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

[rightwinger]

Here's the thing. At the time, it was just another weapon in a war that saw all sorts of weapons used by all sides... Horror on a level most of us couldn't understand today.

Later on, when Nukes became an existential threat to the species, people asked why we used them, but at the time, there was no question. We were at war, they started it.

It's a wonderful case of applying modern values to people in the past who would have looked at you funny.

It did not have to be a question of whether we used them or not

Did we have to choose targets where 150,000 civilians were killed?
Could a non lethal “demonstration” have yielded the same results?

Drop one in a low populated or strictly military area and let the Japanese evaluate the results. Then tell them we have dozens just like it and would target Tokyo next

Unfortunately, yes. We had to inflict massive casualties in order to break their will to fight

There is no evidence that massive casualties was the only way to obtain a surrender.

Given we only gave them three days to decide, we can’t tell if the additional 70,000 Nagasaki deaths were necessary.

70,000 deaths in an instant may not seem like much, but it was more than we lost in eight years in Vietnam

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

Damn...what a stupid response
I’m not even going to bother to reply

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Here's the thing. At the time, it was just another weapon in a war that saw all sorts of weapons used by all sides... Horror on a level most of us couldn't understand today.

Later on, when Nukes became an existential threat to the species, people asked why we used them, but at the time, there was no question. We were at war, they started it.

It's a wonderful case of applying modern values to people in the past who would have looked at you funny.

It did not have to be a question of whether we used them or not

Did we have to choose targets where 150,000 civilians were killed?
Could a non lethal “demonstration” have yielded the same results?

Drop one in a low populated or strictly military area and let the Japanese evaluate the results. Then tell them we have dozens just like it and would target Tokyo next

Unfortunately, yes. We had to inflict massive casualties in order to break their will to fight

There is no evidence that massive casualties was the only way to obtain a surrender.

Given we only gave them three days to decide, we can’t tell if the additional 70,000 Nagasaki deaths were necessary.

70,000 deaths in an instant may not seem like much, but it was more than we lost in eight years in Vietnam

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

You indulge your emotions like a little girl.

You meanwhile make excuses for inexcusable actions.

 

[Picaro]

Henry Stimson, Secretary of War

http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/ps/japan/stimson_harpers.pdf

My chief purpose was to end the war in victory with the least possible cost in the lives of the men in the armies which I had helped to raise. In the light of the alternatives which, on a fair estimate, were open to us I believe that no man in our position and subject to our responsibilities, holding in his hands a weapon of such possibilities for accomplishing this purpose and saving those lives, could have failed to use it and afterwards looked his countrymen in the face.

That is obscenely absurd and revisionist. Stimson didn't even really write that article. He was pressured into "writing" it, and then his "draft" was heavily edited by others. By the time he "wrote" it, he was quite ill.

Months before we nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan was already prostrate, starving, and virtually powerless. The home islands were cut off from China. The Japanese people were approaching the point of starvation. Japan was virtually defenseless against air and naval attacks. Consider:

-- In July 1945 the Japanese government was forced to impose yet another cut in staple food rations: a cut of 10%, in fact. As a result, the food ration per person fell below 1700 calories, well below the minimum needed to maintain basic health. The United States Strategic Bombing Survey, published in 1946, noted.

Undernourishment produced a major increase in the incidence of beriberi and tuberculosis. It also had an important effect on the efficiency and morale of the people, and contributed to absenteeism among workers. (p. 21)​

-- Cases of night blindness due to malnutrition became common.

-- Japan was even running so low on rice that the government announced a program to process acorns as a substitute for rice.

-- The food shortage became so bad that the government actually published articles and booklets on how to eat food no one would usually eat, such as “Food Substitution: How to Eat Things People Normally Wouldn’t Eat.” One government booklet advised citizens to eat locusts and insect pupas.

-- Japan was running so low on fuel that the government began exploring pine-root oil as a fuel substitute for aircraft.

-- By October 1944, many new fighter pilots were being trained with films instead of live flight training in order to save fuel:

The Toho Motion Picture Company constructed a lake in Setagaya and filled it with six-foot models of U.S. warships. Atop a tower a movie camera on a boom took pictures of the vessels from various angles, simulating different speeds of approach. These films were shown as a substitute for flight training in order to save fuel. (John Toland, The Rising Sun: The Rise and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945, New York: Random House, 2003 Modern Library Paperback Edition, p. 536)​

-- Japan was running so low on metal that its military aircraft were increasingly made with larger amounts of wood. In fact, in July the government announced it had established a department to make planes out of wood.

-- Starting in early 1944 the lack of metals became so severe, due to the U.S. naval blockade, that the Japanese government was forced to start confiscating and melting bridge railings, metal fences, metal statues (even those in Buddhist temples), gate posts, notice boards, and even household items.

-- Although Japan built underground aircraft factories, raw materials were in such short supply that only 10—yes, just 10—aircraft were manufactured in those factories.

-- In March 1945, imports of crude oil, rubber, coal, and iron ore ceased.

-- By June 1945, Japan had a grand total of 9,000 planes of any kind. Most of these were trainers or old planes designed for kamikaze raids, and less than half of them were properly equipped for such raids. Many of those planes could not have been flown anyway due to the lack of fuel.

-- By early 1945, the vast majority of Japan’s merchant vessels had been destroyed.

-- By June 1945, the Japanese Navy’s surface fleet had essentially ceased to exist. The United States Strategic Bombing Survey reported,

After the liberation of the Philippines and the capture of Okinawa, oil imports into Japan were completely cut off; fuel oil stocks had been exhausted, and the few remaining Japanese warships, being without fuel, were decommissioned or were covered with camouflage and used only as antiaircraft platforms. Except for its shore-based Kamikaze air force and surface and undersea craft adapted for anti-invasion suicide attack, the Japanese Navy had ceased to exist. (p. 11)​

-- By June 1945, every major Japanese port was mined by the U.S. Navy and the Air Force. Indeed, U.S. Navy mines closed the Shimonoseki Straights, which cut off naval activity between the Japanese main islands of Honshu and Kyushu. U.S. Navy mines also shut down 18 of Japan’s 21 naval repair yards on the Inland Sea. Hiroshima’s port was shut down. Nagasaki’s port, formerly a major port, became nearly worthless.

-- By early 1945, few Japanese stores remained open because there were so few commercial goods being produced or imported.

-- As mentioned earlier, Japan was virtually defenseless against air attacks. By June 1945, the odds of a U.S. bomber being shot down in a bombing raid over Japan were 3 out of 1,000.

Given these facts, it is no surprise that there was such a strong civilian backlash against war veterans and the military in general after the war.

By June 1945, Japan posed no threat to us. The Japanese were purely on the defensive and their situation was only getting worse by the day because of our virtually total naval embargo and total control of the air. Thus, it should come as no surprise that the United States Strategic Bombing Survey concluded that “in all probability” Japan would have surrendered before 1 November 1945 even if we had not dropped nukes and even if the Soviets had not invaded:

Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts, and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey's opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated. (p. 26)​

So this nonsense that we had to use nukes to "save hundreds of thousands of lives" is gross revisionism of the basest kind. Again, weeks before Hiroshima, we knew from multiple sources that Japan's civilian leaders, including the emperor, wanted to surrender, and that their only condition was that the emperor not be deposed, which was exactly the arrangement that we later accepted--after we had nuked two cities.

Again for the slow and amazingly STUPID Japan WOULD NOT surrender. We were faced with an invasion that would probably have killed 6 million Japanese and we would have lost a million troops. Again the FACTS after 2 ATOMIC Bombs the Government oif Japan REFUSED to surrender, they REFUSED. The Emperor over rode them and order the surrender and the response from the Army was an attempted Coup to stop that from happening.

Even assuming we did not invade in November, the winter months would have killed millions of starving and freezing Japanese citizens. And the Army which ran the Government DID NOT CARE.

The only terms they offered were a ceasefire return to 41 start Lines except in China where they offered no concessions and NO disarmament, no troops in Japan and NO sacking of the Emperor.

Once we had an atomic bomb there was never any need for an invasion

The only question was how we should use our new nuclear superiority

Current position was that killing 150,000 civilians was the only way to get Japan to surrender. There is no proof that says a lesser act would not have yielded the same result

LOL even after 2 nukes the Japanese Government REFUSED to surrender but hey we are to believe that cute puppies and wishful thinking would have got them to surrender.

We didn't try group hugs, sitting around campfires passing joints around, and singing along with Joan Baez tunes. that always worked with psycho mass murdering vermin before, didn't it?

 

[Picaro]

Here's the thing. At the time, it was just another weapon in a war that saw all sorts of weapons used by all sides... Horror on a level most of us couldn't understand today.

Later on, when Nukes became an existential threat to the species, people asked why we used them, but at the time, there was no question. We were at war, they started it.

It's a wonderful case of applying modern values to people in the past who would have looked at you funny.

It did not have to be a question of whether we used them or not

Did we have to choose targets where 150,000 civilians were killed?
Could a non lethal “demonstration” have yielded the same results?

Drop one in a low populated or strictly military area and let the Japanese evaluate the results. Then tell them we have dozens just like it and would target Tokyo next

Unfortunately, yes. We had to inflict massive casualties in order to break their will to fight

There is no evidence that massive casualties was the only way to obtain a surrender.

Given we only gave them three days to decide, we can’t tell if the additional 70,000 Nagasaki deaths were necessary.

70,000 deaths in an instant may not seem like much, but it was more than we lost in eight years in Vietnam

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

Damn...what a stupid response
I’m not even going to bother to reply

Well, that's because you know you're full of shit and don't have anything sane to say, since you mostly just parrot commie propaganda like the rest of your peers.

 

[Picaro]

Here's the thing. At the time, it was just another weapon in a war that saw all sorts of weapons used by all sides... Horror on a level most of us couldn't understand today.

Later on, when Nukes became an existential threat to the species, people asked why we used them, but at the time, there was no question. We were at war, they started it.

It's a wonderful case of applying modern values to people in the past who would have looked at you funny.

It did not have to be a question of whether we used them or not

Did we have to choose targets where 150,000 civilians were killed?
Could a non lethal “demonstration” have yielded the same results?

Drop one in a low populated or strictly military area and let the Japanese evaluate the results. Then tell them we have dozens just like it and would target Tokyo next

Unfortunately, yes. We had to inflict massive casualties in order to break their will to fight

There is no evidence that massive casualties was the only way to obtain a surrender.

Given we only gave them three days to decide, we can’t tell if the additional 70,000 Nagasaki deaths were necessary.

70,000 deaths in an instant may not seem like much, but it was more than we lost in eight years in Vietnam

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

You indulge your emotions like a little girl.

You're a whiny little girl who hates being handed your ass on pretty much every topic. Go cruise the public toilets and find some feces to play with, sicko.

 

[sparky]

Where's the moral question?

It doesn't need to be a question of morality , it can be purely militant

~S~

 

[Unkotare]

It did not have to be a question of whether we used them or not

Did we have to choose targets where 150,000 civilians were killed?
Could a non lethal “demonstration” have yielded the same results?

Drop one in a low populated or strictly military area and let the Japanese evaluate the results. Then tell them we have dozens just like it and would target Tokyo next

Unfortunately, yes. We had to inflict massive casualties in order to break their will to fight

There is no evidence that massive casualties was the only way to obtain a surrender.

Given we only gave them three days to decide, we can’t tell if the additional 70,000 Nagasaki deaths were necessary.

70,000 deaths in an instant may not seem like much, but it was more than we lost in eight years in Vietnam

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

You indulge your emotions like a little girl.

You meanwhile make excuses for inexcusable actions.

Of the two of us, only you have done such a thing.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Unfortunately, yes. We had to inflict massive casualties in order to break their will to fight

There is no evidence that massive casualties was the only way to obtain a surrender.

Given we only gave them three days to decide, we can’t tell if the additional 70,000 Nagasaki deaths were necessary.

70,000 deaths in an instant may not seem like much, but it was more than we lost in eight years in Vietnam

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

You indulge your emotions like a little girl.

You meanwhile make excuses for inexcusable actions.

Of the two of us, only you have done such a thing.

Really? so excuses the murder of millions is acceptable? Cause that is what you are doing.

 

[mikegriffith1]

Funny how no one cares about burning Japanese cities to the ground with incendiaries - but a nuke? OMFG!!!

Who said no one cares? Many people have condemned our conventional bombing of Japanese cities.

Professor Sean Malloy has written a book on Henry Stimson’s role in the decision to nuke Japan. Therein he examines Truman’s failure to follow the advice of so many of his advisers who were telling him that clarifying the emperor’s status might very well induce Japan to surrender without an invasion. Malloy also notes Truman’s failure to include the Soviets in the Potsdam Declaration, even though he knew they were going to enter the war no later than mid-August. This is from Professor Malloy’s book Atomic Tragedy: Henry L. Stimson and the Decision to Use the Bomb Against Japan (Cornell University Press, 2008):

The Potsdam Declaration issued on July 26, 1945, contained no guarantee or reassurance on the postwar status of the emperor. Nor was the Soviet Union invited to sign the document, despite the fact that Stalin had formally agreed to enter the war in mid-August and was eager to join in a public ultimatum to Japan. While the declaration did contain a partial clarification of what unconditional surrender would entail—denying that the Allies intended to exterminate the Japanese people or permanently occupy that country—it had been stripped of the two important incentives to surrender that Stimson and others had recommended earlier in the month. Without the immediate threat of Soviet entry or the atomic bomb and a clear statement on the postwar status of the emperor, the Potsdam Declaration was publicly dismissed by the Japanese government as representing nothing more than “a rehash of the Cairo Declaration.” As historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa has observed, the decision to release the declaration in a public broadcast, rather than through formal or informal diplomatic channels, further encouraged the belief in Japan that it was intended primarily for propaganda purposes.​

Why Truman failed at Potsdam to make use of the full arsenal of diplomatic threats and incentives is a matter of some mystery. . . .​

The failure to offer any reassurance on the emperor is particularly troublesome. Nobody on the American side could guarantee that such reassurance would lead to a speedy Japanese surrender. Diplomatic cables intercepted and decrypted by the Americans in summer 1945 revealed that the Japanese government was badly divided on the issue of surrender terms. But amid this uncertainty, it was widely agreed by American military and diplomatic experts that failure to clarify the emperor’s postwar status would almost certainly delay surrender and prolong the war. According to a State Department analysis from mid-June, “every evidence, without exception, that we are able to obtain of the views of the Japanese with regard to the institution of the throne indicates that the non-molestation of the person of the present emperor and the preservation of the institution of the throne comprise irreducible Japanese terms.” It was this belief that had led Stimson to push for such a reassurance on the grounds that “the country will not be satisfied unless every effort is made to shorten the war.” Recognizing the “irreducible” importance of the emperor, Truman did eventually allow Hirohito to remain on the throne after two atomic bombs and Soviet entry into the war in early August. Why did he not follow Stimson’s advice and make such an offer at Potsdam? Even if it did not produce immediate capitulation, it would at the very least have presented a clear set of terms to Japanese leaders in late July rather than forcing them to guess or intuit the American position on this pivotal question. (pp. 128-129)​

Indeed, giving reassurance on the emperor’s post-war status would have also taken away from the Japanese hardliners their main argument against surrender and would have greatly strengthened the position of the moderates.

Japan’s militarists and their backers seek to minimize Japanese war crimes. America’s militarists and their backers seek to deny that nuking Japan was unnecessary and immoral.

It is beyond obvious that, at the bare minimum, Truman blundered horrendously by allowing Byrnes to remove from the Potsdam Declaration the most powerful military threat (Soviet entry into the war) and the most powerful diplomatic incentive for surrender (an assurance about the emperor’s post-war status). Whether he did this because he was unable to withstand his own hardliners’ pressure or because he wanted to nuke Japan to exact revenge and to show the Soviets the bomb’s power, the fact remains that he tragically failed to use two powerful diplomatic tools that provided an excellent chance of ending the war early and without an invasion.

 

[sparky]

and how is it then millions seem acceptable ,when one can become a howling fit of ascii?

~S~

 

[sparky]

Funny how no one cares about burning Japanese cities to the ground with incendiaries - but a nuke? OMFG!!!

Who said no one cares? Many people have condemned our conventional bombing of Japanese cities.

Professor Sean Malloy has written a book on Henry Stimson’s role in the decision to nuke Japan. Therein he examines Truman’s failure to follow the advice of so many of his advisers who were telling him that clarifying the emperor’s status might very well induce Japan to surrender without an invasion. Malloy also notes Truman’s failure to include the Soviets in the Potsdam Declaration, even though he knew they were going to enter the war no later than mid-August. This is from Professor Malloy’s book Atomic Tragedy: Henry L. Stimson and the Decision to Use the Bomb Against Japan (Cornell University Press, 2008):

The Potsdam Declaration issued on July 26, 1945, contained no guarantee or reassurance on the postwar status of the emperor. Nor was the Soviet Union invited to sign the document, despite the fact that Stalin had formally agreed to enter the war in mid-August and was eager to join in a public ultimatum to Japan. While the declaration did contain a partial clarification of what unconditional surrender would entail—denying that the Allies intended to exterminate the Japanese people or permanently occupy that country—it had been stripped of the two important incentives to surrender that Stimson and others had recommended earlier in the month. Without the immediate threat of Soviet entry or the atomic bomb and a clear statement on the postwar status of the emperor, the Potsdam Declaration was publicly dismissed by the Japanese government as representing nothing more than “a rehash of the Cairo Declaration.” As historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa has observed, the decision to release the declaration in a public broadcast, rather than through formal or informal diplomatic channels, further encouraged the belief in Japan that it was intended primarily for propaganda purposes.​

Why Truman failed at Potsdam to make use of the full arsenal of diplomatic threats and incentives is a matter of some mystery. . . .​

The failure to offer any reassurance on the emperor is particularly troublesome. Nobody on the American side could guarantee that such reassurance would lead to a speedy Japanese surrender. Diplomatic cables intercepted and decrypted by the Americans in summer 1945 revealed that the Japanese government was badly divided on the issue of surrender terms. But amid this uncertainty, it was widely agreed by American military and diplomatic experts that failure to clarify the emperor’s postwar status would almost certainly delay surrender and prolong the war. According to a State Department analysis from mid-June, “every evidence, without exception, that we are able to obtain of the views of the Japanese with regard to the institution of the throne indicates that the non-molestation of the person of the present emperor and the preservation of the institution of the throne comprise irreducible Japanese terms.” It was this belief that had led Stimson to push for such a reassurance on the grounds that “the country will not be satisfied unless every effort is made to shorten the war.” Recognizing the “irreducible” importance of the emperor, Truman did eventually allow Hirohito to remain on the throne after two atomic bombs and Soviet entry into the war in early August. Why did he not follow Stimson’s advice and make such an offer at Potsdam? Even if it did not produce immediate capitulation, it would at the very least have presented a clear set of terms to Japanese leaders in late July rather than forcing them to guess or intuit the American position on this pivotal question. (pp. 128-129)​

Indeed, giving reassurance on the emperor’s post-war status would have also taken away from the Japanese hardliners their main argument against surrender and would have greatly strengthened the position of the moderates.

Japan’s militarists and their backers seek to minimize Japanese war crimes. America’s militarists and their backers seek to deny that nuking Japan was unnecessary and immoral.

It is beyond obvious that, at the bare minimum, Truman blundered horrendously by allowing Byrnes to remove from the Potsdam Declaration the most powerful military threat (Soviet entry into the war) and the most powerful diplomatic incentive for surrender (an assurance about the emperor’s post-war status). Whether he did this because he was unable to withstand his own hardliners’ pressure or because he wanted to nuke Japan to exact revenge and to show the Soviets the bomb’s power, the fact remains that he tragically failed to use two powerful diplomatic tools that provided an excellent chance of ending the war early and without an invasion.

Byrnes seems to be the only Truman advocate

Stimson and the top brass all bailed on the bomb

~S~

 

[elektra]

Funny how no one cares about burning Japanese cities to the ground with incendiaries - but a nuke? OMFG!!!

Who said no one cares? Many people have condemned our conventional bombing of Japanese cities.

Professor Sean Malloy has written a book on Henry Stimson’s role in the decision to nuke Japan. Therein he examines Truman’s failure to follow the advice of so many of his advisers who were telling him that clarifying the emperor’s status might very well induce Japan to surrender without an invasion. Malloy also notes Truman’s failure to include the Soviets in the Potsdam Declaration, even though he knew they were going to enter the war no later than mid-August. This is from Professor Malloy’s book Atomic Tragedy: Henry L. Stimson and the Decision to Use the Bomb Against Japan (Cornell University Press, 2008):

The Potsdam Declaration issued on July 26, 1945, contained no guarantee or reassurance on the postwar status of the emperor. Nor was the Soviet Union invited to sign the document, despite the fact that Stalin had formally agreed to enter the war in mid-August and was eager to join in a public ultimatum to Japan. While the declaration did contain a partial clarification of what unconditional surrender would entail—denying that the Allies intended to exterminate the Japanese people or permanently occupy that country—it had been stripped of the two important incentives to surrender that Stimson and others had recommended earlier in the month. Without the immediate threat of Soviet entry or the atomic bomb and a clear statement on the postwar status of the emperor, the Potsdam Declaration was publicly dismissed by the Japanese government as representing nothing more than “a rehash of the Cairo Declaration.” As historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa has observed, the decision to release the declaration in a public broadcast, rather than through formal or informal diplomatic channels, further encouraged the belief in Japan that it was intended primarily for propaganda purposes.​

Why Truman failed at Potsdam to make use of the full arsenal of diplomatic threats and incentives is a matter of some mystery. . . .​

The failure to offer any reassurance on the emperor is particularly troublesome. Nobody on the American side could guarantee that such reassurance would lead to a speedy Japanese surrender. Diplomatic cables intercepted and decrypted by the Americans in summer 1945 revealed that the Japanese government was badly divided on the issue of surrender terms. But amid this uncertainty, it was widely agreed by American military and diplomatic experts that failure to clarify the emperor’s postwar status would almost certainly delay surrender and prolong the war. According to a State Department analysis from mid-June, “every evidence, without exception, that we are able to obtain of the views of the Japanese with regard to the institution of the throne indicates that the non-molestation of the person of the present emperor and the preservation of the institution of the throne comprise irreducible Japanese terms.” It was this belief that had led Stimson to push for such a reassurance on the grounds that “the country will not be satisfied unless every effort is made to shorten the war.” Recognizing the “irreducible” importance of the emperor, Truman did eventually allow Hirohito to remain on the throne after two atomic bombs and Soviet entry into the war in early August. Why did he not follow Stimson’s advice and make such an offer at Potsdam? Even if it did not produce immediate capitulation, it would at the very least have presented a clear set of terms to Japanese leaders in late July rather than forcing them to guess or intuit the American position on this pivotal question. (pp. 128-129)​

Indeed, giving reassurance on the emperor’s post-war status would have also taken away from the Japanese hardliners their main argument against surrender and would have greatly strengthened the position of the moderates.

Japan’s militarists and their backers seek to minimize Japanese war crimes. America’s militarists and their backers seek to deny that nuking Japan was unnecessary and immoral.

It is beyond obvious that, at the bare minimum, Truman blundered horrendously by allowing Byrnes to remove from the Potsdam Declaration the most powerful military threat (Soviet entry into the war) and the most powerful diplomatic incentive for surrender (an assurance about the emperor’s post-war status). Whether he did this because he was unable to withstand his own hardliners’ pressure or because he wanted to nuke Japan to exact revenge and to show the Soviets the bomb’s power, the fact remains that he tragically failed to use two powerful diplomatic tools that provided an excellent chance of ending the war early and without an invasion.

Byrnes seems to be the only Truman advocate

Stimson and the top brass all bailed on the bomb

~S~

Where do you get that idea?

 

[Unkotare]

There is no evidence that massive casualties was the only way to obtain a surrender.

Given we only gave them three days to decide, we can’t tell if the additional 70,000 Nagasaki deaths were necessary.

70,000 deaths in an instant may not seem like much, but it was more than we lost in eight years in Vietnam

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

You indulge your emotions like a little girl.

You meanwhile make excuses for inexcusable actions.

Of the two of us, only you have done such a thing.

Really? so excuses the murder of millions is acceptable? Cause that is what you are doing.

Quote, liar?

 

[sparky]

Where do you get that idea?

Adm. William Leahy, President Truman’s Chief of Staff, wrote in his 1950 memoir I Was There that “the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender.…

US Army Air Forces, Henry “Hap” Arnold, gave a strong indication of his views in a public statement only eleven days after Hiroshima was attacked. Asked on August 17 by a New York Timesreporter whether the atomic bomb caused Japan to surrender, Arnold said that “the Japanese position was hopeless even before the first atomic bomb fell, because the Japanese had lost control of their own air.”


Fleet Adm. Chester Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet, stated in a public address at the Washington Monument two months after the bombings that “the atomic bomb played no decisive part, from a purely military standpoint, in the defeat of Japan

Adm. William “Bull” Halsey Jr., Commander of the US Third Fleet, stated publicly in 1946 that “the first atomic bomb was an unnecessary experiment…. It was a mistake to ever drop it…. [the scientists] had this toy and they wanted to try it out, so they dropped it…”

Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, for his part, stated in his memoirs that when notified by Secretary of War Henry Stimson of the decision to use atomic weapons, he “voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives…

Maj. Gen. Curtis LeMay, head of the Twenty-First Bomber Command, went public the month after the bombing, telling the press that “the atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war at all.”

~S~

 

[elektra]

Where do you get that idea?

Adm. William Leahy, President Truman’s Chief of Staff, wrote in his 1950 memoir I Was There that “the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender.…

US Army Air Forces, Henry “Hap” Arnold, gave a strong indication of his views in a public statement only eleven days after Hiroshima was attacked. Asked on August 17 by a New York Timesreporter whether the atomic bomb caused Japan to surrender, Arnold said that “the Japanese position was hopeless even before the first atomic bomb fell, because the Japanese had lost control of their own air.”


Fleet Adm. Chester Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet, stated in a public address at the Washington Monument two months after the bombings that “the atomic bomb played no decisive part, from a purely military standpoint, in the defeat of Japan

Adm. William “Bull” Halsey Jr., Commander of the US Third Fleet, stated publicly in 1946 that “the first atomic bomb was an unnecessary experiment…. It was a mistake to ever drop it…. [the scientists] had this toy and they wanted to try it out, so they dropped it…”

Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, for his part, stated in his memoirs that when notified by Secretary of War Henry Stimson of the decision to use atomic weapons, he “voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives…

Maj. Gen. Curtis LeMay, head of the Twenty-First Bomber Command, went public the month after the bombing, telling the press that “the atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war at all.”

~S~

All after the fact, back benchers.

I will look into these statements one by one, it will take time to cross reference them to proper sources.

I can say at this time Eisenhower gave a misleading statement if not an outright lie. In Eisenhower's diary there is no mention that Stimson told him of an atomic bomb. Hell, Stinson did not tell vice pres. Truman this top secret so why would he tell Eisenhower who had nothing to do with the Pacific. Further if you read what Eisenhower wrote you will find he wrote 3 different versions of what he claims. Politics, nothing more.

Stinson made the statement that all who were part of the decision to drop the bomb were in complete agreement.

 

[elektra]

Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, for his part, stated in his memoirs that when notified by Secretary of War Henry Stimson of the decision to use atomic weapons, he “voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives

How about links for all your quotes. Eisenhower thought that no lives would be lost if the bomb was not used? This statement is part of the Stinson conversation? At potsdam? It would have to be according to Eisenhower's diary. After potsdam the Japanese sunk the Indianapolis, 900 Americans dead. 18th of August, after the Japanese surrender and 9 days after the bomb is dropped a B29 is shot down over Japan, 1 American dead. How many more Americans died in prison camps after the surrender? Eisenhower is a moron if he stated this.

So link so we can see if there is any truth in any of this.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

We lost almost that many to traffic accidents every year in the 1960's, yet you left wingers never post Pity Parties for those people, just those who died fighting your Heroes like Ho, Mao, and Khrushchev. We know what you actually don't like, and that is America's existence.

You indulge your emotions like a little girl.

You meanwhile make excuses for inexcusable actions.

Of the two of us, only you have done such a thing.

Really? so excuses the murder of millions is acceptable? Cause that is what you are doing.

Quote, liar?

You keep claiming we are wrong when we point out Japan killed 10 million people, you keep claiming we got it wrong.

 

[elektra]

[]
Maj. Gen. Curtis LeMay, head of the Twenty-First Bomber Command, went public the month after the bombing, telling the press that “the atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war at all.”

M Gen Lemay, famously stated, "that if the war is shortened by a single day, the attack will have served its purpose"

I guess, the man in charge of fire bombing thought he could end the war in one big fire?

In regards to the fire bombing that he commanded.
Again, I need a link for this ons.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Where's the moral question?

It doesn't need to be a question of morality , it can be purely militant
~S~

Sure - but the person I responded to wants to discuss morality.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Funny how no one cares about burning Japanese cities to the ground with incendiaries - but a nuke? OMFG!!!

Who said no one cares? Many people have condemned our conventional bombing of Japanese cities.

By "many" you mean a handful of academics who had no iron in the fire.
How do you win a war? Force the other side in a position where it no longer wants to fight you.
What is the most moral way to do this? As quickly as possible, as to prolong a war is to increase suffering.
That's what we did.