BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST,Displaced Camelotian
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 01:00 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: freightdawg
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 01:24 PM

All of these arguments have been posted before, if I remember correctly, in a thread on the mini-series "Band of Brothers." Rapaire said it best: the two planes are historical artifacts, the only difference is that they are related to the direct cause of the end of the war.

And, to correct a post earlier, the two bombs may have been the only readily available bombs, but there were other castings, or shells, that the devices were placed inside so they could be dropped from the planes. Had Japan not surrendered after the second bomb it would not have taken that much longer to produce other bomb cores.

Being born and raised in Santa Fe, New Mexico, I was given the opportunity almost every year to visit the museum in Los Alamos where the replicas of Fat Man and Little Boy were on display. We were taught the role that Los Alamos had in WWII from a HISTORICAL perspective, not a moral one. It was always deathly quiet as we entered the museum, and even more quiet as we watched the films and listened to the curators. It had a profound impact on my life and still does. By the way, due to the pacifists and their constant moralizing, the museum display that we could see as children no longer exists. The version you see today is so sanitized and diluted that it is basically worthless in comparison to the lessons that I learned as a schoolchild. It is a real shame, too. I would think that if the real goal of pacifism is to prevent all future wars, they would want the whole truth of past wars to be exposed. Not so, according to the anti-nuke zealots. Apparently all they want to say is that the United States was solely responsible for the beginning and the middle and the end of WWII.

Who says that Japan was just a few days, weeks months, etc from surrender? Were you alive back then? Were you on a troop ship, or were you in boot camp or in Europe training for the invasion of the Japanese mainland? Does the example of Iwo Jima mean nothing to you? So, SRS, you may attempt to demean my argument by saying that I am "parroting the dogma...etc." but the use of the atomic weapons ended the war that Japan started with a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. It saved thousands of allied soldiers' lives. No one can say with definitive proof (i.e. a signed document) that Japan was ready to surrender. It is all speculation and hearsay and, as Kendall put it, "revisionist history."

Go visit the USS Arizona and explain your revisionist history to the sailors that are entombed there.

Freightdawg

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST,Displaced Camelotian
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 01:24 PM

Remember - if you ever knew - that even after the *second* bomb was dropped, the Japanese government was evenly divided about surrender.

And when the Emperor announced his decision to end the war, a group of Japanese military officers actually tried the unthinkable - a coup to overthrow the government in order to keep the war going until all Japanese could experience the glory of fighting to the death.

Planned or not, had the war not ended when it did, Stalin's army would have invaded Japan in early September, before our own planned invasion. Picture that! And picture a Stalinist Japan during the height of the Cold War!

Two wrongs don't make a right, but in judging the reality of the situation, remember - if you ever knew about - the "Rape of Nanking,"
when the Japanese military killed 150,000 Chinese civilians, maybe more, just to show them who was boss. The Japanese were also the only army in WWII to use poison gas and germ warfare in battle (again, in China).

By the way, it is *not* true that thefire bombing of Hamburg and/or Dresden killed more people than the attacks on Japan. Even David Irving, the pro-German writer who did more to disseminate the "100,000 killed" at Dresden myth in the 1960s, long ago renounced this figure - which, along with even larger "estimates," appears to have originated as Soviet/East German disinformation.

War is indeed HELL and the HELL should be mitigated whenever possible. But second-guessing decisions made in 1945 by an American President trying to end, immediately, the most destructive war in human history against one of the rottenest militarist regimes in history is a waste of time and effort.

Everyone has a horror story from World War II. Compared to the records of Germany, Japan, and, yes, the USSR, those of Britain and the US are justly commendable.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Amos
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 01:49 PM

This discussion has occurred before, and there's little merit in reworking it all over again, but there was a lot more control in the fanatic militant faction in Japan than I had previously understood. In light of that, it is possible that Truman did save thousands of American lives. Yes, it was merciless. It was a time of merciless decisions in many places, under extreme duresses. I would prefer, myself, to forgive those who lived through those times, and made those decisions, with the firm commitment not (if I can possibly help it) to repeat their errors.

I see no value in shreiking about how wrong they were.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST,sorefingers
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 01:52 PM

The reason that the US is marked for eternity as another brutal monster like Rome, is that they very well knew the effects of the bomb before it was used in Japan, since they already had tested it. And, the scientists who created it knew what the yield would be!

Nobody and nothing except G_d could forgive this act!

It was and reamains a deed of such enormous evil that it's perpetrators today labor to disarm any other nation trying to acquire such weapons.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 02:00 PM

But how could Truman have saved thousands of American lives if, as GUEST,Displaced Camelotian says:

Planned or not, had the war not ended when it did, Stalin's army would have invaded Japan in early September, before our own planned invasion.

If this is true, then it would have been Soviet soldiers who would have been killed rather than Americans. So now I'm wondering if maybe the US nuked Japan specifically for the purpose of preventing the Soviets from invading it first.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 02:04 PM

The USA is an evil war-mongering nation, they have no thought for anyone but their murdering uniformed uninformed thugs, their evil deeds throughout the world are well documented.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Amos
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 02:18 PM

Go piss up a rope, GUEST.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST,Displaced Camelotian
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 02:51 PM

Soviet plans to invade Japan in September 1945 were disclosed only within the past few years, after the fall of the Soviet Union. The earliest that a US/British invasion could have taken place was in October. At the very least, Japan would have ended up divided, like Korea, into a Communist north and a non-Communist south.

Nobody knew how long the Japanese nation would have held out, fighting tooth and nail, against any Allied invasion. According to the bushido code, death (including suicide) was *always* preferable to defeat (one reason why the Japanese held Allied POWs in such contempt). This applied to civilians as well as to soldiers.

As cruel as they were, the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki may well have cost fewer Japanese lives than any invasion of Japan.

Ending the war when he did, against the wishes of many of his generals and advisors, was a courageous personal act for an Emperor who was also willing, under the Surrender terms, to renounce the ancient claim that that he was a god, descended directly from the Rising Sun.

Emperor Hirohito had done nothing to prevent his army, navy, and air force from committing some of the worst atrocities in history against the peoples of China, Indochina, modern Malaysia, modern Indonesia, Thailand, and the Philippines. When he broadcast news of his intention to surrender, it was the first time the Japanese people had ever heard his voice. He was driven to surrender, he said, correctly, "in order to prevent the complete destruction of the nation of Japan."

It is hard to imagine any nation (or leader) on earth that would have refrained from using any available weapon to end World War II to its advantage as quickly as possible.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: kendall
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 03:11 PM

One of my cousins was in the battle of Okinowa. Lucky for him he was not one of the 10,000 casualties. Remember, that was just a little island 350 miles from Japan. Imagine the bloodbath if the main islands had been invaded! Truman did a horrible yet necessary thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Raedwulf
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 03:29 PM

Guest, whichever Guest you are, you're a pillock of the first order.

Truman repeatedly delayed acceptance of the Japanese government's conditional surrender attempts until after both types of A-bomb had been used.

The significant words in this are "conditional surrender". Parenthesis. Since May, I now work for Pearson Group, whose imprints include Pearson Education, Penguin, Puffin, & Longmans, amongst others. We have a library at work, so when I can find time to take a break, guess where I spend it, amongst history books a-plenty. Heaven! :)

What I am basing my following points on is a book I have lately been reading called "More What If..." (link here) which includes essays on how nearly Truman didn't become President, & what might have happened if The Bomb hadn't been dropped. I can't quote the essayists sources off the top of my head, & I have no idea what his biases might be, but this, in a nutshell, is what the historian who speculated on The Bomb scenario had to say.

Fact: Japan was ruled by a small military clique. I forget the exact number, but it's something like 6 or 7 people deciding the fate of the entire nation, with unquestioning obedience at their beck & call from the population at large.

Fact: Conditional surrender, which is all that was on offer from the Japanese, meant a surrender in which all the existing power structures remained in place. Does anyone, even Stilly River Sage, think this was an acceptable proposition?

Fact: The ruling clique was perfectly prepared to spend thousands & millions of Japanese lives (never mind Allied casualties) in an effort to force the Allies to accept a conditional surrender on the above terms. They knew they were beaten, but they (very humanly, if very inhumanely) sought surrender on the most advantageous terms. I ask again, does anyone, even Stilly River Sage, think this was an acceptable proposition?

Fact: With the exception of Douglas MacArthur (who was rather Patton-esque in many respects, especially as regards his estimation of his own abilities - sorry, that's somewhat my opinion, rather than quoted fact!), the majority of the the senior US commanders, particularly Navy bods, were unenthusiastic (to say the least) about the prospects of invading Japan.

Fact: Geographical limitations determined & limited the possible beach-heads for any American invasion of Japan. Hindsight has established that the Japanese high command (limited in certain respects, but not stupid) had correctly identified every single possibility & defended appropriately. Any invasion would have resulted in absolute carnage. Okinawa would have been a picnic by comparison & the American command knew it. Conservative casualty estimates run way beyond the million mark (try 2-3 million for size), making Hiroshima & Nagasaki small beer by comparison.

Probability: It is likely that Hirohito had far more power, authority & knowledge than the Allies quite deliberately let everyone believe. There are strong indications that quite late in 1945, Hirohito was still in favour of continuing the war.

Truman's decision was never going to be a good one to have to make. It was a choice between diabolical & far worse. SRS & anonymous guests can bleat all they want about "dogma" & "war criminals". Given the choice he had to make, Truman would have had to have been mad or stupid to have done otherwise. It was a horrible choice, even if he knew (which I doubt he did or could have) the full consequences. Nevertheless, I believe he not only saved thousands of American lives, by condemning H & N, I believe he also saved hundreds of thousands of Japanese (& maybe Russian too) lives. Plus, on the whole, he ultimately created a better society for all of those survivors.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 04:16 PM

There's a bigger picture here than many of you are willing to step back to examine.

What I think is that those who feel their lives were saved by the U.S. committing mass murder with the bombs over Japan aren't going to change their minds. If the bombs hadn't been dropped the continuation of war much beyond that point (equating to the loss of more American lives) or the conditional surrender of Japan (yeah, like we wouldn't have argued for different conditions?) are conjecture.

Those raised in a Western tradition have a language that encodes our philosophies and our history. The same can be said for other cultures speaking other languages, and this is why we have such difficulties in understanding what other cultures are thinking--the hard wiring is distinctly different. (A recent study in Nature highlighted this, though it has been discussed at length for years). Just as today Bush-lite seems to have no one advising him who really understands the Arab way of thinking or how to behave when we're over there, Truman evidently didn't have anyone to consult on the subject of the Asian mind-set when it comes to warfare or negotiation. And the propaganda folks sure weren't going to accomodate the American public at large as to what might be going on in the heads of the Japanese we were fighting against.

Coming from an All-things-being-equal standpoint of a life lost is a life lost, no matter where it is, the Japanese paid a far higher price than they should have as the war was winding down. U.S. politicians and scientists created their bomb that they just had to try, and if the surrender had happened, then they couldn't try it out. Read between the lines.

War is horrible, no one should lose a life in such a way. But the U.S. upped the ante to such a level that the world will never be the same again. Even if one could justify (which I don't) Hiroshima, to drop the second on Nagasaki should be considered a war crime. Better that traditional warfare had continued and the end had come soon than those abominations of the American industrial military complex were dropped to have it end suddenly. The cost to the world was too great.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 04:56 PM

The history of the American wars shows mainly civilians are victims of the fights with the intention to intimidate the civilian population. In Vietnam, orders have been given to throw bombs on the civilian population as well as Napalm bombs in order to burn the woods and bombs with the intention to take the leaves off the trees with the consequence of spoiled harvests....In this war more than 2,000,000 Vietnamese died and 3,000,000 have been injured.... The use of Napalm and poisons had as a consequence devastating and even irreversible ecological damages. After the end of the second world war in Europe came the air attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the largest terrorist attacks ever, killing up to 300,000 people.... Even today, deformed children are born, still increasing the number of victims

That's my translation of what I have found on a German website. It fits deplorably well into the discussion here, in my eyes. I took it from a German Neonazi website.

What always amazes and worries me deeply is that there are two themes in which the Mudcat lefts are hardly distinguishable from the German Neonazis in their argumentation:

(1) The crimes of the USA and (2) Israel

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Nerd
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:09 PM

Don't lump everyone together, though, Wolfgang. I am a "Mudcat left" who has not contributed much to this thread because I saw it as a bit pointless. People are claiming all sorts of things for which there is little firm evidence, etc.

But for the record I definitely lean toward the camp that says, "the bomb was horrible, but necessary at that time." Nothing the other leftists have said here convinces me that this is a "party line from the past," etc, etc. Truman did what he thought he had to do to save lives and stabilize the world. Looking at Japan's progress since WWII, I think he largely succeeded. I would prefer if he had done it without the bomb, but I am not convinced he could have.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:14 PM

The history of the American wars shows mainly civilians are victims of the fights with the intention to intimidate the civilian population. In Vietnam, orders have been given to throw bombs on the civilian population as well as Napalm bombs in order to burn the woods and bombs with the intention to take the leaves off the trees with the consequence of spoiled harvests....In this war more than 2,000,000 Vietnamese died and 3,000,000 have been injured.... The use of Napalm and poisons had as a consequence devastating and even irreversible ecological damages. After the end of the second world war in Europe came the air attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the largest terrorist attacks ever, killing up to 300,000 people.... Even today, deformed children are born, still increasing the number of victims

That's my translation of what I have found on a German website. It fits deplorably well into the discussion here, in my eyes. I took it from a German Neonazi website.

What always amazes and worries me deeply is that there are two themes in which the Mudcat lefts are hardly distinguishable from the German Neonazis in their argumentation:

(1) The crimes of the USA and (2) Israel

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:20 PM

Yes, Nerd, the 'the' before Mudcat lefts is completely wrong. My mistake.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:26 PM

"The Mudcat Left" That's a good one Wolfgang. From a North American perspective, the Mudcat left, is pretty much everyone but DougR.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST,Displaced Camelotian
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:30 PM

My final post on the matter:

For all those romantics who believe that war "before Hiroshima" wasn't so bad, let me remind them that World War I was entirely "conventional," but still cost about ten million lives.

And World War II, also entirely "conventional" before Hiroshima, took another fifty million. Zyklon-B, the gas used by Germany to carry out the Holocaust, was developed in peacetime as an insecticide....

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Once Famous
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:33 PM

Yep, nuke & puke.

What a stupid ass thread. First of all, I am not a right wing nut like some asshole above said, but a patriotic moderate
American. The far left idiots here who probably got there history from a Joan Baez song should be glad that America and Truman did what they had to do using the technology they HAD and others DIDN'T. War sucks. People die. You can't change history, you can only learn from it. Has a nuke been used since? Was a precedent set? Did you crawl under your desk to kiss your ass goodbye in elementary school when the air raid test sirens went off?

Mooman, were you there to personally interview the general consensus of Navy seamen to make suck a ridiculous statement as you did?

Freightdawg, your post was so right on.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:35 PM

Yes, Nerd, the 'the' before Mudcat lefts is completely wrong. My mistake.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:49 PM

Besides the veil of secrecy, we have to remember that news did not travel very fast in those days. Many of us today can not imagine a world without sattelite TV, and wihout the internet. It usually took about 24 hours go get news from the front, and even then, it was filtered before it came down to the general public. Truman himself did not even know about the bomb until a very short time before he had to make that fateful decision. The point being, we can not judge the actions of the past by today's standards, but only by what was available to our leaders at that time. SOL ZELLER

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:50 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 05:59 PM

Martin Gibson and "moderate" in the same sentence. This is turning out to be a very amusing thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Les from Hull
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 06:12 PM

It seems that opinion and propoganda have more of a grip on this thread than anything else. Go read some history, people! And then read some more. By doing so you will get a concensus of what modern historians have discovered about what was happening.

The Soviet Union had agreed a date with the other Allies when they were going to attack the Japanese, not in the home islands, as they did not have the specialised equipment they would have needed, but in Manchuria.

The Japanese (especially the Emperor and those close to him) were starting to sue for peace. They had asked the USSR to intervene, but the Soviets had no wish to because of their agreement to come in against the Japanese in September. So they didn't say that the Japanese had contacted them.

Certainly there were plenty of Allied scientists who wanted to see if their bomb worked. But there was only enough fissionable material for the two bombs, even with some that was possibly captured off a submarine that was taking it from Japan to Germany (not substantiated this last bit, but possible/likely).

Certainly the early surrender of the Japanese did 'save Allied lives'. No one was looking forward to invading the Japanese home islands, although plenty of materiel was making its way there for that job. But, as mentioned above, tht Japanese were sueing for peace, perhaps not as vigourously as the Allies would have hoped. But the story that Truman dropped the bomb to save Allied servicemen's lives is only partly true. But it's the kind of story that you want the folks at home to believe, isn't it?

And Displaced C - WW1 conventional? You have perhaps forgotten about the poison gas used by both sides, and the bombing and shelling of civilian targets (particularly by the Germans).

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 06:27 PM

Certainly there were plenty of Allied scientists who wanted to see if their bomb worked. But there was only enough fissionable material for the two bombs,

You are in error here, there were three bombs in the US arsenal before the end of the war. The first was tested in the US desert. The other two were dropped on Japan. The Allied scientists and the President certainly knew that the bomb worked and what its short term effects would be before it was dropped.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 06:27 PM

Mass murder is mass murder, regardless, but those who commit it will usually seek to justify it after the fact...while those who suffered its consequences (in a collective sense) will protest it and seek revenge, compensation, or at least recognition of their suffering.

The USA committed mass murder numerous times in World War II, as did most of the other combatants (Japan very notably included).

The USA naturally tries to whitewash its own actions in this regard, and was aided and abetted in doing so by being on the winning side...a very useful place to be when justifying war crimes.

It is entirely possible that Truman and his advisors thought they were doing what was best when they dropped those bombs.

It is also possible that they just wanted to test those bombs on a real target and couldn't resist taking advantage of the rapidly dwindling opportunities to do so (Japan was nearing economic collapse and military impotence...in fact had already pretty well reached military impotence in terms of being unable to launch any more offensive operations in the Pacific theatre).

It is also possible that they wanted to send a message to the Russians...or forestall a Russian advance into Japanese-occupied areas in China and Manchuria and Korea by ending the whole thing quickly before the Russians could get very far with that.

They were assuming an amphibious invasion of Japan in 1946 would cost a million or more lives...BUT no such invasion would, in fact, have been necessary in order to secure an end to the fighting. So their assumption was based on somewhat unimaginative thinking, based on the war in Europe.

They were demanding unconditional surrender...but it is never necessary to demand unconditional surrender in order to end a war...and NO surrender is in fact unconditional, truth be told! (Unless everyone on the losing side is dead.) There are always conditions.

It's a very twisted tale.

Those who are emotionally committed solidly to either side of this debate will naturally simply reject out of hand any opinion which opposes their own.

Therefore, I shrug. It's all been said over and over again anyway.

I suspect, sadly, that if the atomic bomb had not been used on Japan in 1945 it would soon have been used somewhere else...against either Russia or China...and that would have been potentially far more catastrophic for the World. So, maybe we all got lucky...with the exception, of course, of the incinerated and irradiated Japanese citizens in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They were most unlucky, and served as the sacrificial lambs on behalf of the rest of humanity...who stepped back and took a second look at the Frankenstein monster that their clever scientists had brought into the World.

It's the sort of thing you can get away with...until enough people become fully aware of the results. Then it becomes almost unthinkable to do it again. Thank Hiroshima and Nagasaki for saving a lot of other people from burning up in the atomic fire. Maybe they saved you and me.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST,Displaced Camelotian
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 06:46 PM

Re WW I, I should probably have used the word "non-nuclear" rather than "conventional." Even so, the admittedly barbaric use of poison gas (not "nerve gas," by the way, a later and more destructive development)along with the bombingj of civilians accounted for only a very few percent of WW I fatalities. About 5% of the 10,000,000 dead in WW I were civilians. In WW II, this percentage was closer to 66% - most of them in Russia and Eastern Europe.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:25 PM

There is not one, single nation, not one, that cannot say that their people haven't committed a war atrocity. Beziers, Malmady, "Killing Fields", Nanking, Kilkenny, Wounded Knee, "Bataan Death March", My Lai, Manchuria, the Gulags, Warsaw Ghetto, Oradour sur Glane -- the list is endless and is not limited to Western countries or any particular time.

If you want to see war crimes, look to the history of any country, not just the US or Japan.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:33 PM

Absolutely! What I find disturbing is the acrobatics people go through, winners and losers both, to sanitize and make excuses for the atrocities their side committed in wartime.

There seems to be an unwillingness out there to bear responsibility.

Of course, if you want to harangue another generation of young kids into going off willingly to war you certainly don't want to dampen their ardour with stories of past war crimes committed by your OWN people, do you now? Ah, no...what you want to do in that case is inflame their ardour by only mentioning the OTHER side's atrocities. Standard Orwellian tactics.

If people in general were more keenly aware of what war entails there would be very few who would ever support launching one in the first place.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: kendall
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:37 PM

Let's not forget Canada and the massacre of the Mitis.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:38 PM

mitis?

Massacre?

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:40 PM

Unquestionably, Kendall. The Metis got a very raw deal, for the usual reasons...valuable land that someone else wanted jurisdiction over. As usual, the guys with the most money and guns won the fight.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:41 PM

There's actually a lot of sympathy in Canada now for Louis Riel, Gabriel Dumont and the rest of the Metis.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Bobert
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:43 PM

Sorry, din't mean to start such a fuss... I was curious...

And, yes, Sinsull. My spellin' has gone into it usual late summer slump but... I'll try harder...

Does seem from what I have read here that, given what we know now about Japan's desires to surrender, that someone should be held accountable??? Jus MO, of course...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Les from Hull
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:48 PM

Sorry Jack - I should have made it clear that I meant after the test and before the decision to drop, there were just the two bombs. It would have taken a long time to produce another (the fourth, if we include the test).

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 07:56 PM

What always amazes and worries me deeply is that there are two themes in which the Mudcat lefts are hardly distinguishable from the German Neonazis in their argumentation

Here's the difference for you, Wolfgang, although I fear it may be too subtle for you. The German Neonazis advocate killing, whereas, the Left Mudcatters advocate not killing.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 08:07 PM

In any case, Wolfgang, if I may be the devil's advocate to your statement...

Even people who are catastrophically wrong (like the Nazis) may and often DO make isolated statements that are in themselves quite accurate...while using those statements within the context of a larger wrongful intention!

That doesn't invalidate the accurate statement itself.

I bet even Joe Stalin and Al Capone made some very cogent and astute remarks in their time. Criminals and scoundrels do not oblige us by uttering ONLY exaggerated lies and obvious misrepresentations...they frequently sprinkle some cold, hard truths among them. It is precisely in that way that they succeed in persuading many people to side with them, don't forget.

Only a fool would tell nothing BUT lies when attempting to persuade people of the rightness of an extreme position.

The Far Right in America also tells the truth about certain specific matters...while generally presenting what I would term a destructive viewpoint on things in the larger context.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: GUEST,sorefingers
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 08:19 PM

Turning away from history saying it is done with and cannot be undone, is dangerous, and untrue!

Besides while denying other nations the benefit of nuclear weapons they nonetheless continue to manufacture them, all the while warning any who feel the urge to make war upon the US that they will be incinerated.

What is there to stop a US administration from declaring a President 'Emperor'? as it nearly did in the selection of G W?

Anyway who is watching the watchers?

If anything a World Court of Justice should remove all nukes from the US precisely because of Hirsohima and Nagasaki it cannot be trusted with them.

Let those who say this evil act was justified think about this; Saddam used chemical weapons on civilians to end a war and we now have him in jail awaiting trial for it!

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 08:37 PM

Harry Truman was the democraticly elected leader of his country. Sadaam became the leader of his country via an armed coup. He had the guns and the other guys did not. Truman did not gas citizens of his own country who disagreed with him. Sadamm, in order to retain his dictatorial power, gassed his own civilians. That is why he is on trial. Anyone who does not understand this basic difference deserves to flunk History 1.1 and Political Science as well. SOL ZELLER

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 08:39 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 09:07 PM

Oh, Sol...Mr Truman would have been on trial if he had been on the totally defeated and losing end of a great war...like Goering and Tojo were. Depend on it. :-) Not that I am disagreeing with your basic point that Saddam was a far less law-abiding man than Truman. Not at all. But it's the losers of wars that go on trail, not the winners. The winners always find plenty of good reasons to try the losers and blame them for the whole thing. That's politics. And the majority of people always seem to believe those reasons, whether they are true, half-true or entirely false and self-serving. The courageous Germans who tried to assassinate Hitler were tried, depicted as the most dreadful and contemptible lot of terrorists, and brutally executed. He who controls the power metes out the punishment to whomever he deems to be the "evil ones". In this same way, America executed many brave Native American leaders and warriors who only fought to save their land and their ancestral way of life. (and they too sometimes committed atrocities in the process...the Natives did, I mean...war tends to result in people doing that)

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 09:23 PM

Truman is dead. Roosevelt is dead. Groves is dead. Conant is dead. Oppenheimer is dead. Teller is dead. Einstein is dead. Fermi is dead. Doolittle is dead. Churchill is dead. Stalin is dead. I believe that all of the crew of the Enola Gay and Bock's Car are dead, but I don't know for certain. But I do know that damned near everyone of any consequence has had to face a Judge far more just and knowing than any human one and we who live now have to live with the decisions made then.

Refighting WW2 (or any other war) is an interesting and even fruitful exercise, but you can't change the actual historical outcome. Sure, a naval blockade could have starved Japan into submission -- perhaps, but we'll never know.

Try this: You are Harry S. Truman. Your nation has been at war for four years, there are lots of dead and wounded. Germany has surrendered, and you're turning your attention to the Pacific. The troops in Europe will go fight, but they certainly aren't enthusiastic. You're told that an invasion of Japan will bring millions of casualties, and you're also told that there's a new weapon of immense, unbelievable power. Churchill and Stalin are both aware of this weapon, and they too have troops that will be committed or are committed in the Pacific. What do you do?

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 09:24 PM

Oh, yeah -- you have to keep your decision within the limits of what was known then. Hindsight is always 20/20.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Two_bears
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 09:26 PM

For those of you who are old enough to remember WWII, Truman had a very agonizing decision to make. The cost in lives, both, American and Japanese, would have been much greater, had we undertaken an invasion of Japan by conventional means. All the intelligence we had indicated that the Japanese would have resisted the invasion stubbornly, by any means at their disposal. Having experienced their kamikazee pilots crashing into our battleships, we already knew that they had no fear and would fight to the last man. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the only way to convince tha Japanese that all further resistance was futile, and brought an abrupt end to a very long war. SOL ZELLER

Sol:

I was born 10 years AFTER WW II ended; but I want to say that you have this issue ABSOLUTELY correct.

The Kamikaze were willing to die for their cause, and if Japan had been invaded; the fighting would have been urban warfare fighting house to house.

Before the bomb (little boy) if memory serves was dropped on Hiroshima; it was believed there was not enough fisionable Uranium to make a bomb.

Hiroshima was bombed, and they had to drop the bomb (fat man) over Nagasaki to demonstrate to the world that the U.S. has more than one bomb.

The two bombs used different sets of technology.

"little Boy" was built in a cylinder with two non critical masses of uranium in each end, then an explosion slamming the two masses together to cause a critical mass and start the fision process. (splitting the atoms)

"Fat Man" has one non critical mass then was surrounded by explosive that compacted the element into a smaller and smaller space until Critical mass eas reached and begin the process of fision (splitting the atoms.)

ANL - 2B

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 09:48 PM

So, if the USA had had a third bomb, then they would have been required to drop it on Japan so that the World could see that they had more than two bombs, I suppose...?

After all, are 2 measly little A-bombs really enough to sufficiently impress the World (and the Russians in particular)? They only dropped 2 because they only had two to drop. Japanese lives were not considered very valuable at the time. Matter of fact, I believe they were hardly considered to be human at all by a lot of westerners.

Fortunately the Emperor of Japan took it upon himself to make the decision to end the fighting. Good thing. The Army generals were less sensible than he was.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: PeteBoom
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 09:50 PM

Ummmm.... Why did Japan invade China? Why did Japan attack every direction it possibly could?

Consider Saipan.

Then the next time you go off with soft comfy moralistic pontification, remember that if you pick a fight, you'd better be in it to win - because the other guy might be precisely in it to win. When you make war, every resource available must be thrown into it - or you will fail. The object of war is to utterly destroy your opponent's belief in their victory.

When you cite statistics on the number of dead from either, or both, of the atomic bombs, consider the number of dead combatants and civilians where "conventional forces" were used - and consider the percentages of the defending forces and civilian population. Then consider that Japan had begun sending out peace proposals early in 1942. They got more insistant following Midway. They got more frantic with each defeat.

That is what usually happens. The bosses at the top urge the worker bees at the bottom to give everything they have - while they look for an out themselves.

The bomb(s) ended the pretense in the eyes of the average person that the war COULD be won. THAT ended the war far more effectively than anything else.

Yup - I'm a blood thirsty savage - I've been told that before.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 10:09 PM

I seriously doubt that anyone here is trying to justify Japan's aggression in the 30's and 40's. That is not what is at issue.

What is at issue is whether there was any actual need to drop A-bombs on Japan OR to launch an invasion of the Japanese mainland either. My answer to that is "No" in both cases. Truman may have seen it differently, and in fact I'm sure he saw it differently. So Truman and I would disagree on that one. Fine. We would probably disagree on any number of things.

In a war one fights to win. Winning does not necessarily require complete annihilation of, occupation of, or complete humiliation of the opponent. It just requires attaining a winning position, that's all.

Let me give a hypothetical example. The South could conceivably have won the Civil War, had they held out long enough and won certain key battles (like Gettysburg), but winning would not have required them to entirely conquer the North (which would have been beyond their capability anyway), nor would it have required them to force an unconditional surrender on the North, nor would it have required them to burn Washington or force the North to disarm its entire armed forces or any other such overweaning action.

Nope. Winning would simply have required them to convince the North that IT could not win, by inflicting serious enough defeats on the North. It was the North that was seeking unconditional surrender.

It was abundantly clear to even ordinary servicemen in Japan that Japan could not win by 1945. Totally, absolutely obvious! Everybody knew it, but hardly anyone dared to say it openly, because of their peculiar honor system. They had already lost. The government would have fallen in disgrace with or without an American invasion, and not too far down the line. The High Command would have been disgraced and kicked out. Their empire was in a shambles. Their navy was defunct. Their air force was nearly defunct. Their armies were helpless to do anything about the situation.

There is no need to do much further to a nation in such straits, and there is certainly no need to either invade them or drop A-bombs on them. Just blockade them, let their economy starve, and wait for them to ask for terms (which they in fact were already asking for...but through the Russians! Bad choice of intermediary. However, they didn't know who else to do it through, because they didn't have diplomatic contacts with anyone else at that point.)

The reason I disagree with Truman is partially because of hindsight. I fully realize that he may have thought it necessary to invade Japan or use the Bomb. That he did think so was a form of hubris common in great victorious powers.

And...he may have been in a hurry...because of the Russians. They had plans for the Japanese holdings on the Asian mainland.

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: CarolC
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 10:12 PM

Hey Pete. You didn't strike me as a blood thirsty savage when I met you up in Michigan.

I don't really have an opinion on this issue at this time, but every now and then someone says something that makes me a bit confused, like the bit about the planned Soviet invasion of Japan (and now that it's been explained to me, I understand it a bit better). This part of your post has left me puzzled:

Then consider that Japan had begun sending out peace proposals early in 1942. They got more insistant following Midway. They got more frantic with each defeat.

If they were so insistant with their peace proposals, why didn't we accept them instead of using the nukes?

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 10:34 PM

Little Hawk: When Germany was defeated in WWI, we did not impose unconditional surrender on them. We reached an armistice and did not occupy Germany proper. What happened. Along came Hitler to avenge the honor of the fatherland, and we had to fight another even more bloodier war. Had we occupied Germany the first time and imposed unconditional surrender, Hitler would have never come to power. We learned our lesson well after that, and given the Japanese penchant for the Bushido code of honor, we could not allow another dictator to arise. We had to insist on unconditional surrender and occupation in order to change the entire mindset of the country. When you see how anti-war Japan is today and what a valuable role they play in the world economy, you can see that our course of action was correct and successful. SOL ZELLER

Subject: RE: BS: Exactly why the US dropped THE BOMB?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Aug 04 - 10:52 PM

I don't believe that is correct, Carol. As far as I know, the Japanese did not begin thinking in terms of "losing" the war until after the huge naval battle of Leyte Gulf in 1944. That was really the last hurrah of the Japanese fleet. It was after Leyte Gulf that the naval staff knew for certain the war was lost, and they were really unable to threaten the US fleet again with anything but kamikaze attacks by airplanes and the odd submarine attack here and there. Kamikaze attacks are necessarily a short range and short-lived defensive action borne of total desperation, and they require the near approach of an enemy fleet. They are not a means of gaining any military initiative.

It was in late '44 that the Japanese began thinking about making peace overtures through the Russians. Those efforts intensified in '45, but were fruitless, as Stalin did not pass on any of the messages to the USA or Britain.

Russia was not at war with Japan, so Japan still had diplomats in Moscow. Stalin, however, was planning to declare war on Japan, and gobble up as much spoils in Asia as he could as soon as he could transfer sufficient forces from Europe. He had secretly agreed with the Allies at the Yalta Conference to declare war on Japan within weeks of the end of the European fighting. This had not been announced publicly, so the Japanese knew nothing about it.

The Hiroshima bomb fell on August 6th. On August 8th Russia declared war on Japan. This shocked the Japanese even more than the atomic bomb strike had. The following day Nagasaki was bombed. Following that, the Emperor met with his ministers and chiefs of staff and advised them to accept the Allies' Potsdam Declaration (which demanded unconditional surrender). On August 14th a group of young officers assasinated General Mori, commander of the Imperial Guards Division, after failing to persuade him to use the unit in a rebellion to take the government by force and continue fighting the Allies. War Minister Anami, hearing the shooting, wrote a letter of apology to the Emperor, and killed himself with a short sword. Meanwhile, loyal troops led by General Tanaka put down the short-lived rebellion. The next day, August 15th, the Emperor read a short message to the entire nation over the radio. Most people had never heard his voice before. It was clearly an announcement of Japan's surrender, although the war "surrender" was not used. What he said was that Japan must "endure the unendurable and suffer what is insufferable". You have to understand the Japanese penchant for understatement. It meant surrender, that was for sure. Everyone in Japan knew that immediately.

The Japanese were not actively seeking a negotiated end until the spring of '45. What they did in '42, after Midway, their first substantial defeat, was to clench their teeth with grim resolve, admit that there was a tough fight ahead rather than a cakewalk, and start desperately trying to build more aircraft carriers. They were in no way thinking of defeat at any time in 1942 or 1943, nor were they seeking any negotiation at that time.