We Were Right to Drop the Bomb

[martybegan]

Funny how the thought of killing 200000 people (mostly civilians) was once deemed a sound strategy

At least in those cases the wars ended, instead of the slow bleed we see now.

Since there have been no official declarations of war you can say we haven't fought any wars since WWII

Maybe that's part of the issue as well. War should be war. you declare, you fight, you finish. What we have now goes more back to the primitive form of skirmish war than the European tradition of armed conflict.

 

[there4eyeM]

Most of the Japanese leadership knew Japan could not win the war. If that is true what then was Japan's strategy, and how would that strategy fit into operation Olympic and Coronet, and finally the A bomb?

There was no 'strategy' left. There were only the tactics of clinging to power and the ghost of some ridiculous code. Like the Nazis, they had a kind of death cult that meant success or annihilation. Both got the latter.

 

[westwall]

Funny how the thought of killing 200000 people (mostly civilians) was once deemed a sound strategy

Not funny. But certainly sad. Also necessary, which is even worse.

 

[Correll]

Funny how the thought of killing 200000 people (mostly civilians) was once deemed a sound strategy

At least in those cases the wars ended, instead of the slow bleed we see now.

Since there have been no official declarations of war you can say we haven't fought any wars since WWII

you can say it.

it would not be true, of course.

words do not define reality.

if the words fail to accurately describe the reality that exists independently of them, then they are worthless bullshit.

 

[regent]

Some assume the Japanese were like the Nazi or other European nations, when it was clear they could not win they would surrender. That was not true of the Japanese, the Japanese knew, as has been suggested, they could not win the war, but did believe America would tire of the casualties and arrange some type of peace where Japan would end up with territory that had her needed raw materials. With the Japanese philosophy of nation over death she would make every island, every inch of territory so costly in American casualties we would negotiate, and as we neared the mainland of Japan, Japan's resistance stiffened, hence the Iwo's and Okinawa's. We will never know how long Japan would have fought on, or how many more Americans would have died but we were given a choice, and we took it.
Thank you America

 

[there4eyeM]

It was not necessary for any rational or human reason.

 

[Correll]

It was not necessary for any rational or human reason.

sure. you could have just doubled us losses for the whole of wwii.

or not.

 

[HenryBHough]

Fortunately FDR was dead before the hard decision had be made. Had he lived we might all be bowing toward Mt. Fuji five times a day.

 

[there4eyeM]

Japan was subdued. No further ground action on any large scale was needed. As with many other aspects of WWII, mistakes in strategy and goals lead to terrible losses without proportionate gain. Propaganda still insists on a version that puts Hiroshima and Nagasaki in a light that spares the US.

 

[regent]

Fortunately FDR was dead before the hard decision had be made. Had he lived we might all be bowing toward Mt. Fuji five times a day.

Truman simply carried out FDR's intent. The bomb was FDR all the way, I wonder how many Americans know the extent of the decision to build the bomb starting with Einstein saying it could be done?

 

[Correll]

Japan was subdued. No further ground action on any large scale was needed. As with many other aspects of WWII, mistakes in strategy and goals lead to terrible losses without proportionate gain. Propaganda still insists on a version that puts Hiroshima and Nagasaki in a light that spares the US.

Japan was subdued. No further ground action on any large scale was needed. As with many other aspects of WWII, mistakes in strategy and goals lead to terrible losses without proportionate gain. Propaganda still insists on a version that puts Hiroshima and Nagasaki in a light that spares the US.

Japan was subdued. No further ground action on any large scale was needed. As with many other aspects of WWII, mistakes in strategy and goals lead to terrible losses without proportionate gain. Propaganda still insists on a version that puts Hiroshima and Nagasaki in a light that spares the US.

Soooo, we should have what, asked them to surrender and they would have said yes?

Color me suspicious.

 

[browsing deer]

Fortunately FDR was dead before the hard decision had be made. Had he lived we might all be bowing toward Mt. Fuji five times a day.

Truman simply carried out FDR's intent. The bomb was FDR all the way, I wonder how many Americans know the extent of the decision to build the bomb starting with Einstein saying it could be done?

It was a remarkable achivement. no doubt about that. I kind of wish we never built it, but I have no cumpontion about using it on the kind of folks who faught the way the japanese did on Iwo and Okinowa

 

[whitehall]

The victors write the history books and life was cheap during the 2nd war to end all wars. The insanity that surfaced and prevailed among the Allies half way into the "world war" was that it was a legitimate concept that the mass killing of "enemy" civilians was a factor in winning the war. Was Paul Fussell aware that the Bushido Japanese holdouts were desperate to negotiate terms of surrender with the U.S. and desperate egghead scientists were pressuring the administration to test their monstrosity on real (sub human) people? Meanwhile president Harry Truman was under some sort of mystical pressure from his former dead boss to refuse to talk about terms of surrender with the Japanese other than unconditional surrender. Meanwhile the Japanese were trying desperately to negotiate terms of surrender with freaking Stalin. Ironically the most important term in Japanese surrender was the preservation of the Japanese emperor and the guarantee of not executing him and that happened anyway after the former clothing store owner who found himself president without a clue authorized the incineration of two Japanese cities.

 

[skye]

In a strange but terrible way they were right to drop the bomb back then because ....it's like they ended WW2 in a prophetic way ...the way WW3 is going to start....

if you know what I mean...

horrible ...I know

 

[Correll]

Fortunately FDR was dead before the hard decision had be made. Had he lived we might all be bowing toward Mt. Fuji five times a day.

Truman simply carried out FDR's intent. The bomb was FDR all the way, I wonder how many Americans know the extent of the decision to build the bomb starting with Einstein saying it could be done?

FDR certainly deserves credit for listening to Einstein and putting so much resources behind the weapon that saved so many American lives.

 

[Correll]

The victors write the history books and life was cheap during the 2nd war to end all wars. The insanity that surfaced and prevailed among the Allies half way into the "world war" was that it was a legitimate concept that the mass killing of "enemy" civilians was a factor in winning the war. Was Paul Fussell aware that the Bushido Japanese holdouts were desperate to negotiate terms of surrender with the U.S. and desperate egghead scientists were pressuring the administration to test their monstrosity on real (sub human) people? Meanwhile president Harry Truman was under some sort of mystical pressure from his former dead boss to refuse to talk about terms of surrender with the Japanese other than unconditional surrender. Meanwhile the Japanese were trying desperately to negotiate terms of surrender with freaking Stalin. Ironically the most important term in Japanese surrender was the preservation of the Japanese emperor and the guarantee of not executing him and that happened anyway after the former clothing store owner who found himself president without a clue authorized the incineration of two Japanese cities.

And because of all that spin, you get to talk about WWII, without having to say something nice about the United States!

 

[there4eyeM]

To ease the conscience, believing the nice story may be preferable.

 

[Camp]

I have wondered if balloon bombs had anything to do with the decision. About 300 of them reached the US and Canada. These were fire bombs and fragmentation bombs, but bio weapons were a possibility and probably would have been used once the targeting had become more accurate. The Japanese had an extensive bio weapons development program. The hydrogen plants were bombed in Japan and that was the only thing that prevented further development and implementation of this easy and inexpensive way of intercontinental attack.

npr.org/sections/npr-history-dept/2015/01/20/375820191/beware-of-japanese-balloon-bombs

 

[Unkotare]

we might all be bowing toward Mt. Fuji five times a day.

That makes no sense.

 

[Unkotare]

I have wondered if balloon bombs had anything to do with the decision. ...

Very, very unlikely. They were almost entirely ineffective and had no bearing on the outcome of the war.