Hiroshima: the Crime that keeps on paying

The historical record makes it quite clear that I am completely correct in every respect.

The only propaganda that I've seen in this thread is that which you've cut-n-pasted. You can assume from the ready way that I am able to counter this propaganda with lots of facts that this propaganda is not even remotely convincing.

There was no decision. Japan was still refusing to surrender, so we kept attacking them.

No one was holding meetings to consider whether we should suddenly stop attacking Japan right in the middle of the war.

If Japan was ready to surrender, but needlessly prolonged the war for no reason, then any complaints about needless war casualties belong on their doorstep.

Yes. Ike voiced opposition to using the bombs to a single person (Stimson).

As your quote notes, Ike was not even remotely convincing.

Neither Ike nor Stimson bothered to repeat the conversation to anyone else, so Ike's opinion was a non-issue as far as wartime thinking went.

But just as a matter of historical trivia, even if Ike had managed to be convincing, it was really too late to do anything. By the time Ike raised his objections to Stimson, the final orders to use the bombs had already been sent out to the field, and Truman had departed Potsdam. The bomb was dropped on Hiroshima before Truman's ship had arrived back in Washington.

Unless you present convincing evidence of the existence of time machines, stuff written years after the war had no bearing on the course of the war.

The only thing Leahy had to say about the A-bombs during the war was: "I'm an expert in explosives and I promise you that those contraptions will never work."

It is true that MacArthur was not even consulted on the use of the bomb. Therefore it is silly to suggest that he was a source of any opposition to the use of the bomb.

The MacArthur biography sure has a lot of historical errors in it. What Japan asked for was a guarantee of Hirohito's unlimited dictatorial power. We most certainly did not agree to that request, and in fact rejected it outright. Further, Japan made this request only after both A-bombs had been dropped.

The Potsdam Proclamation was a list of generous surrender conditions.

As I noted above, the condition that Japan asked for was Hirohito's unlimited dictatorial power. And this request came only after both A-bombs had already been dropped.

General MacArthur was not offering advice. As previously acknowledged, no one was consulting him about this.

Given that Japan was not willing to contemplate "surrender with a guarantee for the Emperor" so long as they had hopes of the Soviets helping them to end the war in a draw, it seems pretty unlikely that making this offer would have influenced them.

Is this supposed to be evidence of military leaders opposing the bombs "during the war"? Unless someone presents convincing evidence of time machines, stuff written years after the war did not influence the course of the war.

Japan's refusal to surrender after Hiroshima indicates that it is pretty unlikely that a mere fireworks display would have induced surrender.

Hiroshima certainly warned them. They didn't seem to surrender.

There are no records of Japan offering to surrender in March of 1945.

Hard to see the immorality of bombing a military target at the height of a horrendous war.

The historical record is very clear on the fact that Japan did not offer to surrender until after both A-bombs had been dropped.

Truman had departed Potsdam and was on his way back to Washington. Ike talked to Stimson, not to Truman.

As already acknowledged in your earlier quote, Stimson was spectacularly unconvinced and practically called Ike an idiot.

As I pointed out a few lines up, even if Ike had made a convincing case, it was already too late to stop the bombs from being dropped.

The bombs were dropped on military targets.

There really wasn't anything to negotiate. We had informed Japan of the surrender conditions (which were quite generous). All that was left was for Japan to decide to surrender to us.

No one was pressuring Truman. No one in the government was giving any thought at all over whether the bombs should be used. That would have been as goofy as holding a meeting to decide whether or not our soldiers should use guns.

Hiroshima was a huge military center filled with tens of thousands of Japanese soldiers, and was the military headquarters in charge of repelling any invasion in the southern half of Japan.

Nagasaki was an industrial center with huge weapons factories.

The destruction of Hiroshima seems an equally adequate demonstration of the fact that we could destroy their cities at will. It didn't seem to make them surrender.

What a coincidence. Hiroshima was a large naval installation. Both Kokura Arsenal and Nagasaki were large manufacturing centers. We leafleted both Hiroshima and Nagasaki warning the civilians to flee.

Sounds like we followed Marshall's plan to the letter.

The war planners didn't really have a "vital " classification for targets. However, the large military value of both cities factored greatly in the decision to select them as A-bomb targets.

Hiroshima was selected as an A-bomb target early. After that it was off limits to conventional bombing.

Nagasaki was not bombed earlier because it could not be targeted easily by the large nighttime bombing raids.

The bomb at Hiroshima was aimed at the center of the city, specifically a T-shaped bridge. There were tens of thousands of Japanese soldiers stationed throughout the center of the city. Many of these soldiers were killed. The bomb exploded close enough to Hiroshima Castle (where the the military headquarters was) to level it.

The intent was to drop the second bomb directly over Kokrua Arsenal, which was a pretty big military target. The intended target at Nagasaki was the Mitsubishi shipyards, also a pretty big military target. The second bomb ended up being dropped over an industrial zone north of Nagasaki, directly between two large weapons factories, destroying both of them. One of those destroyed weapons factories was the place responsible for the special shallow water torpedoes that Japan made specifically to attack Pearl Harbor.

Questions about "whether the bombs were needed" make for interesting trivia, but they aren't really relevant to much. Japan hadn't surrendered yet, so we kept attacking them. Then we stopped attacking them after they surrendered. Pretty straightforward really.

 

Hiroshima was in fact a demonstration or experiment and the bomb had to be used on real targets. It also prevented a Soviet landing on the Japanese mainland and served as the first shot in the Cold War to contain Soviet expansionism in the Far East. Stalin was about to grab the northern part of Japan but the request was denied by an American commander. A prolonged war would have enabled a Soviet occupation of northern Japan, which could have been divided into American and Russian zones of occupation.

 

What he did, as the written record of the thread proves irrefutably, is make a snide comment about para "trumpian posters expressing bigotry against Japanese." It was uncalled for, and it's YOU who needs to reread the damn thread.

 

ok I must read it wrong or with another post, you are right!!

 

There are anti-Japanese bigots here and using "trumpian" as an adjective to describe bigotry is reasonable I'd say. In any event, your response to my post (despite your clumsy follow-up) made absofriggin'lutely no sense whatsoever. Try to keep us Amerika-hating-liberals (AND your own various posting names) straight. Now enough jawbonin' and start takin' back yer country!

 

The Russians murdered 25 million people between the 1930's and 1946( they kept up their murdering ways after the war) and we called those savages allies. Japan and Germany were not the only savage PIeces Of S during WWII.

- - - Updated - - -

The Russians murdered 25 million people between the 1930's and 1946( they kept up their murdering ways after the war) and we called those savages allies. Japan and Germany were not the only savage PIeces Of S during WWII.

 

No doubt -you- would in reason-free land. Or rather cite it. I've not seen any kind of anti Japanese bigotry on this forum. I'm sure there is some... somewhere... the place does generate 4000 posts a day. But in your warped world, two of them racist a day makes the place "stormfront sister site," so no limit to the cognitive boogey men plaguing you I guess. They're behind every bush and tree you know, those wascally wacists!

OK, I will try to cut down on the big three and four syllable words in the future.

If you are saying that I use puppet accounts here, you couldn't be more wrong... as usual.

 

To conquer Japan without the Atomic Bombs it was estimated to take 2-3 years, cost the Americans 1.7-4 million casualties to include 500,000-one million Killed. I wonder how many of us are alive today because of Truman's decision to drop the A-Bombs. This is not counting the expected Japanese casualties which was estimated at five to ten million. Once again, I wonder how many Japanese are alive today because of that decision.

 

Revisionist spin and tripe.

The decision was a military decision and one of necessity.

The Japanese started the war and had to be more than defeated they had to be crushed so as never to start another one.

Without the nukes invasion may have failed and the cost would have been ghastly on both sides.

SOrry but those with your view are proven wrong about history by the facts. Revisionist fiction does not count and that is all you have

 

The Soviets would have developed the atomic bomb on their own they had the needed physicists hell if Hitler gave up on all his super weapons but rockets and the atomic bomb he likely would have gotten there first with a practical delivery system by missile.

But its not a war crime if it was we would have been up on War Crimes charges which never happened the fact is we won the war, who cares how?

 

My uncle survived Corrigidor.

 

Only a few radical and extremist historians agree with this.

The fact is that the bombs were a military decision and the right one to make. Yes many had and have differing opinions but it is also true that many of them changed their opinions and realize that it was a righteous and correct decision.

It is you who accept revisionist fiction as a form of brainwashing from those who paint any decision by the USA as bad.

 

You are absolutely right. The fire bombing of Tokyo on the night of March 9/10 killed more people than either of the A-bomb attacks. The result of the two A-bombs was the war came to an end and probably saved the lives of millions of Americans and especially japanese.

 

As I posted on another thread, the A-bombs probably saved my brothers life, since we did not have to invade the japanese main land.

Further all the nay sayers about the bomb were not in the military and have their life on the line. While they are entitled to their opinion, IMO it is pretty much worthless since they were not involved.

 

Hiroshima
Population on 1942 - 419 182
Population on 1945 after the bombing - 137 197
Immediate death toll – 70 000
Death toll within 6 month after bombing – 140 000
Hiroshima was the base of Second Army Command and central Fleet Command

Nagasaki
Death toll (end 1945): 60 000 – 80 000
End 1950: 140 000
Mitsubishi steel mine, Mitsubishi torpedo production, Mitsubishi shipbuilding, port

Mass murder of civilian population. Same as Tokio or Dresden. If you approve mass murder of civilian population you have no right to judge Assad and Saddam. In fact there is only theoretical difference between you, Assad, Saddam, e.t.c. Congratulations.

 

Well then blame Japan. We gave them the option to lay down their weapons. It ended a war all because Japan decided to keep terrorizing the world.

When a bully pushes a kid he's been teasing for weeks, and the kid has had enough, and kicks the bully's ass, do you all of the sudden take the bully's side?

Hah, what a pathetic thread.

 

Factually accurate, but note that a lot of the population drop happened before the bombing.

Factually accurate, but note that these are high estimates. There are lower estimates that are just as reasonable.

Yes. Very much a military target.

Yes.

No. This one is factually inaccurate. The Nagasaki death toll has not increased much beyond the 60,000 to 80,000 range.

Yes. Very much a military target.

No. Attacks on military targets are in no way murder of civilians.

I approve of attacks on military targets.

 

So then they should have surrendered the many opportunities they had before the bombs.

 

Maybe we could go back to US civil war and compare the numbers of dead as a percentage of the population at that time. It would probably be comparable to WW2, except that as a percentage of population it would equate to 6 million in today's population numbers. That was with relatively primitive weapons, mostly single shot rifles, cannons and bayonets.

http://www.civilwar.org/education/civil-war-casualties.html

Even further back; the genocide of the American Indian; up to 90% of American Indians killed by new "Americans". The sheer scale of death as a percentage of the American Indian population dwarfs many other historical genocide cases.

http://americanhistory.oxfordre.com...199329175.001.0001/acrefore-9780199329175-e-3

 

From this point of view you are correct and I am not. According to western standards this is manslaughter – a kill without intent. Murder – kill with intent (malice aforethought). But please note, western legal system is not the only one on Earth, and it is difficult for me to imagine how a pilot dropping a nuke on a city or a general giving such an order might be unaware of civilian casualties that will accompany the destruction of a military target.

But this is not the case. This is the father of city bombing strategy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giulio_Douhet
This is one of the main principles:
>>>The chief strategy laid out in his writings, the Douhet model, is pivotal in debates regarding the use of air power and bombing campaigns. The Douhet model rests on the belief that in a conflict, the infliction of high costs from aerial bombing can shatter civilian morale. This would unravel the social basis of resistance, and pressure citizens into asking their governments to surrender. The logic of this model is that exposing large portions of civilian populations to the terror of destruction or the shortage of consumer goods would damage civilian morale into submission. By smothering the enemy's civilian centers with bombs, Douhet argued the war would become so terrible that the common people would rise against their government, overthrow it with revolution, then sue for peace.<<<

Bombing of Dresden was arranged in a manner where waves of bombers would drop HE bombs that would destroy roofs and floors of the buildings (leaving walls standing as a chimneys). Which is to be followed by a flow of Incendiary bombs that would put a city on fire to create a firestorm that would be followed by a wave of HE that would throw the fire from one building to another and prevent the firefighters to putting the firestorm out before it spreads.
The effect – the civilians hiding in bomb shelter are doomed. They cant escape due to fire, they suffocate because the firestorm sucks the oxygen out of the basements and bomb shelters via ventilation system.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestorm
Firestorm works properly only in urban areas, it needs buildings as high as possible to direct the heat up, this is how a furnace works sucking the air from below, heating it up, and directing it up. It needs a chimney tube to create the airflow to create income of oxygen.

In Hiroshima the civilian population was the primary target. Remember our quest? We want to force the Japanese government to surrender on our terms. Army or Fleet command centers cannot influence the government to surrender, they are solders and they will fight till the end, Okinawa has proven that. Destruction of torpedo production factory is irrelevant, there is like 200 workers. The Japanese navy is already no more, harbor facilities are standing idle. This was a sociological game, ether way the civilians will force the government to surrender, or the government will face extinction of a nation and surrender.
Primary target was the civilian population. This was a murder not manslaughter.

 

Wartime strikes on military targets are neither murder nor manslaughter.

That is part of the International Laws of War, which apply everywhere in the world.

Douhet was not part of the target selection committee for the A-bombs.

That may have been the UK's strategy regarding Dresden.

American bombers used precision bombing to attempt to get their bombs on the Dresden railyards.

That is incorrect. Civilians were not part of the target list at all. We even dropped leaflets warning them to flee.

The target at Hiroshima was the tens of thousands of soldiers within the city, along with the military headquarters in charge of repelling any invasion in the southern half of Japan.

Dead soldiers do not fight. Smashed headquarters no longer coordinate defenses.

Weapons production is a legitimate target.

That is incorrect. Civilians were not part of the target list at all. We even dropped leaflets warning them to flee.

The target at Hiroshima was the tens of thousands of soldiers within the city, along with the military headquarters in charge of repelling any invasion in the southern half of Japan.

Wartime strikes on military targets are neither murder nor manslaughter.

 

One thing is indeed true, the residual effects of Radiation, causing Birth Defects and other Radiation related illnesses, continued to take victims, long after the initial Destructive effects of both bombs.

 

Evidence mounts that nuclear bombs prolonged the war rather than shortened it as USA ignored surrender negotiations while it prepared to drop the bombs.

I nuclear bomb was necessary, why wasn't one bomb enough?

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/08/09/how-us-hiroshima-mythology-insults-veterans/

 

Pearl Harbor was well provoked by the US by a trade- / oilboycot which had been put on Japan:



And it wasn't a 'surprise-attack' as it was well known that it was under way:

 

So it's ok to slaughter people over a boycott?

ANd those news paper clippings are nothing without a link. I could make one of those stating the Japanese believed Hitler to be God....Would you believe it just because?