of cavalry targets in the town itself. However, other German pilots had reported no military targets present. German historian Jochen Böhler writes that the first operational report by Sturzkampfgeschwader 76 stated there had been "no enemy sightings", a finding corroborated by Poland's Institute of National Remembrance, which concluded there were no Polish military targets or units in the city or vicinity on 1 September or the preceding day—as had already earlier been stated as well by a number of historians. Most historians agree that the town contained no targets of military value. Historian Timothy Snyder suggests that the civilian population itself may have been the primary target: "The Germans had chosen a locality bereft of military significance as the site of a lethal experiment. Could a modern air force terrorize a civilian population by deliberate bombing?" This view has also been supported by Polish historians Tadeusz Olejnik and Bogumił Rudawski. Another view of a number of historians is that the destruction of the town infrastructure may have been the raids' aim, in order to test the tactics and firepower of the Luftwaffe, in particular of the new Ju 87B bomber. Two weeks before the war began, Germany's Chief of the General Staff Franz Halder mentioned in his war diary a plan called "Offensive Operation Red in the Wieluń area". In the first days of the war, the Luftwaffe launched several further attacks in the area, including on the small towns of Działoszyn and Kamieńsk, and produced aerial photographs of the effectiveness of attacks on other towns. Halder distinguished in his war diary between "terror attacks" and attacks on military targets. German historian Hans-Erich Volkmann notes that, for the German 10th Army, which was the critical military factor in this section of the front, Wieluń would have had no operational, let alone strategic, importance to justify its bombing. The commander responsible for the Luftwaffe, Wolfram von Richthofen, would have personally ordered the attack. Volkmann, like Böhler, observes that while Richthofen might not have intended it as a "terror attack", he had selected Wieluń as a target close to the border in order to test the capabilities and operational effectiveness of his dive bombers, if possible without losses to his own force. Volkmann characterizes the destruction of Wieluń as an attack on a non-military target and therefore as a war crime. Similar reasons for bombing a defenseless small town are given by