I wanted to re-post these two comments .................

......... because I still think they represent what we really need to understand about terrorists and/or freedom fighters.

One of the really great things about dropping the atomic bombs on Japan is that any claim to this being a terrorist act or war crime is squarely in the debatable gray area with no clear and distinctive determination for either point of view.

That actually helps deflect attention from the glaring terrorist act and war crime committed by the US when none other than Robert McNamara ordered the firebombing of Tokyo which killed an estimated 100,000 civilians.

McNamara would later admit that was actually a war crime by their own definition.

 

Historian Walter LaFeber on Truman's Soviet Policy

Let me clarify my comments by saying that the atomic bombing of Japan was not necessary. I do not claim to know what President Truman thought as he made the decision to use the bombs. Generals Eisenhower and MacArthur claimed after the bombing that they opposed it before.

The following transcript from PBS suggests that a major reason for using the atomic bombs was to intimidate the Russians. The Russians did not intimidate easily. When Staling leaned that Truman was going to use atomic bombs, he accelerated Soviet efforts to develop their own bomb.

-------

"The remark became common at those time that if, ah, somebody around Truman said, "If this thing works like we think it will, we'll certainly have the hammer on those boys." And I think "those boys", in this context, meant both the Japanese in terms of winding up the war, and the Soviet Union...

"From the time that Truman found out about the bomb from Stimson in late April of 1945, I don't think there was ever any doubt but that Truman intended to use it. The bomb had been built to use...Billions of dollars had been put in -- put into the bomb project. Truman was not going to waste that money...at the point in April and May of 1945 that Stimson said to Truman at one point, "I'm not sure if we can find a city that's still standing enough to show just exactly what the bomb can do." And Truman, according to Stimson's diary, laughed and said, yes, he understood. There wasn't a whole lot left standing in -- in Japan by May and June of 1945. But they did find several cities that hadn't been bombed extensively. Those cities -- the first city was, of course, Hiroshima. The second city, which was actually an alternative site for the August 9th bombing, was Nagasaki. Consequently, there was no question about whether or not Truman was going to use the bomb. The question was when and how and where?..

"Truman was very uncomfortable at Potsdam until apparently July 17th. He had been there several days and then that day he received news that the atomic device that had been exploded in New Mexico had worked and that he was going to have an atomic bomb to use in several weeks on the Japanese. Stimson, who was at Potsdam with Truman, immediately recorded in his diary that President appeared to be "all pepped up". And Churchill later said that Truman, once he heard the news that the atomic bomb worked, was, quote, "a changed man". It was quite clear to Truman now that he had, as he would later say, "an ace in the hole and an ace showing." That is to say, the ace in the hole was a atomic bomb; the ace showing was American economic and military power. And he was going to use these and he was going to use them particularly for two things that he wanted out of Stalin at Potsdam."

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/truman/filmmore/it_2.html

 

Oh fuck....Stumbler.....and DL


here we go again then?


can't you just both keep it shortish and succinct?

 

I was wondering if we can pick the terrorists from the freedom fighters in this scene.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=508_1266295805

 

Terrorist failure of fake.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcKEG0ZOTu0

 

Well done. You understand basic genetics. What the fuck has that got to do with moral justification for anything?

 

Your attempted 'whatever you want to call it' does not take away the fact that questions already asked of you in this thread remain unanswered.

However.....I know what I'D call it.

Do you want me to spell it out?

 

Both must have file after file ready for cut and paste.

 

probably...... or just google........

 

wait for dl to deny it

 

I won't hold my breath!!

 

Next time I would find a better source than LaFeber, the guy is subjective and not objective, lots of speculation and nothing to back it up with.

 

Amd what if one of the Germans that was killed would have gone on to cure cancer? It's just as fatuous an argument.

 

One should not expect the objectivity in politics and history one can get in the natural sciences. The impression I got from reading the transcript of Walter LaFeber's interview is that President Truman was not at all troubled by the prospect of using the atomic bomb on Japanese civilians. He was pleased with his power, and had the attitude of a boy with a new toy. There is no indication that Truman considered any alternative to using the bomb.

Nor is there any indication that he had any doubts afterward. I would like to know what he thought of the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, after it was published.

I wish the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey was better known in the United States. Most Americans think the atomic bombing of Japan was necessary to end the war. That belief feeds American militarism and the desire to maintain an expensive defense establishment.

 

Nice kid eh?

Ok......One I can just about understand......atomic bombs I mean...which at the time was a swift smack around the mouth.......and quite effective.....

but twice......to kick a man whilst he was down?

What was he trying to prove?

 

The Russians thought he was trying to intimidate them. Instead of being intimidated, they accelerated work on their own bomb project, and tightened their grip on Eastern Europe.

After the Second World War a certain amount of tension between the United States and the Soviet Union was probably inevitable. I do believe that the United States could have acted unilaterally to reduce the level of animosity.

First, the atomic bombs should not have been dropped on Japan. Second, the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe should have been seen as an understandable response to two devastating invasions through those countries in thirty years, and not as a preparation for an invasion of the West. Third, the United States should never have gotten into the business of protecting right wing dictatorships against left wing insurgency movements.

 

I think that they were saying with the second one.

OK this is it, the end, we will just nuke you out of existance if you don't give up.

I worked for an old guy that had been a Japanese POW he believed that the bomb saved his life and had a huge painting of the Enola Gay on his wall.

 

I'm not absolutely sure that it's true......but some say the Japenese had already given up before the FIRST one was dropped.

I had a teacher at school.....a Mr. Hill...who used to take us for swimming lessons when I was about 12 or 13

The scars on his back were a nightmare. He gained those scars in a Jap POW camp..... but he used to say that whatever the Japenese did .....they never deserved what they got.

 

I disagree. Your author does not understand that the target is not the point. What is the point is the intent of the attack. A terror attack is conducted with the goal of creating fear in the populace. Terror is a tactic. The 9/11 attacks were militarily insignificant. They were conducted solely to scare the American people into changing the course their government was taking to one the islamists approved. Guerilla attacks against military objectives, even if civilians may be killed, are not conducted to instill fear. They are conducted to tie up, distract, and disturb military operations by one's larger and better equipped military opponent. The Viet Cong used both tactics, attacking civilians to induce fear, and conducting guerilla ops against military targets to blunt the vastly superior US capabilities. The Islamists didn't begin guerilla tactics until the end of the Iraq invasion and the fall of the Taliban's regular forces. They continue to use the terror tactic against the israelis (with no result). They have tried to mount terror attacks in the US (without sucess). They've been running guerilla ops against US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. They gave up using terror against their own people when the people rose against them.

Terror attacks are conducted to induce fear. Guerilla attacks are conducted to fight a larger military organization on ones own terms. Both are tactics, applied by some state and some non-state actors to meet their political goals. As the old saying goes (Clausewitz, IIRC) war is the continuation of politics by other means.

So what's a terrorist? A fighter who uses terror as a tactic. What's a freedom fighter? A fighter who used terrorist or guerilla tactics, and won. As our founding fathers knew, the only excuse for a revolution is if you win.

 

Oh.......that's just fucking great!!

Can you see any solution behind that idea?

Incidentally.......What would the solution be?