Would you have used the atom bomb on Japan in WWII if you were Prez?

we did firebomb many Japanese cities prior to using the bomb. do some larnin before you post. http://www.ditext.com/japan/napalm.html

 

Truman was kept out of the loop and had no idea what to do after fdr died. He made a criminal mistake

 

Tokyo was an early target. Doolittle's raiders hammered Tokyo as much as that small of a bomber could manage.

You can talk of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in various ways.

You can start out saying how many died. You don't mention that people vanished, just how many died. And not instantly in the case of many burned by fires, but over time. We need not mention the primitive nature of medicine then available.

I don't want to review the targets again since I have done it a number of times. I think Nagasaki was an alternative.

We need not discuss the way the two cities differed I suppose. Easy to knock out from a single blow to each, difficult for troops since it would be hand to hand combat.

I voted to use the a bomb of that era. Matter of fact, as an infantry company clerk in Germany, I found that we had nuclear bombs in our unit. Each had a powerful punch but troops could operate in the area shortly past the blasts.

In Germany I also stood next to the dreaded Atomic Cannon.

[video=youtube;eiM-RzPHyGs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiM-RzPHyGs[/video]

 

I just now paused to recall that i slept with the A bomb. I doubt most of the company I served in in Germany had any idea that each time we went to sleep, or work in the HQ building, we were in the presence of the A bomb. The were apparently safe to sleep with since I am still posting.

I mentioned the Davy Crockett in the past post. You can see one in the museum at the West Point Academy. They may also be in other military museums. They may surprise you at how small they are yet have a powerful punch.

Here is the Atomic cannon that fired nuclear weapons and could also fire non nuclear rounds if the ammo was available to them.

[video=youtube;5N0Balj2tLw]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5N0Balj2tLw[/video]

 

The use of atomic weapons in ww2 constituted a war crime

 

No, I would have followed up on the overtures for peace which the Japanese had made through the Russians in January of 1945 and ended the war then. Truman kept the war going for several more months and at the cost of many thousands of American lives because he wanted to demonstrate to the Russians that we had the bomb and would use it.

 

This is exactly right. The Japanese requested one thing. And we fave them that very thing

 

I am not trying to excuse Japan's aggressions but simply to point out that the American public would not have supported a war the FDR desperately wanted as FDR worked hard to ensure that Japan would launch a "Sneak Attack" on the U.S.

Only such a "Sneak Attack" would enrage American pro War passions to the point of supporting a War that FDR wanted so badly.

FDR & his pro War cronies went so far as to freeze all Japanese assets in the U.S, place an embargo on US goods, impose sanctions etc and knew that the Japanese would not have accepted the options you suggested.

The U.S. had broken the Japanese code & knew of the coming attack on Pearl Harbor. Rather than share that information with the P.H. Base commanders to minimize US losses & save American lives, FDR etc withheld knowledge of the attack permitting a catastrophe that he knew would enrage US public opinion to support his war.

If the Japanese had seen that Pearl Harbor was already prepared they would possibly have aborted their attack; a risk FDR was unwilling to take.

If FDR etc didn't want War with Japan, why did he withhold information of the attack from P.H. base commanders?

 

if this is true then US and germany would be nuclear powers today, and russia and england would have been destroyed by the nazi atomic bomb.

America could have saved her resources and people by not entering world war 2, and invested in herself while the winner was truly determined.

what good was it to save europe when America has trade deficits with them today?

 

We had an even much more powerful THIRD atomic bomb ready for Tokyo, and we would have used it, too. OF COURSE I would have approved that if I had been president. If you wouldn't, ask yourself what American AND Japanese casualties would have been in a land-invasion....

 

No land invasion was needed

 

Anybody go to jail over them you care to discuss?

 

Right, the Japanese had planned parades for our men and women aplenty huh?

 

Japan committed war crimes. Who in the royal family went to jail?

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No. Just ready to surrender according to our military experts

 

During WW2, and up to the Tommy Franks invasion, it was routine for invading forces to first expend ammo for at times several days. But they normally did not mass attack without first a heavy barrage at the enemy. Not distant, but close to the invasion forces.

We had a General who really is the father of the system employed by General Tommy Franks. William E. DePuy should you wish to study himFranks hit them close, in the middle and deep. Most recall the shock and awe. Franks was on the attack everywhere in Iraq.

I did not hear of the more powerful 3rd A bomb. At the time of the 2 bombs dropped, I thought ... might be wrong ... that the state of those weapons was then maximized for that level of knowledge. After the war, they did manage to vastly increase the bomb power. Bombs to be useful had to be dropped from the air. The famous Russian H Bomb, the Tsar bomb was not dropped from the air. It resembled a number of heavy trucks full of the H bomb makings but far too large to drop from the air. That bomb really was massive.

What would interest me is to read this from the insight of the former Japanese leaders.

 

Look, you are skipping all over the place.

I believed you alleged it was the USA guilty of war crimes due to the A bombs dropped.
Japan ready to surrender? The military experts of WW2 never claimed that. How would our then experts guess what was on the mind of the Emperor?

There were senior leaders of Japan that were executed for war crimes. They used politics to let off the Emperor.

 

It was never up to Tommy franks. That is hilarious

 

The USA wanted Japan crushed. Russia was no champion of taking it easy. They gutted Germany of machines of war. Nothing left in former East Germany could be used to make war. I think few nations were as ruthless to the conquered enemy than was Stalin to his enemies.

 

What wasn't up to General Tommy Franks? My motive to bring him in is he is the product of the modern war thinking. Ike and MacArthur were old school. Truman had been a Captain so he would also be old school.

My unit in Germany had the joy of having William E. DePuy command it then depart for 1 star and General school. DePuy is the father of what Colin Powell's fans try to credit Powell for. It is not the Powell doctrine, but the DePuy Doctrine.

 

What politics? Be precise

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Read your own posts

 

You retired from my comments.

 

I love retirement. Lol

 

When they were assembling the Japanese war crime tribunals, our politicians got very involved. It was felt best to hang Tojo and keep the emperor of Japan alive and under the control of General Douglas MacArthur. I suggest commentators first seek to study what took place at that time, then opine.

 

And I suggest you read what the military experts of the time said about the bomb

 

Japan was not a "practically vanished enemy." Explain how the the 859 sailors who died from the USS Indianapolis demonstrates that Japan was a "practically vanquished enemy." Explain how an enemy with over 2 million troops, including over a million not in Japan, dozens of submarines at sea and over 2000 Kamikazi planes - plus us not having defeated 1 inch of the Japanese mainland constitutes a "practically vanquished enemy?"

Obviously, then your also believe once the Allies reached the German border we should have then just turned around a left, because proceeding to conquer the "practically vanquished" German military and government would have been a "murderous, gratuitous act of horror."

For how absurd and false you message really is in terms of reality, your's is just another "I hate Americans" message that permeate this forum and the American left - plus of course hating the Chinese who the Japanese were still slaughtering on mainland China. Is there a reason why you claim it was immoral to let thousands more Americans and hundreds of thousands more Chinese be killed by the Japanese military? Explain the immorality of ending the war and ending the militarism of Japan?

I could be mistaken, though. It could be that you wanted 35,000,000 Japanese, 5,000,000 more Chinese and 100,000+ more Americans killed instead. Is that it?