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

[Concerned American]

The atomic bombs were already tested at that point. Trinity proved them.

The bomb had never been used on a human target. They also did not know what configuration would be most effective, hence two bomb designs. Re: surrender, Japan and the US had talked about surrender as early as July. Japan wanted to retain Hirohito as emperor and wanted a negotiated surrender--the US wanted unconditional. Seventy five years later we all have 20-20 hindsight but none of us in this discussion have any idea of the thought processes at the time given the technology that was available. Instant communications did not exist. American thoughts on the matter are generally colored with what our predecessors, as victors, have told us. As in any conflict, there are two sides.

 

[Concerned American]

The US beat them with logistics

There is a lot to be said for this. The US had the Japanese blockaded for sometime and shortages were wide spread. Japanese nationalism was a very real thing--still is for that matter.

 

[Concerned American]

This was already understood.

Wrong.

 

[Concerned American]

If that is a fact, it is an irrelevant one. Japan was still refusing to surrender, so we had every right to keep attacking them.

No one is disputing whether it was right or wrong. The US was bombing the hell out of most major cities daily. The war was still being waged. The question was whether or not the atomic bomb was necessary. I contend it was not. I also have made clear that I believe there was a research angle to the dropping. Given what we know now, I am convinced of it. The tactics of war are barbaric and every war has what, in hindsight are atrocities in a civilian researcher's mind. In the mind of a military commander or troop, war is hell and the quickest way to victory is preferable. End of story.

 

[Mac-7]

That is incorrect. Japan did not contemplate surrendering until after both atomic bombs had already been dropped.

The japanese military high command never conceded

only after Hirohito himself expressed a desire to surrender did the weight of history overcome their objections

 

[Open Bolt]

The bomb had never been used on a human target.

So what? Someone has to be first.

They also did not know what configuration would be most effective, hence two bomb designs.

That is incorrect. The implosion design was by far the more effective design if it worked. And they knew from Trinity that it worked.

There were two designs because Little Boy had already been built by that point, just in case Trinity had been a failure.

Re: surrender, Japan and the US had talked about surrender as early as July.

No they didn't. Japan and the US did not talk until August 10, by which time both atomic bombs had already been dropped.

Japan wanted to retain Hirohito as emperor and wanted a negotiated surrender--the US wanted unconditional.

The US backed off from unconditional surrender when we issued the Potsdam Proclamation, which was a list of generous surrender terms. Japan still refused to surrender.

Japan's offer to surrender with an additional condition came only on August 10, which was after both atomic bombs had already been dropped.

Seventy five years later we all have 20-20 hindsight but none of us in this discussion have any idea of the thought processes at the time given the technology that was available.

Historians have done a pretty good job of laying it all out.

Instant communications did not exist.

Once Japan actually decided to surrender it didn't take them very long to communicate that to us.

Communication was not instant by any means, but it only took a few hours at most.

American thoughts on the matter are generally colored with what our predecessors, as victors, have told us.

There are plenty of decent history books that lay out the bare truth.

As in any conflict, there are two sides.

The facts are on America's side.

Wrong.

That is incorrect. The dangers of radiation were understood ever since Hermann Joseph Muller delivered his paper "The Problem of Genetic Modification" in 1927.

It also didn't escape the notice of the scientific community when Marie Curie died of radiation poisoning in 1934.

No one is disputing whether it was right or wrong.

Some people here are disputing it.

The US was bombing the hell out of most major cities daily. The war was still being waged. The question was whether or not the atomic bomb was necessary. I contend it was not.

What does "necessary" even mean?

Japan was still refusing to surrender, so we kept attacking them.

I also have made clear that I believe there was a research angle to the dropping. Given what we know now, I am convinced of it.

You are mistaken. There was a "make Japan surrender" angle to the dropping.

The tactics of war are barbaric and every war has what, in hindsight are atrocities in a civilian researcher's mind. In the mind of a military commander or troop, war is hell and the quickest way to victory is preferable. End of story.

The atomic bombs were certainly dropped with the goal of bringing us closer to victory, but I see no atrocities on the part of the US.

 

[Concerned American]

So what? Someone has to be first.

Please keep up, that has been my point all along if you have been following the thread.

 

[Open Bolt]

Please keep up, that has been my point all along if you have been following the thread.

If there is a point here about Japan being the first to be nuked, I am having trouble perceiving it.

 

[Concerned American]

I am having trouble perceiving it.

That is clear.

 

[Open Bolt]

That is clear.

There isn't any point here about the fact that Japan was first to be nuked. It's just a meaningless factoid.

 

[Concerned American]

There isn't any point here about the fact that Japan was first to be nuked. It's just a meaningless factoid.

And standing alone, irrelevant to the thread

 

[Open Bolt]

And standing alone, irrelevant to the thread

Well, let me know if you decide to post anything that is relevant to the thread.

 

[Unkotare]

"General Dwight Eisenhower, in his memoirs, recalled a visit from Secretary of War Henry Stimson in late July 1945: “I 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. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of ‘face.’” Eisenhower reiterated the point years later in a Newsweek interview in 1963, saying that “the Japanese were ready to surrender and it wasn’t necessary to hit them with that awful thing.”1

In fact, seven out of eight top U.S. military commanders believed that it was unnecessary to use atomic bombs against Japan from a military-strategic vantage point, including Admirals Chester Nimitz, Ernest King, William Halsey, and William Leahy, and Generals Henry Arnold and Douglas MacArthur.2 According to Air Force historian Daniel Haulman, even General Curtis LeMay, the architect of the air war against Japan, believed “the new weapons were unnecessary, because his bombers were already destroying the Japanese cities.”3"

Was There a Diplomatic Alternative? The Atomic Bombing and Japan's Surrender - The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus

[…]

apjjf.org

"
One day after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, General MacArthur’s pilot, Weldon E. Rhoades, noted in his diary: “General MacArthur definitely is appalled and depressed by this ‘Frankenstein’ monster. I had a long talk with him today, necessitated by the impending trip to Okinawa.”4

Admiral Halsey, Commander of the U.S. Third Fleet, testified before Congress in September 1949, “I believe that bombing – especially atomic bombing – of civilians, is morally indefensible. . . . I know that the extermination theory has no place in a properly conducted war.”5

Admiral Leahy, Truman’s chief military advisor, wrote in his memoirs: “It is my opinion 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 because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons.”6

That the Japanese were on the verge of defeat was made clear to the president in a top-secret memorandum from Secretary of War Henry Stimson on July 2, 1945. Stimson noted that Japan “has no allies,” its “navy is nearly destroyed,” she is vulnerable to an economic blockade depriving her “of sufficient food and supplies for her population,” she is “terribly vulnerable to our concentrated air attack upon her crowded cities, industrial, and food resources,” she “has against her not only the Anglo-American forces but the rising forces of China and the ominous threat of Russia,” and the United States has “inexhaustible and untouched industrial resources to bring to bear against her diminishing potential.” "

 

[Unkotare]

"The assertion that the atomic bombings forced Japan to surrender was not supported by a U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, published in July 1946, which noted that the decision of Japanese leaders “to abandon the war is tied up with other factors. The atomic bomb had more effect on the thinking of government leaders than on the morale of the rank and file of civilians outside the target areas. It cannot be said, however, that the atomic bomb convinced the leaders who effected the peace of the necessity of surrender.”17"

Admiral King, Commander in Chief of Naval Operations, stated in his memoirs that neither the atomic bombings nor a prospective U.S. invasion of the Japanese mainland was necessary, as “an effective naval blockade would, in the course of time, have starved the Japanese into submission through lack of oil, rice, medicines, and other essential materials.”18"

 

[Unkotare]

"This was not why Hiroshima was chosen. Rather, the city was selected because it was “the largest untouched target not on the 21st Bomber Command priority list,” according to the administration’s Target Committee.20 Hiroshima, in other words, did not have enough military production to justify an earlier conventional attack (as compared to other cities on the priority list), and the effects of the bomb had to be uncontaminated from previous bombings in order to properly assess their damage."

 

[Unkotare]

"Indeed, Japan had put out peace feelers. As reported in the New York Times on July 26, 1945, “The Tokyo Radio, in an English-language broadcast to North America, has urged that the United States adopt a more lenient attitude toward Japan with regard to peace.” The broadcast quoted an ancient Aesop Fable in which a powerful wind could not force a man to give up his coat, but a gentle warming sun succeeded in doing so.25

Japan’s appeal fell on deaf ears in Washington."

 

[Unkotare]

http://wyso.weebly.com/uploads/2/2/9/0/22903824/trohan_article.pdf

 

[Open Bolt]

"The assertion that the atomic bombings forced Japan to surrender was not supported by a U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, published in July 1946, which noted that the decision of Japanese leaders “to abandon the war is tied up with other factors. The atomic bomb had more effect on the thinking of government leaders than on the morale of the rank and file of civilians outside the target areas. It cannot be said, however, that the atomic bomb convinced the leaders who effected the peace of the necessity of surrender.”17"
Admiral King, Commander in Chief of Naval Operations, stated in his memoirs that neither the atomic bombings nor a prospective U.S. invasion of the Japanese mainland was necessary, as “an effective naval blockade would, in the course of time, have starved the Japanese into submission through lack of oil, rice, medicines, and other essential materials.”18"

So what? All this pathetic whining is pretty tedious.

Japan was free to surrender any time they wanted.

Japan chose not to surrender, so we kept on attacking them.

If Japan didn't want us to keep on attacking them, then they should have surrendered earlier than they did.

 

[Unkotare]

"Two days before the late President Roosevelt left the last week in January for the Yalta conference with Prime Minister Churchill and Marshal Stalin he received a Japanese offer identical with the terms subsequently concluded by his successor, Harry S. Truman."

 

[Unkotare]

The Bomb Was Not Necessary

With the sixty-fifth anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb almost upon us, there is undoubtedly going to be a flood of commentary on the wisdom of its use by the United States during World War II. The justified scolding of Charles Pellegrino and his The Last Train From Hiroshima...

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