Do you think it was the right decision to drop the atomic bombs on Japan to end WW2?

[Youve Got To Be Kidding!]

We had to drop the bombs. We had to end the war. PERIOD. We had to use 2 of them because we wanted them to believe we had more. Supposedly we dropped the only 2 we had. Or perhaps there where 2-3 more that I am not sure. To bad Hitler couldnt get a taste of one of those instead.

I am glad to see someone else knew about the attempted coupe in Japan. I was going to wriet about it props to you. And yes it was necessary. And yes we knew what it would do.

If you have the means to stop a World War that no body else has why would you not use it? World War is NOT ACCEPTABLE. I guess smaller wars are. Tough to say it but that is it.

Stupid but thought provoking poll. Not making remarks towards you specificaly poster.

 

[Fantasea]

I believe it was probably right to drop the atomic bombs on Japan, but I do not think it was necessary to hit such a densely populated area. We could have dropped it in an area where no one lived and it would have achieved the same result.

I believe that you make the same mistake that most occidentals make when they negotiate with orientals. They do not understand that the oriental culture differs greatly from that of the occidental. As an example, in war there can be only the victor and the vanquished.

Unless a crippling blow is suffered from which there can be no recovery, the militarty continues fighting to victory or death.

Invading the home islands would have resulted in a fight to the death as it did for the Japanese on Okinawa, Iwo Jima, and other islands. The military leaders were fully committed to the code of victory or death.

It was only the intervention of the usually silent Emperor Hirohito who, seeing the nuclear attacks, against which there was no defense, as the beginning of a series which would eventually inflict a crippling blow, overruled the military and insisted on surrender so that Japanese deaths would stop.

He did not want to see the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and subsequent attacks which he knew could not be prevented. After Nagasaki, the Emperor understood that the Allies could, at an altitude of over thirty-two thousand feet, simply fly unimpeded over any target and obliterate it. With a range of nearly six thousand miles, and airfields being built on captured islands, no city of consequence was safe from the B29 and the destructive force it delivered.

 

[akyron]

Do you think the second bomb was really necessary?

It was the second bomb that convinced the Japanese warcouncil to capitulate and even then it was only under the condition that the emperor retain his throne so yeah unless you wanted a few more years of sustained heavy warfare costing millions of lives.

History channel has some great shows on it this week.
College history I and II cover this as well usually.Interesting stuff.
.

 

[jallman]

I'm sorry, I just dont buy it. I find it really hard to swallow that there was no other way to end that war. By the time we dropped those bombs, the island hopping campaigns in the pacific theater had already dealt a "crippling blow" to Japan. Their navy was in shambles, they were resorting to suicide attacks to inflict damage. Dont you think that a naval blockade and a unified allied economic embargo, though slower, would have been just as effective. They had nowhere to go with Russia on one side and the US on the other...they are an island. Stuck on an island with no means to rebuild, the people would eventually forget notions of victor/vaquished; empty bellies usually feed on principles first.

 

[Fantasea]

"HIROSHIMA"

Tonight at 8:00 on the Discovery channel.

The program consisted of plenty of fact and plenty of conjecture and propaganda.

The objective seemed to be to paint the US as a heartless agressor.

 

[Gandhi>Bush]

Given the experience gained fighting the Japanese ground forces in the island hopping campaign across the Pacific for nearly four years, and the introduction of the Kamikaze in the campaign to re-capture the Phillipines, American planners estimated that an invasion of the Japanese home islands would result in a two year campaign with upwards of four million casualties, a million of which would be among the Allied forces. Many of the Japanese dead would be suicides.

Can you back this up for one.

Many of the major Japanese cities were already in ruins from frequent B29 firebomb raids which it was hoped would cause the civilian population to rise against the goverhment. The opposite occurred. The Japanese military convinced the population that the intent of the Allies was to annihilate them in retaliation for the harsh treatment accorded to Allied POWs.

Did people really think that fire bombing would turn the people against their government? That's a moronic plan of action. Firebombings, sanctions, etc., you don't win a war by fighting the people.

Japanese women and children were organized into resistance units and received training in ways to oppose the invaders.

Like what? Can I have an article to read?

Demands for surrender were ignored.

This as well.

A tough decision? You bet. But, faced with the alternatives, what was the correct decision?

Anything that doesn't involves a mass murder of civilians.

It's was akin to having to amputate a leg to save a life. Horrible to contemplate. Monstrous to endure. But, in the end, the correct course of action.

And now Japan can't walk?

 

[Fantasea]

Can you back this up for one.



Did people really think that fire bombing would turn the people against their government? That's a moronic plan of action. Firebombings, sanctions, etc., you don't win a war by fighting the people.



Like what? Can I have an article to read?



This as well.



Anything that doesn't involves a mass murder of civilians.



And now Japan can't walk?

It is obvious that you are not a student of history. Nor a googler. Nor a humorist.

Read this: http://www.waszak.com/japanww2.htm

 

[faminedynasty]

I'm sorry, I just dont buy it.

Good for you. It is beyond me why people are still buying the government-issued version of this history when it is obvious to anyone willing to look into it that the myth is a lie. I understand it makes people uncomfortable to think that we slaughtered babies just to intimidate the soviets, but where is their commitment to truth? Your commitment to truth should come before being comfortable.

 

[C.J.]

Did people really think that fire bombing would turn the people against their government? That's a moronic plan of action. Firebombings, sanctions, etc., you don't win a war by fighting the people.

Just curious, but have we ever won a war without decimating and demorilizing the civilian population?

 

[nkgupta80]

Good for you. It is beyond me why people are still buying the government-issued version of this history when it is obvious to anyone willing to look into it that the myth is a lie. I understand it makes people uncomfortable to think that we slaughtered babies just to intimidate the soviets, but where is their commitment to truth? Your commitment to truth should come before being comfortable.

That is true. Cold War policies were in place before WWII actually ended. The US forsaw the Soviet threat and the Chinese conversion to Communism. Further spread of communism would be a disaster to the US. It wasn't that the cost of lives would be greater if we fought the Japanese. The problem was time. The more time we spent in Japan, the more USSR would gain in Asia. Now we wouldnt want the Japanese counterpart to the Berlin wall now would we... I am not trying to say that the US was a war-mongering bloodthirsty monster that had no care for these individuals. But given the immense time put into creating the bombs, given the war-hardened administration, and given the soviet threat, using the nukes was an opporunity that just couldn't be passed. Looking back however, I think that nukes were still not the answer.

 

[Fantasea]

That is true. Cold War policies were in place before WWII actually ended. The US forsaw the Soviet threat and the Chinese conversion to Communism. Further spread of communism would be a disaster to the US. It wasn't that the cost of lives would be greater if we fought the Japanese. The problem was time. The more time we spent in Japan, the more USSR would gain in Asia. Now we wouldnt want the Japanese counterpart to the Berlin wall now would we... I am not trying to say that the US was a war-mongering bloodthirsty monster that had no care for these individuals. But given the immense time put into creating the bombs, given the war-hardened administration, and given the soviet threat, using the nukes was an opporunity that just couldn't be passed. Looking back however, I think that nukes were still not the answer.

You are finally beginning to understand that things are not always as simple as they seem. Especially sixty years after the fact.

 

[jallman]

That is true. Cold War policies were in place before WWII actually ended. The US forsaw the Soviet threat and the Chinese conversion to Communism. Further spread of communism would be a disaster to the US. It wasn't that the cost of lives would be greater if we fought the Japanese. The problem was time. The more time we spent in Japan, the more USSR would gain in Asia. Now we wouldnt want the Japanese counterpart to the Berlin wall now would we... I am not trying to say that the US was a war-mongering bloodthirsty monster that had no care for these individuals. But given the immense time put into creating the bombs, given the war-hardened administration, and given the soviet threat, using the nukes was an opporunity that just couldn't be passed. Looking back however, I think that nukes were still not the answer.

EXACTLY! Besides, history prooved that the Berlin Wall eventually fell in Europe. I think impatience and paranoia was the motivation for using the bomb needlessly.

 

[C.J.]

EXACTLY! Besides, history prooved that the Berlin Wall eventually fell in Europe. I think impatience and paranoia was the motivation for using the bomb needlessly.

Regardless of the reasoning, did the bombings save American lives or not? If so, were just a few saved or were many saved?

 

[nkgupta80]

yeah the bombs saved american lives. we shoulda used them in vietnam as well. maybe korea.

 

[jallman]

yeah the bombs saved american lives. we shoulda used them in vietnam as well. maybe korea.

hey yeah...why dont we fly a couple over to Iraq too?

 

[GPS_Flex]

It was the USA or the USSR that was going to occupy Japan.

The bomb just helped them make the best choice.

 

[cnredd]

It was the USA or the USSR that was going to occupy Japan.

The bomb just helped them make the best choice.

Don't make it too simple for them Flex; Some like to go the convoluted route....

 

[jallman]

Don't make it too simple for them Flex; Some like to go the convoluted route....

The real convolution is to claim values of liberty and respect for life while extinguishing hundreds of thousands of already defeated enemy civilians just to make a point to a potential new enemy.

 

[cnredd]

The real convolution is to claim values of liberty and respect for life while extinguishing hundreds of thousands of already defeated enemy civilians just to make a point to a potential new enemy.

....which in turn will save millions....

Killing 5 now is worth more than killing 20 later...Does it suck? Absolutley...But I'll take "sucks" over "sucks alot worse" anyday...

Why are you having a problem looking at the big pic? Without Hiroshima & Nagasaki, millions would have been dead...not a few hundred thousand.

These were our only two options....One is horrible...One is even more horrible.
We went the EASY route...I'm surprised you would have wanted even more lives destroyed for the sake of not going nuclear.

Keep in mind you are thinking like someone who lives in 2005; not 1945, where political correctness wasn't even a twinkle in the eye of the ones who made it an alternative to reality....

 

[jallman]

....which in turn will save millions....

Killing 5 now is worth more than killing 20 later...Does it suck? Absolutley...But I'll take "sucks" over "sucks alot worse" anyday...

Why are you having a problem looking at the big pic? Without Hiroshima & Nagasaki, millions would have been dead...not a few hundred thousand.

These were our only two options....One is horrible...One is even more horrible.
We went the EASY route...I'm surprised you would have wanted even more lives destroyed for the sake of not going nuclear.

Keep in mind you are thinking like someone who lives in 2005; not 1945, where political correctness wasn't even a twinkle in the eye of the ones who made it an alternative to reality....

That is true, I am thinking like a person in 2005 and hindsight is always 20/20. But I still am not buying into the logic that lives were saved. Japan was already trying to surrender and even if they didnt, there were other options (for example again...naval blockades and stopping all trade until the people forced a surrender out of hunger).

I just dont see why you have such a hard time controlling your trigger finger. And I dont give a damn about whether it was a nuclear bomb or not...it was a massive explosion that vaporized the populations of two cities. And for what? To tell Russia we have bigger bombs than they did.

And what really sucks now is that America looks like an asshole now. We promote this war on terror and base it on the senseless killing of civilians on our soil, yet what did we do when the truth comes out? It sucks to have our moral high ground eroded now by such a barbarous act then.

 

[akyron]

Quote:
Demands for surrender were ignored.


This as well.


July 25: "it is impossible to accept unconditional surrender under any circumstances, but we should like to communicate to the other party through appropriate channels that we have no objection to a peace based on the Atlantic Charter." (U.S. Dept. of State, Potsdam 2, pg. 1260 - 1261).


Unconditional surrender demands were not really ignored so much as rejected.
They wanted the Russians to broker a good deal but the Russians ended up in North Korea instead.


"Unfortunately for all concerned, Japan's leaders were divided over precisely what terms should be sought to end the war, with the Japanese military leaders still wishing to avoid anything that the Allies would have considered a clear "surrender". Surely Japan's leaders hold the lion's share of the responsibility for the fate that befell Japan.

The bombs really did not make a difference. Only the assurance the Emperor would remain on the throne allowed surrender regardless of bombs or no bombs.

"That unconditional surrender remained an obstacle to peace in the wake of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the Soviet declaration of war - until the government of the United States offered the necessary (albeit veiled) assurance that neither Emperor nor throne would be destroyed - suggests the possibility, which even Stimson later recognized, that neither bomb may have been necessary; and certainly that the second one was not." (Sherwin, pg. 237, emphasis in original). As noted earlier, Stimson explained, "the Allied reply [to Japan's 8/10 surrender offer]... implicitly recognized the Emperor's position" (Stimson & Bundy, pg. 627).


Atomic Bomb - the Last Resort

There is no way we can know for certain whether this approach would have ended the Pacific war sooner and with fewer deaths. But one may regret that such an attempt was not made. Had the attempt failed, the continuing blockade of supplies, Soviet invasion, and the atomic bombs were still available. However, anyone tempted to use the atomic bomb would have done well to share the hesitancy agreed upon by President Roosevelt and Great Britain Prime Minister Winston Churchill on September 19, 1944: the atomic bomb "might, perhaps, after mature consideration, be used against the Japanese" (Robert Williams and Philip Cantelon, ed., The American Atom, pg. 45). (School of Advanced Airpower Studies historian Robert Pape has written an intriguing paper stating that further conventional air bombing would have been unnecessary: Why Japan Surrendered, International Security, Fall 1993).

It is likely Dwight Eisenhower was right when he said of the atomic bombings of Japan, "it wasn't necessary to hit them with that awful thing." (Ike on Ike, Newsweek, 11/11/63, pg. 108).


After further research I have come to the conclusion that the bombs were unnecessary to end the war.
What was needed was for two vastly different cultures to magically intimately understand the ins and outs of their respective governments and cultures but then if that was so would there have been a war at all?
If Truman had understood the fanatical religious importance (familiar topic?) of the Emperor then perhaps surrender could have occured quickly and peacefully.


Source

 

[Gandhi>Bush]

That is true, I am thinking like a person in 2005 and hindsight is always 20/20. But I still am not buying into the logic that lives were saved. Japan was already trying to surrender and even if they didnt, there were other options (for example again...naval blockades and stopping all trade until the people forced a surrender out of hunger).

That is proven not to work. That is an attack on the people, not an attack on the government. You don't starve the people into group think against a war. It just doesn't work that way. The sanctions on Iraq did nothing to topple Saddam Hussein, but they did succeed in killing children by starvation.

I just dont see why you have such a hard time controlling your trigger finger. And I dont give a damn about whether it was a nuclear bomb or not...it was a massive explosion that vaporized the populations of two cities. And for what? To tell Russia we have bigger bombs than they did.

And what really sucks now is that America looks like an asshole now. We promote this war on terror and base it on the senseless killing of civilians on our soil, yet what did we do when the truth comes out? It sucks to have our moral high ground eroded now by such a barbarous act then.

I agree with this part.

If we had to use the Nukes, why not do it offshore where the islanders can see it from. Do it where they can feel it under their feet. If you must terrorize them into capitulation, I think you could use fear of destruction rather than actual destruction. If they don't like it, drop another one closer. The fear, sight, and feeling of that bomb, I think, would work wonders toward a surrender. We had already beaten them in the sea. I believe this would have worked, but as was mentioned: Hindsight is 20/20.

That may not have got you the unconditional surreneder, but you would have got a surrender. Is a few hundred thousand lives worth the word "unconditional?"

 

[vergiss]

Conclusion: atomic weapons suck. The loss of innocent lives is always a tragedy.

Happy?

 

[jallman]

That is proven not to work. That is an attack on the people, not an attack on the government. You don't starve the people into group think against a war. It just doesn't work that way. The sanctions on Iraq did nothing to topple Saddam Hussein, but they did succeed in killing children by starvation.



I agree with this part.

If we had to use the Nukes, why not do it offshore where the islanders can see it from. Do it where they can feel it under their feet. If you must terrorize them into capitulation, I think you could use fear of destruction rather than actual destruction. If they don't like it, drop another one closer. The fear, sight, and feeling of that bomb, I think, would work wonders toward a surrender. We had already beaten them in the sea. I believe this would have worked, but as was mentioned: Hindsight is 20/20.

That may not have got you the unconditional surreneder, but you would have got a surrender. Is a few hundred thousand lives worth the word "unconditional?"

Ok, then I can concede that. Maybe laying seige to the island wouldnt have worked, and the example of Iraq proves that it probably wouldnt have. So maybe the scenario you present would have worked. The bombs were clearly dropped to terrorize and whether they were meant to defeat Japan or to make a display against Russia is irrelevant. Either way, you got to the marrow when you said that the word unconditional was not worth the loss of life for either side.

 

[AlbqOwl]

They taught us in history class that we never would have dropped the bomb if Japan had had it too. Nevertheless, while some seem to think Japan was on their last legs anyway, the historians mostly teach that without the bomb, the war would have dragged on for months, perhaps years, at a cost of a probable many millions of lives.

What the bomb accomplished:
- It ended the war
- It turned Japan into a peaceful and productive democracy
- It demonstrated the horror of nuclear war to a world that has never used that type of weapon since.

All around, it was pretty much win win for everybody. That's the best possible outcome for anything I think.