64 years ago today

[THEU]

GT and I don't hardly ever agree, but I believe on this matter we do.

Now, I am not going to say it was an easy decision then, it would never be an easy decision. I do believe though that it wasn't the only option, and therefore one can't say it 'HAD" to be done.

We could have tried other tactics, and I am not saying any would have worked better, or saved lives, or anything like that.

I just struggle with killing women and children. I think that we should all struggle with that.

 

[Coelacanth]

Even more women and children would have died later if we didn't drop the bomb.

 

[Texanne]

Gee, I guess it's too bad Japan didn't say, "Evacuate Pearl Harbor, then stand by and watch this massive air strike we are going to launch. You will be so amazed by our power that you will surrender on the spot."
War is, by it's very nature, a dirty, dirty business. There is no way that war casualties can be limited to military personnel only.

The fact that it took two bombs to convince Japan to quit tells me that we made the right choice.

The only way we are ever going to have a world without war is to have a world without people. Someone is always going to want what someone else has.

 

[GT WT]

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[Coelacanth]

The Rape of Nanking

Let's not go too far down the road of moralistic comparisons between the belligerents of World War 2. The US behaved as benevolently toward the human race as any nation involved in that crisis. We played a decisive role in saving the world from the fascists of both Germany and Japan. If you're bound and determined to argue that the US was morally deficient in its actions, then I guess no one can stop you. You have no facts, nor any apparent desire to deal with them, nor any basis for the argument at all except the vague and uninformed notion that there must have been some other way. You care about the women and children. Ok, we get it.

But please spare us the idea that Japan was in some way more noble because they picked a military target. Had Japan possessed the means to occupy American soil, they would have treated us the same way they treated the Chinese--as racially inferior, as sexual objects, as a people worthy of being either annihiliated or enslaved.

 

[GT WT]

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[Coelacanth]

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[groverat]

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[Coelacanth]

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[Hayden_Horn]

the japanese had never been conquered, in their entire history. NEVER. and it is a rather long history.

many viewed their islands as the center of the world, protected by the gods, and inviolate to invaders. even further, the japanese did not, and still do not, in many instances, tolerate any kind of failure. their philosophy of war, all throughout their history, was the complete and utter annihilation of their opponent.

they expected that in turn. cultural misunderstanding is not a one-way road. their mindset was that to lose meant everyone was going to be slaughtered or imprisoned, because that was the lens through which the japanese viewed war. it explains a lot of their actions in nanking and southeast asia. to be conquered was weak. to surrender was unconscionable. many preferred the blinding light of death rather than the dishonor of surrender. it was, and is, a fundamental part of the japanese cultural character.

and they expected nothing less from their opponents. for that island to face an massive invasion would've been hell.

that's one of the reasons the bombs worked as well as they did. they were awesome demonstrations of power. one bomb could suddenly do what a thousand could. the bombs rocked the japanese, because, for the first time, it was an enemy against which they could not fight. you can shoot down bombers, fire machine guns at enemy soldiers and destroy tanks. even further, you could die with honor in combat.

the bombs were a gross dishonor. there was no combat. only melting flesh and blasted buildings. and, as i've covered, the japanese valued honor above all else.

there are no real "good" ways to end a war against an implacable foe. dropping fat man and little boy, however, was the best way.

i've been to hiroshima. i've stood under the hypocenter of the blast, and seen pictures of the aftermath. it was a sobering experience that i will never, ever forget.

but in the end, as jingoistic as it might sound, dropping those bombs was better for the japanese people than a long, protacted, bloody invasion that they surely would've lost.

and in the end, the japanese were lucky it was the US that dropped the bombs. the russians would not have been so merciful. thank god for macarthur and his natural understanding of the asian character. without much of his direction, the aftermath of the war could've been the start of another.

in short, i agree that dropping the bombs in the middle of civilian city centers was immoral. but it was the most moral of choices, imo.