The Nuking of Nagasaki: Even More Immoral and Unnecessary than Hiroshima

[Unkotare]

No

.....

Yes. Anything that didn't actually happen is speculation.

 

[Unkotare]

All true. And if one considers that the only other option, the justification for nukes becomes crystal clear. But were they the only two options? That's a big part of the discussion.

There were several other options.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

All true. And if one considers that the only other option, the justification for nukes becomes crystal clear. But were they the only two options? That's a big part of the discussion.

we could have waited and starved and frozen millions of Japanese civilians

 

[RetiredGySgt]

There were several other options.

ya we could have met Japanese demands and done nothing to them for the war

 

[Markle]

However you cut it...we are the only nation to use nukes on civilians. We have no moral high ground here.

We saved the lives of millions of Japanese and at least a million Americans. THAT is the moral high ground.

To you, Ben Thomson, the "MORAL HIGH GROUND" is lying to your military and civilians and forcing them to commit suicide by the thousand. Mothers slashing the throats of their children before throwing them off cliffs and leaping to their own deaths. Yep, that's the moral high ground.

 

[Flash]

It is not. Stay on topic.

Stop running away from the question I asked.

What are your convictions on the morality of war?

You don't really have any, do you?

 

[Unkotare]

We saved the lives of millions of Japanese and at least a million Americans. THAT is the moral high ground.
....

THAT is speculation.

 

[Markle]

Because it is. Nuclear bombs are indiscriminate.

What bombs discriminate between a military target and a civilian target? Were no civilians killed at Pearl Harbor?

Knowing you're wrong, you'd argue with a fencepost, wouldn't you Fort Fun Indiana?

 

[Unkotare]

Stop running away from the question I asked.

....

The one who can't stay on topic is the one running away. Do you have a question about THIS topic?

 

[Unkotare]

What bombs discriminate between a military target and a civilian target? Were no civilians killed at Pearl Harbor?

Knowing you're wrong, you'd argue with a fencepost, wouldn't you Fort Fun Indiana?

Are you equating a military attack on a military base with the annihilation of hundreds of thousands of civilians?

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Are you equating a military attack on a military base with the annihilation of hundreds of thousands of civilians?

Both cities WERE ALSO military targets dumb ass.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

What bombs discriminate between a military target and a civilian target?

Smaller ordinance, guided ordinance, etc. You are going to have to find someone dumber to talk to, if you want to equate the morality and ethics of all bombs or all weapons. Sorry. Travel back a few decades and join the debate on our global treaties on both. You know, the one you lost already. Good luck.

 

[Mac-7]

Yes. Anything that didn't actually happen is speculation.

After a hundred invasions against japanese held islands our military knew what to expect

it is highly informed opinion

who else would know better?

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

we could have waited and starved and frozen millions of Japanese civilians

Right, which is arguably more immoral than incinerating 100,000 of them.

 

[9thIDdoc]

well, then you disqualify yourself from any serious dicsussion of war and tactics, as we have long realized that there are degrees of morality to our tactics and recognize that certain tactics are not justifiable at certain times. We literally have signed global treaties to this effect. So enjoy being outside the class looking in the window, I guess.

WTH "we" are you talking about? I have at least have been a part of the US Army and involved in combat in Vietnam. I believe that I have a more highly informed opinion of war and tactics than most. Has your life ever depended on correct tactics? Have you ever been required to to carry out tactics devised by someone else? Why should anyone consider your mutterings on the subject anything other than the wild delusions of a fool?

 

[Flash]

The one who can't stay on topic is the one running away. Do you have a question about THIS topic?

You are too chickenshit to answer the valid question.

If it was wrong for the US to kill civilian Japs was it also wrong for the Union turds to kill Americans?

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

WTH "we" are you talking about?

The united states. And the other signatories to the global treaties that, unlike yourself, recognize the baseline truth that some methods are less moral and less ethical than others, and so the time and place where they are acceptable varies. I did not think this discussion would devolve to such a stupid place. I will leave you guys to hash out that silly talking point amongst yourselves. Say hello to 1950 for me.

 

[Unkotare]

You are too chickenshit to answer the valid question.

....

Ask a valid question about this topic and I'll be happy to answer.

 

[Mac-7]

But were they the only two options? That's a big part of the discussion.

Of course there were options

the soviet union declared war on japan 9 Aug 1945

the same day we bombed Hiroshima

thank goodness we avoided dividing japan into a soviet and US zone of occupation

 

[Moonglow]

Whatever labored, embarrassing arguments one can make for the nuking of Hiroshima cannot be made for the nuking of Nagasaki just three days later. From my article "Did We Really Need to Use the Atomic Bomb Against Japan?":

On August 9, 1945, just three days after we nuked Hiroshima, and before Japan’s leaders had sufficient time to process and respond to our nuclear attack on Hiroshima, we dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Nagasaki, which was home to Japan’s largest Christian population. The atomic bombing of Nagasaki was even more inexcusable than the nuking of Hiroshima. . . .​

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On August 9, we nuked Nagasaki, just three days after Hiroshima, and hours after the Soviets began to maul the Japanese army in Manchuria,, and while Japan’s civilian leaders were understandably absorbed with trying to process what had happened to Hiroshima and with responding to the Soviet attack in Manchuria. Surely Truman and other high officials knew that three days was not enough time for Japan’s government to formulate a formal response to the unprecedented use of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and to the Soviet invasion in Manchuria. Even McGeorge Bundy, who helped Henry Stimson write his defense of the atomic bombing of Japan, acknowledged that Truman was too quick to nuke Nagasaki:​

"It is hard to see that much could have been lost if there had been more time between the two bombs. . . . Such a delay would have been relatively easy, and I think right." (https://miketgriffith.com/files/immoraluse.pdf)​

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The Japanese were not even able to get a scientific team to Hiroshima until August 7, the day after the attack. Meanwhile, Japan's leaders were getting conflicting, fragmentary information about what had happened in Hiroshima. Some Army officials were telling the government that the bombing of Hiroshima was merely a very large conventional bombing raid, and they were suppressing information about the kinds of wounds that had been inflicted. There was no Internet back then, no fax machines, no Skype.

Surely it was obscene for us to nuke Nagasaki just three days, 72 hours, after we had nuked Hiroshima.

Well then, the Japanese should have thought about that when attacking on December 7th, 1941.