How am I out of touch? Why did Japanese atrocities require the use of atomic bombs on civilian populations after Japan had been defeated?

 

No it isn't ridiculous. I grew up with the belief that the United States has always been morally right. That illusion was fostered by the way I was taught to think about the Second World War. It lead over a million young men to go to Vietnam to kill and die for an immoral cause.

President Harry S. Truman provoked the Cold War by unnecessarily dropping two atomic bombs on Japan If more Americans had known that in 2002 and 2003, fewer would have supported the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

Gen. MacArthur needlessly prolonged the Korean War, and risked a much larger war. That is a topic for another thread.

When he advocated the use of the atomic bomb on Communist China, Communist China had not been defeated. When he opposed the use of the atomic bomb on Japan, Japan had been defeated. That is the difference.

 

They had not been defeated. The surrender of Japan came only after the bombs. You can project all you want, but that fact cannot be debated.

Now the debate centers on when Japan would have surrendered and at what cost in lives would that delay have caused, if the bombs were not used. In the month prior the bombing, over 3,000 Allied troops were killed, the number of civilians killed by the Japanese in that period varies according to the source of the information, between 10,000 and 100,000 are the numbers that I found. Taking the lowest number and using your most optimistic link estimate that the war would have lasted three more months, the death toll could have been as little as 39,000 additional deaths of civilian and Allied troops.

What I have read on the subject, seems to indicate that the war would have lasted into 1946 and that the invasion of the Japanese mainland would have cost over 20,000 Allied deaths and 500,000 to 1,000,000 more Japanese casualties.

In either case the use of the a-bombs seems completely justified. If you read the summary that you posted, you will see that our intelligence on the locations of military installations was solely dependent on prewar information. Information that was flawed by presuming that Hiroshima had an extensive military presence.

 

Purely your opinion, you use obscure literature to come up with the most bizarre conclusions. And then present them as factual.

One crystal clear fact is that you have a profound hatred for the US, one which you have openly confirmed. It is quite obvious to me, that you will use whatever bits and pieces of information gathered from others in an attempt to justify this growing dislike for your country,

Go for it, just don't be upset if you get engaged by folks who see through your agenda.

 

In the meantime on topic, it has been strangely quiet on the issue for the last few days.

How come?

 

Here's yesterday's news...

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/704271

 

I have quoted the United States Strategic Bombing Survey, an obituary of Harry Truman that appeared in The New York Times, Mandate For Change, by Dwight Eisenhower, The Pathology of Power, by Norman Cousins, and From Hiroshima to Glasnost, by Paul Nitzie. That is not obscure literature.

My conclusions are that the atomic bombing of Japan was not necessary, that President Truman either knew that or should have, and that he went ahead with the bombing in order to intimidate the Soviet Union. I have substantiated those conclusions with facts that I have documented. There is nothing bizarre about them at all tenguy.

What is bizarre is your inability to argue rationally.

 

The way I feel about the United States is irrelevant. What matters is that I have presented conclusions logically drawn from facts that I have documented. You have responded with tired old clichés, embarrassing appeals to emotion, and personal invective.

Any, objective, competent debate judge would award this contest to me. It has hardly even been a contest.

 

America may well become more unstable with the current economic decline. They have already shown themselves to think they are "above any moral code of conduct". The president they have in power now appears to be level headed, at least in this early stage of his presidency but his term of stewardship will not last forever. After that, who know what the next president will be like. Perhaps he will be yet another war monger, and won't be satisfied until he's unleashed their nuclear arsenal on a.n.other government who won't bow to his command.

Those countries who have their own personal stock of nuclear armaments cannot morally call for a ban of such arms from other countries. The undefended countries then become sitting targets for the superpowers. We have seen this already in Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

hiding behind the American flag

Samuel Johnson who authored an excellent condemnation of the American Revolution that one can find here:
https://www.samueljohnson.com/tnt.html
is famed for saying, "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel."

A quote I discovered myself by reading Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Rebolution in France is, “To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely.”

Those who hide behind the American flag have reason to hide.

 

On topic, the latest from Congress, getting the new sanctions all lined up.

http://www.examiner.com/a-2249488~Congress_readies_Iran_sanctions_if_diplomacy_fails.html

 

Why does everyone think Bush II is proof that America is trigger happy with its nuclear arsenal? Afghanistan was a provoked response to the 9/11 attacks, which pretty much everyone agrees on. As for Iraq, why does everyone forget that we'd already been occupying the country for more than 10 years before the 2003 operation? Admittedly, the 2003 operations were weak on intelligence and a major let down on expectations, but Bush was just the sad third act to something that had started long before him/ Hell, even Clinton tossed a few missiles at Saddam when he felt it was warranted.

"Above any moral conduct"? Why? Because we didn't bow down to the whims of the UN, the same UN which was deep in the middle of the Oil for Food scandal at that point? Gee, I wonder why they were so against us going in, while the people who were there with us were also ready to get the damn thing over with! I ask, would we still have the moral authority you claim we abuse if we simply continued to fly planes back and forth waiting for suicidal SAM operators to take pot shots?

Here's another question, considering you're worried about morality. When was the last time you saw an American president stand up and declare that the best documented case of attempted genocide had never happened, and that an entire country needed to be wiped off the map?

And yes, we have nukes; we've also done most of the testing, know most of the side effects, and know just what sort of Devil's Own weapon we're sitting on. Mind you, no one questioned use having them 20 years ago when it looked like the USSR might still just roll right over Western Europe, but now apparently we're a threat because disagree with the new madmen who have taken the stage. Funny, that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northern_Watch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Southern_Watch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Desert_Fox

 

Good post, quite rational, thanks for posting it.

Now the "other" side can step in and scream slogans.

 

i have never been among the US haters but I do find some of the recent us actions a little worrying but the above point is well made there is a political oposition in the EU lead bt france that would not have existed during the cold war