put the port out of action until March 1944 for the Allies, and was called by some ‘Little Pearl Harbor.’ ”

For a further overview of the incident see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Raid_on_Bari; for a detailed account see http://www.historynet.com/world-war-ii-german-raid-on-bari.htm.

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