The city of Hiroshima was bombed 59 years ago today. U.S. has a dubious honor of being the first (and only) nation to use a nuclear weapon against an enemy. As we all know, close to 140,000 people, overwhelming majority of them civilians, died as a result of the bombing.

What are your thoughts on the event? Do you think it's one of the largest war crimes in history? Do you think it was necessary because it brought the war to an end? Do you think it was just because of Pearl Harbor? Please share your thoughts.

Not having lived through WWII, I can only go by what I hear and read. Personally, I am horrified that this country nuked two Japanese cities. Truman’s assertion that the bomb actually “saved lives” in the long run seems to me at this point in time to be fine military strategy, but poor moral strategy. It is my belief that the horrible decision to drop an atomic bomb was based on fear: fear that Germany would develop the bomb first, and fear that Japan would never capitulate. In the 40’s, fear is what drove this country to using a weapon that, as far as I’m concerned, never should have been used.

In turn, this fear continued to poison the entire world for the next half century. Everyone lived in fear of total annihilation. This fear drove the cold war, and forever changed world politics...

And we continue to live in fear.

Albert Einstein summed it up nicely.

People (governments) were aware of the potential long before the US ever dropped them. It would have been discovered and I think using it made everyone understand how much power it had and prevented it from falling into the wrong hands.

The biggest war crimes were carried out by the Japanese and Germans and in Japan these war crimes were supported by a majority of the people who had been bred to murder and eradicate the Chinese.

Everyone lived in fear because they had an example of the the bombs capabilities. Imagine if the US never dropped and people upgraded it to a hydrogen bomb and then tested it to see its magnitude. By using the weopen I think the US has prevented it from being used again. If know one was aware of the damage it would create then what would stop them from using it themselves?

The ends certainly justified the means I think. Look at Japan today.

Japan had a fighting spirit that almost couldnt be stopped. They were fanatics. Even after we dropped two and threatened more the Japanese launched a coup to stop the surrender. There were Japanese hiding in caves in the islands until the 50's and 60's refusing surrender. They had too much resolve and they had to be stopped at any cost.

The allied fire bombing of dresden, the British starvation blockade on Germany in WWI, the conferderates murdering of black soldiers in the American civil war, the Japanese invasion/massacre of mainland China, the British Boar war concentration camps, what the Vietmanese and Americans did to each other in nam, the abuses of Abu Graibe, the Russian treatment of German soldiers surrendered at Stalingrad these are much worse war crimes.

I voted "too complex to be painted in black and white".

The whole of WWII is a very complex subject in this regard. The Germans and the Japanese did some horrible things and in the light of revisionist history I guess it could be said that dropping the bomb on Japan was a horrible thing as well.

I don't think you can look at it like that though, you really have to look at it as if it was your decision to make at the time and not with the benefit of all of the history since then.

So, from that perspective - We were in a two front war at the time that had been very costly thus far but we were making good progress and getting close to winning. Things were a little bit different in the Pacific Theater than they were in the European Theater.

Towards the end of the war it became very clear that the Germans really didn't have the spirit left to fight and they were beaten, there were a lot of surrenders. The Japanese on the other hand were still fighting to the very last man for every island, atoll and scrap of land that they defended. Even in when wounded their pilots didn't give up, they would try and inflict damage upon US ships. This kind of fighting was really unprecidented and a ton of US lives were lost. There have been stories of people finding Japanese soldiers on remote islands 15 to 20 years later and they were still hostile because they didn't know the war was over.

At the time the leaders of our country knew that the only way the Japanese would surrender was if we marched into Tokyo and killed every last soldier. Given the losses in Iwo Jima and some other battles, our military leaders knew that the assault on Japan itself would be a very bloody affair indeed.

So, in a sense, yes dropping the bombs saved a lot more lives than would have potentially be lost and it also shortened the war and allowed the healing process to start. The decision itself to kill that many civilians was a moral quagmire at best and I don't envy the president for having to make that call. Personally I think that one bomb would have done the trick, but that's just me.

Maybe some amount of separation between the first bomb and the second bomb should be made. It can be argued that while the first bomb saved lives ultimately, the second bomb was simply a show of force, although, some historical accounts place it as an accident due to a misunderstanding on whether the Japanese had already surrenedered or not.

This is a fine post, DaffyGrl.

So few of us (myself included) on this forum were even alive when this brand-new type of destruction was dropped on mainly Japanese women, children and elderly civilians. Truman had said according to one newspaper article that it was not dropped on civilians. Oops, his bad; oh well, that was his intention. It's good intentions and not good deeds that matter anyway, right?

Madam, we killed your family and all of your friends, but look what we've done for Japan in the last 59 years. That should make it all better. How do you say "It sucks" in Japanese?

Many claim that America had some kind of moral mandate to be the first to drop the most devastating weapons of mass destruction. Pardon my skepticism. Since then the whole world seems to be occupied with building these monsters so they are not attacked by others who possess them. Except the United States--our President is having them developed not as a deterrent but for battlefield use.

So feel secure in our American moral superiority if you choose to, and rationalize these actions if you can. Like it or not, should we use these weapons again, you will be inhaling the nuclear radiation and drinking it in your milk (Strontium-90 replaces calcium in milk), regardless of where in the world the bomb is dropped.

After all, we wouldn't impose on citizens of the world what we wouldn't want for ourselves, would we?

I realize in some people's eyes this may not serve as justification, but I am a fairly strong believer in the idea that if Hiroshima and Nagasaki (the 2nd is admittedly more suspect) had not happened, a far greater horror might have taken place later on.

We came dangerously close to WW3 with the Bay of Pigs. The level of destruction that would have taken place twenty years later would have dwarfed what happened at Hiroshima and likely annihilated most life on two continents. I believe the memory of that devastation is what allowed cooler heads to prevail.

In the following decades the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) solely rested on these memories for success in preventing a nuclear war.

Does such insanity justify what took place 59 years ago? Maybe not. I certainly would not want to be the one to explain my theory to a family member who lost someone in that attack. At the same time I can't deny its effect on history these near 60 years.

If there were a Sliders episode with an alternate universe because Truman hadn't made that decision, it scares me to think of what the world would be like. It gnaws at my conscience to think that, but I can't deny the belief.

Doc

I voted it was a war crime. The way I see it is even if you feel it was necessary to drop those bombs to end the war and chalk it up to a necessary evil...it was still evil. It's not like we didn't know there would be heavy civilian casualties, we just weren't concerned enough to let us stop us.

Also I am becoming more and more wary of the reasoning we bombed Japan is because it would save lives in an invasion, or at least the number of lives they were claiming. We were bombing japan already, they had no real airforce to contend with us. With us having such air superiority I doubt we would have taken close to the casualties that people use to justify the bombing. Add to that I have read in a couple of books ideas that suggest the reason it was so necessary to gain immediate surrender of war was because Russia was planning to declare war on Japan,(which it did 2 days after Hiroshima), and we were unwilling to allow Japan to surrender to them. Whish to me falls right in line with how both russia and the U.S cared less about any other people in our "Cold War" maneuvering. One could say Japanese civilians were simply the first of millions casualties of the Cold War.

I agree with your point of view Doclotus. One of the classes I teach is American Military History. In all of my readings and research, I have never come across a credible dissenting viewpoint from the assertion at the time that nearly the entire Japanese population would be rallied to fight (suicidally) on the beaches to meet our invasion, Operations Olympic and Coronet.
From a strictly selfish angle, my grandfather was in the Navy, taking part in the assaults on Iwo Jima and Okinawa. If he had been a casualty due to the necessity of an amphibious invasion, where would that leave me? Or my children? It may sound cold and heartless, but I'm not willing to trade my life for a different account of events on that day. And I'm willing to bet the thousands and thousands of descendents of our military that would have been in the invasion, would say the same.

As far as the outcome of world events if we hadn't dropped the bomb? One has to delve into the realm of alternate histories to answer that, but I can easily envision a far worse outcome had the Soviet Union invented and/or used the bomb and we hadn't. But that's just my opinion.

From this link.



More civilians were killed in traditional warfare at Okinawa.

On March 10, 1945 an incendiary raid over Tokyo killed over 100,000 civilians. An invasion of Japan would have led to the deaths of millions. This was a case where shock and awe worked for the benefit of all. Except the citizens of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. War is hell.

There's a big difference - your grandfather was in the Navy; the civilians killed in Hiroshima were not part of the military. One can find any justification for Hiroshima bombing (such as "the entire population would have rallied to fight our troops", etc.) but the truth is that Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombing fits the very definiton of a war crime as defined by the international lawyers:

In other words, it is illegal to kill civilians in order to avoid potential losses of soldiers.

Another definition of a war crime can be found here:


There were many ways to avoid such horrendous casualties. We could have bombed a smaller town first if the purpose was just to display the military might, not the city with the population of 250,000. But the real question is, how much U.S. wanted to avoid the repeat of May 1945 when Russians conquered Berlin first? Soviet Union announced a war against Japan only days before Hiroshima bombing. Instead of letting Russians to repear themselves and occupy Tokyo, we decided that we'll take victory by any price. And we sure did.

Both of my grandfathers served during WWII. One of them started the war in 1941, was wounded several times, went from leutenant to a artillery colonel, was awarded several medals, and finished his duty all the way in Koenigsberg (now Kaliningrad). He told me that when bombers were flying overhead going to bomb German towns, he didn't think about casualties - the only good German for him was a dead one. However, things comitted by Russian soldiers do bother him now, and I know that.

I think there is one fairly big problem with that assertion English Horn. You are trying to judge the decision of bombing a large city with the benefit of 60 years of history.

At the time, it was widely understood that the Japanese were not going to simply lay down and surrender. To win the war our military firmly believed we'd have to kill every last one of them in a beach invasion of Japan.

Could we have bombed some small village? Sure we could have. But I think that Truman and the military leaders of the United States thought the only way to make a decisive impact was to bomb a large city. Given what they knew it seemed like the right decision then. Given what we know now it may still have been the right decision (for the reasons Doclotus stated), but the second bomb was probably not necessary.

Yes. Truman's military analysts had predicted at least 1 million dead allied soldiers just to take Japan, and a nuke was necessary to end the war.

I attended Mass today, and I was grateful that those who died in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and their families were included in the prayers.

I just pray that America's current leadership never considers it expedient to use nuclear devices to take so many innocent lives in the interest of saving lives.

There's got to be a better way to achieve peace.

I am sure that Truman's military analysts knew the difference between civilians and armed soldiers. The difference between them is the difference between combat operations and a war crime.
I just hope that "what goes around comes around" proverb will prove false and we will never be on the receiving end of such military decisions.

So what would have happened if Japan didn't surrender after Nagasaki? Would we then bombed Kyoto, Tokyo, Yokohama, Osaka, as long as we had enough uranium?

It is all too easy to condemn and criticize the decision to use the Bomb in today's environment - secure from the harsh realities of 1945. With the experience of D-Day in Europe and the increasingly ferocious resistance the Japanese offered the closer we came to their home islands - taken in the context of public war-weariness and perceptions of disproportionate US casualty rates to those of our allies - attempting to bring a rapid end to the War by dropping the Bomb rather than launch a massive amphibious assault of the Japanese home islands was a logical decision for the President.

The plan for Operation Olympic called for 14 divisions of soldiers and Marines to land on Kyushu - the southernmost Japanese island - on 1 November 1945. A second invasion was planned for 1 March 1946 - Operation Coronet - which would land at least 22 divisions to face approximately 1 million Japanese defenders on the main island of Honshu and the Tokyo Plain. With the exception of a part of the British Pacific Fleet, this was to be an entirely US operation. It would employ the entire Marine Corps, the entire Pacific Navy, and elements of the 8th Army Air Force, the 8th Air Force (recently redeployed from Europe), the 20th Air Force and the American Far Eastern Air Force. More than 1.5 million combat soldiers, with 3 million more in support - more than 40% of all servicemen still in uniform in 1945 - would be directly involved in the two operations.

The intel estimates of July 1945 made the planners of Operation Olympic very nervous. Intel warned that the build-up of Japanese forces in southern Kyushu had reduced the US attack force ratio of 3:1 to 1:1. In hindsight, we now know that the Japanese by this time had surpassed the 1:1 ratio and actually outnumbered the planned American invasion force. In July 1945, US intel estimates were underestimating Japanese strength on Kyushu by about 36%.

Some historians use the casualty estimate that was briefed to Truman in June 1945 to claim that the projected casualty rate of 25,000 US KIA did not justify the use of the atomic bomb. However, those casualty estimates were based on an April 1945 estimate of Japanese force strength of around 229,000. By July 1945, that force had almost tripled to 657,000. With this ground force supported by the special attack forces, and further supplemented by a civilian populace that had been thoroughly mobilized for defense of the homeland, it is easy to reach a total casualty figure of close to 500,000 US KIA.

This is the number used by Truman in his diary to justify the use of the Bomb. In addition to US casualties, the Japanese on Kyushu would probably have suffered upwards of 2,000,000 military and civilian casualties. The projected figures for Japanese casualties on Kyushu far exceed the casualties inflicted by the Bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Should the Japanese still have not surrendered and Operation Coronet been launched, the invasion of Honshu would have resulted in truly horrific Japanese casualty numbers.

By 1 August 1945, almost all of the Japanese forces that were to defend Kyushu were in place. Had we not dropped the Bombs, as the 1 November invasion date approached, recon flights would have increased and, with Japanese forces remaining static, the aerial imagery would have given us a much clearer picture as to their true strength on the ground. Also, SIGINT intercept analysts would have had more traffic to work with from which to identify the Japanese units on Kyushu. By October, our forces would probably have identified the majority of Japanese units in Kyushu and correctly assessed their defensive preparations and capabilities. This would have necessitated significant changes to the existing plan: either the postponement of Operations Olympic and Coronet, a massive increase in the size of the invasion forces - causing a lengthy delay in the final push of the war, or, quite likely have had the same end result and forced Truman to approve the use of the Bomb to end the War.

Edit: English Horn, the Fourth Geneva Convention was adopted on 12 August 1949, after the fact. They were adopted in large part to enshrine in international law restrictions upon warfare that would, nations hoped, avoid a repeat of some of the worst horrors of WWII - in which civilians suffered tremendously.

I keep reading the same tired refrain that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were civilian targets. That is pure *** NOTICE: THIS WORD IS AGAINST THE RULES. FAILURE TO REMOVE IT WILL RESULT IN A STRIKE. ***, in Hiroshima was the Japanese Army 5th Division, plus the Chugoku Regional Army Headquarters, surely a military target if there ever was one. Plus it was 2nd only to Kyoto in production of military equipment. Nagasaki produced 25% of the Japanese Naval Ships and fully half of their merchant ships. Since when do combat divisions, Army Headquarters and Naval construction yards constitute 'civilian' targets?

Japan had a very active nuclear weapons program, though not as advanced as the US. The head of that program stated that if they had developed the bomb first they certainly would have used it.

The Japanese Army had developed biological and chemicals weapons, tested on Allied POWs and used them against Chinese civilians. They intended to unlease these weapons against American cities.

It is not a case of the 'ends justifying the means'. It is a case of those were legitimate military targets, and the Japanese should not have started a war with the United States.

Mustang and others,

The estimates are unimportant. That's why the title of this debate seems essential. Let's pretend that there is no Monday morning quarterbacking going on and here in front of you is the estimate that still claims 1 million allied forces will die if you invade Japan. Does the idea that 1 million soldiers may die justify the killing of 100,000 to 200,000 civilians(depending if you want to take the low or high numbers). As English Horn submits...

[QUOTE]I am sure that Truman's military analysts knew the difference between civilians and armed soldiers.[/QUOTE]

As I look at this poll, I am surprised by the results. Or maybe not.... First and foremost it was a war crime to intentionally bomb a city like we did. After that one can argue whether it was necessary to do such a war crime, but please acknowledge it was a war crime even if you believe it saved lives.

I just read this quote by Mark Twain, I'd like to share it

[QUOTE]"There has never been a just one, never an honorable one -- on the part of the instigator of the war. I can see a million years ahead, and this rule will never change in so many as half a dozen instances. The loud little handful -- as usual -- will shout for the war. The pulpit will -- warily and cautiously -- object -- at first; the great, big, dull bulk of the nation will rub its sleepy eyes and try to make out why there should be a war, and will say, earnestly and indignantly, "It is unjust and dishonorable, and there is no necessity for it." Then the handful will shout louder. A few fair men on the other side will argue and reason against the war with speech and pen, and at first will have a hearing and be applauded; but it will not last long; those others will outshout them, and presently the anti-war audiences will thin out and lose popularity. Before long you will see this curious thing: the speakers stoned from the platform, and free speech strangled by hordes of furious men who in their secret hearts are still at one with those stoned speakers -- as earlier -- but do not dare to say so. And now the whole nation -- pulpit and all -- will take up the war-cry, and shout itself hoarse, and mob any honest man who ventures to open his mouth; and presently such mouths will cease to open. Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception."[/QUOTE] (Please feel free to use this quote for current day events, because it applies so aptly ... or maybe someone has already)

At any rate the fact that people can use so many things that the Truman administration put forth to appease themselves and justify such an action we took, to mean means anything can be justified. Of course, in truth, I already knew any and everything can be justified... it all depends whose getting hurt and who's doing the hurting.

I watched a BBC program on North Korea the other day. They still get taught daily that America is the cause of all their problems. Propaganda is fed into their homes on a speaker that can be turned down, but not off. They have one TV channel during the week, 2 more on weekends. A lot of the program showed the lives of 2 girls training in mass gymnastics, the purpose of which was to perform in celebrations of their "dear general" (the son) and their leader for eternity (his deceased father). There is a lot more that I could say about this program, but it made me think that GWB would be a complete idiot to attack North Korea. They are very likely far worse than the population of Japan was during WWII.
Their lives (Japanese and Korean) revolve around serving their country and their leader, and would likely die to the last man, woman, and child big enough to carry a weapon.
North Korea is a country we can leave alone, as long as they stay at home.
The Japanese did not stay home, and had to be stopped.
I voted that it was justified.

We can not use "they attacked us first" .... let's imagine for a minute that Saddam DID possess WMD and had the means to deliver them to USA... I am sure the fact that "we attacked him first" would not justify him using his weapons on targets like San Diego (which has a significant military importance) or San Antonio.

As droop224 correctly pointed out, you may believe that committing a war crime was necessary to save lives in a long run (I have to read some more information myself to firmly formulate my own opinion); however it still doesn't change the fact that a war crime was committed. A while ago there was a thread about torture and people discussed whether it's appropriate to use torture in extraordinary circumstances, e.g. when tens of thousands of lives are at risk. Some people said yes, some people said no, but nobody said that because of extraordinary circumstances a torture stops being a torture.

I'm not real sure of the point of this thread. OK, it was a war crime, everybody happy?

Do I think the ends justified the means, with information and intelligence we had at the time? Yes, absolutely.
Droop, the estimates are unimportant to you, because they don't fit into your argument, but they are the essential reason that the bomb was dropped. Would I trade those 100,000 civilian lives for a million military, if it had to be an either/or scenario, without the benefit of hindsight? Yes, absolutely. Please find me a descendent of any of those million casualties would would say different. Anyone on this board willing to lay down their life, if the bombing would be erased from history, with a million casualties?
The argument is getting circular here.

Truman knew that Russians were just about to enter the war with Japan (significant number of troops were deplored near Manjurian border). Why didn't U.S. wait and let Russians do half of the work?

As for military casualties, here is a good link which provides the total number of deaths by country during WWII. You may find out that U.S. losses (in proportion to the population) were significantly smaller than of many other countries.

I think Truman was using Russia's involvement as a backup plan. Certainly we didn't want their troops occupying Japan. Look at the problems we had with a divided Germany. And there may have been some political profit in having them close enough to witness the power of our new WMD.

Actually I don't think the argument is circular at all. You seemed to sum it up exactly

After hearing that from you...
What confuses me is you saying that "it is unimportant to me", part. I wasn't saying it from an ethical standpoint, but from a factual. If I go back in time (which we all agree is impossible) put a gun to baby Adolph Hitler's head and blow it off, it doesn't make me any less a child murderer. We could argue whether it was justified or morally the right thing to do, but the number of people that would die at the hands of Hitler would be unimportant to the issue of whether I was or was not a child murderer. Same goes for when I am speaking about the unimportance of the numbers of GI that may die.
Lastly, I understand that descendants are more happy to be alive than caring about the life of some "Jap" 50 some years back. But by that logic of justification, I guess I should be thanking my lucky stars that Africans were enslaved, beaten and taken to from their homes and brought to America. Actually, I have a light-skinned complexion, maybe there is a rape I should appreciate, too.

The death toll for Japanese civilians was far worse in the incendiary bombing runs in other parts of Japan (already cited by Hugo). The civilian death toll would have been much larger had we not dropped those bombs. There is no question of that. Japan is known for its centuries of suicide tradition. Thousands of Japanese committed suicide jumping off the cliffs in Saipan when our soldiers took the island. Woman threw their children off of the cliffs and then jumped themselves rather than being taken. There is nothing to indicate the culture of the mainland would have behaved differently.

Not quite sure of your point with the death-chart, English-Horn. Yes, occupied countries will sustain more casualties than unoccupied countries. Your own chart debunks your theory that more civilian lives were lost from nuclear bombs than an invasion, BTW. Of the 350,000 dead Japanese civilians, over 200,000 were not from nukes.

Why didn't we wait for the Soviets? Because we had a Faustian relationship with them and knew they would occupy Japan and never leave. One has only to look at the ‘Stans and know the fate that awaited Japan, and our future too would have been exponentially more grim.

Your question (Would we then bombed Kyoto, Tokyo, Yokohama, Osaka, as long as we had enough uranium?) proposes a scenario where casualties could have turned catastrophic if Truman gambled on the wrong strategy. And yet you propose more civilian casualties by suggesting Russia "cull" the resistance for us, and we finish the job by taking care of depleted, but stubborn Japanese fighters and Russians simultaneously. If you don't appreciate how using the bomb saved lives on all sides it's not surprising you'd propose an approach that would likely result in more deaths so we wouldn't be the world's only country that used the bomb.

I appreciate the irony of the U.S. leveling WMD accusations against Iraq with the "smoking gun" hoopla, but this is a different time, with a helluva different president.

To Mrs. Pigpen, Bill55AZ and others,

I don't know the historical accuracy of the facts in the article from "Institute for Historical Review", but the have the following line there:

So glad I could brighten your day, unless you're being as sarcastic as I was.
Your post sums up the circular-ness of my point. You want to bring up ethical dilemmas of the past and compare casualties, but you appoint a higher worth to civilians than you do military. That for me is just as offensive as your interpretation of the logic you cite is to you.
All credible facts point to the conclusion that more lives were saved by using the bomb than not. Until I see anything that disproves that, I'm remain convinced.

English Horn


They have published several articles 'not quite in so many words' denying the holocaust.
After further reading, I need to amend the last statement, the do say it in so many words.

I understand that when facts emerge that change your lifelong perception of certain events the denial is the most obvious reaction , but still... seems like the articles and memos mentioned in the IHR article are real, and if you do search on Google they appear in many other sources. So why dismiss something outright?

No, that's exactly what I don't want to do. I don't want to make this ethical. If I was speaking ethically I would be saying, "ethically, all war is a crime by the nature of war"
Also, from a practical standpoint, I don't really put the lives of civilians above that of the military. But I understand that we live in a world that does. Have you ever notice when people kill civilian non combatants it is called terrorism, but when people kill combatants it is called war. I didn't make the rules of war, I personally find them absurd. But if the rules state that:

and we violate such rules, what do you want me to do??? Pretend that we didn't...throw out all the possible lives on both sides of the equation to minimize the breaking of that rule?? What is your suggestion to my dilemma?
I don't want to put forth a circular argument DTOM. I want to say if x is a war crime and America committed x then America committed war crimes.

So try not to be so offended, it's not like your the only one with interests in connection with the military.

As already mentioned by Mustang, that convention was adopted in 1949, after the fact. Mustard gas was used in WWI. It wasn't a war crime. In WWII it would have been. Sorry to hear you find rules of warfare arbitrary and absurd.

I'm not sure what you are trying to say here, are you a holocaust denier yourself? Ahh, but that's for another thread.......


That line made me giggle, as it is soooo appropriate in so many other threads, but probably not to your liking.
In the absence of enough time to pore through all of the data on that site, one looks for credibility indicators. It didn't take me long. I'm not dismissing the article outright, since you will notice, I didn't say that. But in the time I spent on your link, it would cause me to view it with some level of skepticism.


Thank you ever so much Droop, clearly I thought I was. You've changed me, hallelujah!!!

Obviously it's your choice to accept or not the position presented in the article. Gar Alperovitz, the historian quoted in the article seems like a well-respected fellow and his book "The decision to use the Atomic Bomb" was named a "Distinguished Finalist" for the Lionel Gelber Prize.

IHR itself seems like a fairly respectable organization. This is not some college sophomore with anti-war leanings musing on the subject. At the very least their article deserves a thorough read-through... the conclusions that you make is, of course, up to you.

P.S. Yes, and by the way - that's how Dwight Eisenhower felt about the bombing:

There is a problem with Mark Weber's account, EH.

He fails to mention the mokusatsu misunderstanding and through it the importance of communication. Mokusatsu (generally) has two meanings: ignore or refrain from comment. Truman decided the Japanese meant to ignore the ultimatum.

What the Japanese actually meant is entirely up for debate. Truman's interpretation of events, is not.



If anything I think it shows intelligence can keep you out of a war, but it cannot produce evidence that justifies starting a war.

The invasions of the previous Jap islands were seen as some of the most difficult battles in U.S. history. Each Jap fighting to the very last man. The loss of life on both sides was 10X than expected. And now, loosing thousands of men, and estimates of 1million lives on the U.S. side alone if invasion is the our chosen action, you call this a warcrime?

No, Truman saved american lives, and Jap lives, and was one of the most important things of his presidency.

It occurs to me that those opposed to the use of nukes do so while living in a vacuum. First, WWII was not an event which occured alone. It preceded the bloodiest war in world history. Many of the players from the first war, survived to see the second. On the horizon appeared to be the opening for a third if Russia wasn't contained. Yes, we did use the bomb, in part, to prevent Russia from laying a claim to a Japanese concessions. I also think it is silly to accuse an American president for thinking of American lives above all others as though that were a particular brand of evil. Isn't that the American president's job? The question was whether the ends justified the means. It would seem the answer, so far, is yes. The doomsday scenario painted by the anti nuke crowd has not come to fruition. The years following WWII, while Russia and the U.S. acted in a bi-hegemonious world, created 50 years of relative peace. The threat of nuclear deterence has been used to stabilize the world in manner never before witnessed. There are people who think war is always evil and unneccesary. Let them think what they have the luxury to believe.

Well, the issue was raised whether it was necessary to bomb them "to save lives" since Japanese were about to surrender anyway; you can agree or disagree with the author of the article, but he quotes historians saying that bombing, in fact, achieved nothing. Even the link which was kindly provided by Lesly indicates that Japanese replied to the Potsdam Ultimatum in a way which at the very least warranted a behind-the-scenes follow-up.
Also I think it's a mistake to judge every historic event with the benefit of 60 years of history. As a sort of extreme example I'd like to point out that the State of Israel would probably not exist without the Holocaust - it doesn't mean that Holocaust was justified in any way, does it? Same from 9/11 - we don't care if the events on that day may eventually bring peace to the Middle East, democratic Iraq, etc. - we still consider them the largest terrorist attacks on U.S. soil and the day will forever be remembered as a tragedy without justification... We need to take historical events for what they were on that day.

I think the first bombing had to be done but they should have been given more than 2 days before we dropped the 2nd bomb. I think that fact that it was done has revenge written on it.

I find this issue to be exactly in line with the dilemma America still faces today--decisions made which might take many factors into account are open to criticism from many sides, most of whom assume the decision made was done out of selfish reasons.

Regardless of many other stated motives, Truman was faced with a couple of statements which most agreed with. First, the invasion of Japan, given the history of all other islands which we had retaken, was widely expected to be very bloody--with approximately a million US casualties, and many more on the Japanese side. So, while 140,000 people, all Japanese, did die in the attacks, it is, at worst, difficult to judge the morality of the act, whereas at best it saved millions of lives on both sides. When you consider the potential impact it may have also had on Soviet interests--who knows how many millions more might have been saved?

As I have stated in several other threads (to get directly to the topic), I don't think you can avoid the ends vs. the means approach to international relations. Things are just too complex to be handled any other way. You might think it unethical to launch such an attack, on account of all the civilians killed. Using that same justification, one could also argue it would have been unethical NOT to launch the attack. Holding firm to a moral compass is simply beyond human capabilities in such situations--we can only make pragmatic decisions based on information we have, and the likely outcomes. As such, although I dislike applying the principle to individual affairs (where situations are much simpler), I don't think you can avoid it in international diplomatic issues--they are simply too complex to be dealt with any other way. A classic example of this is in imposing sanctions on governments we feel are infringing on civil rights--while this is done to avoid war (one would assume a good thing), it ends up inflicting drastic hardship on the very citizens it is supposed to be helping (in fact, one of its goals is to make citizens so desparate they will risk life and limb to engage in a revolution and replace their government). So, one could actually argue that imposing the sanctions, thereby avoiding war, is in actuality very, very cruel.

You are merging two issues into one. The first bomb was widely recognized as having saved a million or more American lives. It was widely recognized in keeping the Russians from laying claim to Japanese interests, thus allowing them to be a free society today. The second bomb may have been a misunderstanding as Truman may have misintrepreted the surrender given by the Japanese emperor. So, if you would like to say the second bombing was not needed, you are probably correct and can, therefore claim that the end did not justify the means. But, as you aptly pointed out, that you must take historical events in their context, then the second bomb and first bomb carried the same intention, namely a quick Japanese surrender which saved American lives. Within the scope of what Truman knew (or claimed to know), he succeded in saving American lives and winning the war without invading the Japanese mainland.

Just for kicks...

What do you suppose the Japanese would have done had we wired them a message saying look 100 miles off your coast at x o'clock on x date, and proceded to do an atmospheic drop of both variety of bombs?

Hello everyone!! this is my first post on here, hopefully of many to come!!

One thing I never understood is when people talk of nuclear & weapons of mass destruction falling "into the wrong hands"...who is the 'right hands'? America is the only nation ever to have used nuclear weapons, but that aside, history has shown that the US is a nation that won't hesitate to use force (and weapons of mass destruction) if 'threatened' (this seems to mean against any nation that does not agree with the criminal foreign policies that allow america to be the worlds leading superpower)...the USA is built on the foundations of the bones of the Red Indian people that were massacred during its conception, and right through to the current day Iraqi invasion, there have been many situations in which the US has used its might (e.g. Nicaragua, Vietnam, Korea etc etc) to quash any opposition. Haven't enough innocent civilians been killed by US forces around the world to raise some questions as to who the real 'Axis of Evil' is? all I'm saying is get off the moral high horse that never existed.

As for the Hiroshima thing...it is a tough one, as the world was at war and the German/Japanese were the 'bad guys'...I think it was an atrocious war crime on a level of morality & humanity, but it did end the war, so it really is a case of do the ends justify the means...someone should ask Saddam Hussein what he thinks, seeing as he used brutal murder to keep the nation at peace...

An interesting idea, that I'm sure was voiced at some point in the decision making process. However, it carried with it a significant risk. Remember, there were only the two bombs. Drop them and you lose all capability to deploy them against Japan if they didn't cave in to the implied threat. Plus, you might have raised the question of whether or not we had the will to deploy such a weapon, further defeating the purpose. Some of the same issues would apply to only using one in such a fashion--then there would only have been one to deploy. Note that Japan didn't fully surrender until after the second bomb was dropped.

It shouldn't go without observation that the same debate question could be applied to the Japanese initiation of military activities. I say this not to point blame, but just to reinforce the fact, oft stated, that 'war is hell'. In the grand scheme of things, probably nothing in war is ever 'justified'--yet wars happen nonetheless, and atrocious acts are committed during them. Unless there is strong evidence to support that any act in war was committed purely out of malicious intent (which I think is glaringly lacking here), the ends vs. the means debate in wartime is somewhat irrelevant. Any country, when engaged in war, will do whatever is within its power to ensure victory, thinking that that end would justify almost any means--otherwise, they wouldn't be fighting at all in the first place.

Ah this old gem… Forgive the length of this post, but I am a professional historian, and a few things really need to be said for this discussion to continue in an informed manner.

Ok, a few things. Firstly, before I launch into the atomic bombings, please PLEASE do not EVER quote the Institute for Historical Review. It is an extremely well known holocaust denial group trying to lend itself historical legitimacy. It has links with hate groups and neo-Nazi groups, its common speakers include notorious Holocaust denier David Irving. It posts lies and fiction and twisted half-truths to support a view of history entirely determined by a racist political agenda. To be blunt, as a Historian if I ever cited anything from that site I would be regarded the same way as a civil rights expert drawing facts from a Klan website.

Back to the issue at hand.

The most important issue to remember here is one of context. People look at the atomic bombings through the eyes of 2004 citizens of the west who lived through the cold war. To try and judge such an anachronistic event using 2004 morals and terminology (WMD?) is silly. Was the German and Allied use of WMD (chemical weapons) in the first world war a war crime?

At the time, the situation was VERY different from now. People have mentioned the fire bombings of Tokyo, they have not mentioned the fire bombings of nearly every major Japanese city on the island. The US air force incinerated between 50% and 80% of the 30 largest cities in Japan, (as high as 94% in a couple cases)and many smaller ones as well. USAF intel reports from September 1945 note that it is a good thing the war ended when it did, as the Bomber command was running out of targets. Mass bombing of cities was simply the order of the day, in Japan and in Europe. The mass 'city-buster’ raids at the end of the war in Europe were intended to annihilate German cities, to ‘de-house’ workers and civilians and cause a mass uprising against the German government. The only reason more German cities were not annihilated was because the German air force put up more of a fight until the end of 1944, and the weather over Germany was prohibitive. Still, Hamburg, Dresden, Cologne, Nuremburg, Berlin, and many other cities were destroyed from the air, creating huge firestorms where the oxygen caught fire and flames lept over a mile into the air.

Japan has no significant air force left in 1945, much better weather and cities made primarily out of wood and paper, not stone, so the USAF went at the country with a vengeance. They used tactics of mass area bombing started in 1917, and used since then by Germany, Spain, Russia, Italy, Canada, Britain, Australia, Turkey, France, the US and Japan itself since. Every nation in the world, allied and axis, accepted the bombing of cities as a part of modern warfare, and every nation that could practiced it. Britain and the US got very good at it, but Germany and Japan had had a lot of practice as well. Post-war studies would show that the effect on civilian morale was not what people expected, that in fact morale strengthened under this aerial assault, but that was not known at the time.

The ruling cabinet in the Japanese government was formed of three groups, civilians, naval and Army Officers. The civilians were divided, some wanted peace, some wanted war. There was no consensus. The Navy was disgraced, and it tended to follow the decisions of the Army. It still had a strong voice, but nowhere near as much as in 1941. Due to its performance in the latter years of the war, it no longer held a voice of power. The Army was unified in its desire for war. It held the strongest voice and had no intention of surrendering. On paper, more than 2/3 of the Japanese army was unharmed and intact in China and Manchuria. In fact the war in China was still going fairly well. While most knew that it would be impossible to win the war, Japan saw opportunities for an honourable settlement, which would allow them to keep their Chinese possessions. The plan was for a single massive attack against any US or Allied forces landing on the homeland. Japan had over 7000 aircraft stockpiled (old and obsolete aircraft mind you) for which ¾ would be given suicide assignments on US coastal fleets. The actual effect of the counter push would have had on landing US forces is of course unknown. The Japanese correctly guessed the landing spot of the US, but most of the defences would have been severely damaged by shore and naval bombardment. Previous estimates show that Kamikaze pilots had about a 5-10% hit rate. Even if you lower that considering the poor quality of the remaining Japanese pilots, that is still a potential for a lot of damage.

But there was no chance of surrender. The Japanese ambassador to Holland decided on his own initiative to try and broker a peace with the US on behalf of his government. The Japanese government, upon hearing this, cut off his status, and sentenced him to death as a traitor in absentia. A further series of pro-peace officials were arrested and imprisoned or executed in June of 1945. The Japanese refused to mention the Potsdam declaration in the Media, or discuss it in cabinet past a few dismissive comments. We know this because we have the cabinet transcripts from the Japanese government at the time.

The US on the other hand has its own problems. Morale was low, as many troops do not want to get into such a bloody conflict, and many just came from the long struggle in Europe. Worse the points system means that the most experienced NCOs in the US army all got to go home, and a critical component of US combat effectiveness was lost. The home front was tired of war and demanding a return to a civilian economy and there was even the fear that continued resistance in the East might cause problems involving renewed resistance in Europe. Casualty figures for the invasion of Japan are as high as 1 million casualties (not dead), though more realistic estimates are for about 500-600,000 casualties, meaning about 150,000 to 200,000 dead. That of course does not include the incalculable slaughter of Japanese soldiers and civilians in the maths.

So the bomb is discussed. Originally designed for use in Europe to counter a possible Nazi bomb, the possibility of deploying it against Japan comes up. Several scenarios are discussed: Use of the bomb to support a landing; use of the bomb as a bloodless demonstration of power, say over Tokyo harbour, or use of the bomb against remaining Japanese targets.

The first option is dismissed because it does not make a very good tactical weapon, and the same support could be achieved with mass conventional bombing, and without the relatively misunderstood boogeyman of radiation to contend with. The second is dismissed because the ‘demonstration’ would be limited to those who happened to be nearby and watching the flash, and the power of the bomb would not be understood simply by seeing a flash in the sky.

So the decision was taken to hit Japanese targets in the hope of forcing surrender. Interestingly, the bomb was not dropped on Tokyo for several reasons, but the main one was that Tokyo was so huge, and the centre of the city was already so gutted (the March 3-5th firebombing destroyed 26 square km in the centre of the city) that the effects of the atomic bomb would be muted. Hiroshima was chosen because of the naval academy and command stationed there, and the fact that it was one of the very few cities relatively undamaged from bombing so far in the war.

So they dropped the Bomb. The effect upon Japan was limited. There was no mention of it in the press, and no unusual activity in the cabinet on the 6th or 7th. When army representatives visited the site 24 hours later, they described it as being 'not as bad as the centre of Tokyo'. They also did not believe it was an atomic bomb. A common theory was that the US had dropped hundreds of thousands of strips of magnesium, and then ignited them all at once. Most importantly, everyone agreed that the US would not be able to duplicate this feat. There was NO talk of a surrender.

2 Days later, the forgotten even occurred, which nobody ever seems to mention for some reason. The USSR invaded Manchuria on 9 August 1945. Within 24 hours they had utterly routed much of the Japanese forces. The Red Army, huge, equipped and experienced against the Nazis, faces the Kwangtung army fielding no artillery above 75 mm, few tanks, and those tanks they had with guns no bigger than 50 mm and no modern anti tank weapons. This was a double blow, because the USSR had been the traditional route of diplomatic messages between japan and the Allies, and many regarded the USSR as a benevolent neutral.

This destruction broke the back of the Army in the Ruling cabinet, they were disgraced much like the navy, but they still had the power to veto any legislation, and both army and Navy had the power to dissolve and reform the cabinet at will, a power they had used several times during the war. There was still little talk of peace, in fact the order for the mobilisation of defences against invasion (hardly the act of a surrendering nation) was done the same day as Nagasaki. More time would have made no difference. The public were completely in the dark, and the government held firm to their option of a negotiated surrender.

Nagasaki is more nebulous. A second bomb was required, but this one could have been dropped in a place with less loss of life. Maybe Tokyo harbour. At this point is was just proof that the US could do it again. In response to that I say, maybe, but this is 1945 we are talking about not 2004, and to quote Patton "you don't win wars by not killing people". Its not just the 60 years difference, its also the experience of just having survived 6 years of brutal warfare, and 4 years more only 20 years earlier.

So they dropped the Bomb. Again. Also on the 10th, the US delivered another massive conventional bombing raid on Tokyo (another forgotten fact). The cabinet met and after some debate is was decided that Japan would not surrender unconditionally, and that the planned defence of the mainland would continue. Army Minister General Anami (a leading cabinet member) made a loud proclamation on the radio stating that the Japanese would never surrender. That bears repeating for effect: The decision of the Cabinet after the bombing of Nagasaki was NOT to surrender, and this was announced on the radio. At this point, the Emperor, technically head of the cabinet, but traditionally silent, spoke up (for only the second time in his life) and pled for peace. The Cabinet could not disagree, and this gave the Doves in the Cabinet the ammunition they needed to call for immediate surrennder, and the next day Japan was to capitulate.

But it wasn't over. That night, the Army staged a Coup against the Emperor in order to take him into 'protective custody' and reverse his decision to surrender. The coup was a very close thing, but was thwarted when several key generals stayed loyal. The offending officers either killed themselves, or in several cases, got into aircraft for last ditch kamikaze missions against the US. As the announcement of surrender was read by the Emperor on 12 noon on the 15th, there were mutinies in barracks across the country from disbelieving troops, though in most cases it was short or ended by suicide.

Not only was Japan NOT about to surrender, but it is unlikely that they ever would have EVEN AFTER the two bombs, had not the Russians invaded Manchuria. While there is an argument to be made that the second bomb did not need to target Nagasaki, there is no argument against dropping the bombs. Even after these three critical events, the Japanese came very close to continuing the war.


I can recommend about 40 books on the subject, but the best are probably the more recent:
Downfall: by Richard B Frank.
Japan's War: by Edwin Hoyt
The Decision to Surrender: Akira Iryie
Japan's Longest day: Pacific war Research Society (Japan)

Honestly?

The japanese Army would have sounded air raid sirens half an hour before the expected blasts, everyone would have run for shelter and nobody would have seen a thing. Any news or coverage about the blasts would be completely silenced, and 99.999% of the population of Japan would never have know anything at all happened, and the US would have just used 2 of its 3 bombs and spent several hundred billion dollars in real terms to kill some fish.

Please keep in mind, even when the US dropped the bombs on two cities, the information was so tightly controlled that almost no Japanese knew about it until after the surrender.

Lastly, even if some had seen it, so what? A massive flash on the horizon, clearly a big explosion, but what does that mean to them? These are people who have seen their cities burn night after night for ten months. What does a big explosion mean to them exactly?

I think Truman decided dropping the bomb was a military necessity.

ibelsd, I am at a loss. Where did you find that quote? I think you are attributing to me something that someone else on the forum said. You might want to recheck where you lifted that quote.

Truman was filled in about the atomic bombs only after FDR died. He didn't seem to have much time to think about it. Of course, we can all try to second-guess what his decision would have been.

I know that the majority opinion is that the dropping of the two atomic bombs saved so many lives, and that most authors are in line with this thinking. However, I will continue to maintain that it was wrong. Often in warfare a side will go for the expedient rather than a more difficult course that might ultimately bring a better quality of peace in a region. Bombing the smithereens out of Hiroshima and Nagasaki still seems to have been a terrible way to achieve that peace. I can only imagine how our own people would have felt had the tables been turned.

Therein lies the crux of the matter. On the one hand, I think it is difficult to argue that dropping the bomb did save hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of lives. On the other hand, it was a terribly destructive act, committed mainly against civilians. Saving the lives is a strong end, but achieved through a horrific means. For those who don't believe in the 'ends justifying the means', there really is no workable solution--but I can't find fault with that position, either (how do you argue against someone trying to hold us to a higher standard?). All I can add is that wars themselves require and ends vs. means justification--otherwise they would never happen. Given that, it would surely apply to individual acts within that war. All I can say to PE and others: Would it really have been better if we hadn't dropped the bomb, and been forced to invade? Imagine the carnage that would have resulted from that--and the potential for even further devastation had we not intimidated Russia.