On August 9th, 1945 at 11:02 am a US B-29 dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki killing 70,000 noncombatants.
If we had landed on their beaches and tried to physically defeat them in combat, all those 70,000 non-combatants would have become warriors and that includes even the school children. There are a bunch of Americans walking around today because their grandfathers didn't have to face combat on Japanese soil.
The greatest justification for ever dropping the first atomic bomb was that it was necessary to drop the second.
All the alternatives to dropping the atomic bomb were us as horrific as dropping the atomic bomb. The only difference was the atomic bombs ended the war more expediently, thus saving lives in the end. If you start a war of aggression, and lose that war, you don’t get to dictate surrender terms, and that was exactly what the government of Japan was trying too do prior to Truman authorizing the use of Atomic weapons. Anything less than unconditional surrender was never a option for Nazi Germany, why should it have been any different for the Empire of Japan? The Japanese conduct in their occupied territories were just as horrific as what the Germans did in Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union. Like the Nazis, the Japanese started wars, resulting in the deaths of millions of people, and unlike the Nazis the empire of Japan had been conducting their barbaric war since 1931. The first option was the invasion of the Japanese home islands. The loss of life would have been terrible. The Japanese fought fanatically over little desolate islands in the middle of the Pacific. Now imagine how it would turned out on their home soil. Curtis Lemay wanted to use the B-29 to firebomb every single Japanese city, until Japan surrendered. The Japanese civilian population would have suffered ten times over than what happened at Hiroshima, and Nagasaki. The last option was a naval blockade, that would have starved Japan into submission. This method would have also resulted in the death of more Japanese civilians than what happened because of the atomic bombings. Real genocide would have happened if the US went with one of the alternate plans.
The people of Japan had tuberculosis, typhus, various dysentery diseases in pandemic numbers Malnutrition augmented their susceptibility. Why NOT just blockade Japan to submission? Moi Say "thank you", - - Japan
I think it was necessary. The Japanese was an enemy that would have been very hard to defeat unless they were fully defeated mentally and physically However I also voted that it showed us World dominance.
After Hiroshima... One day before the bombing of Nagasaki, the Emperor notified Foreign Minister Shigenori Tōgō of his desire to "insure a prompt ending of hostilities". Tōgō wrote in his memoir that the Emperor "warned [him] that since we could no longer continue the struggle, now that a weapon of this devastating power was used against us, we should not let slip the opportunity [to end the war] by engaging in attempts to gain more favorable conditions".
Bombing of Hiroshima Aug 6, 1945 Bombing of Nagasaki 9 August 1945 The Kyūjō incident(Coup attempt by Japanese Military) Aug 14, 1945 – Aug 15, 1945 Surrender of Japan September 2, 1945
It was not necessary, but it was justifiable. The pertinent question I think is this: if we'd taken a poll of all the soldiers, sailors and airmen who had been fighting the Japanese and asked them 'we can end the war right now by killing a hundred thousand civilians, including women and children, or you can keep fighting their military for an indeterminant amount of time, and maybe you die' what do you think would've been their response? I think it would've been very mixed... at the end of the day, Japan attacked us, so its up to us to decide when the threat is neutralized and how to do it. I like to think I would've answered 'keep fighting, killing civilians is wrong' ...and hopefully I'll never find out whether I'm truly that benevolent or not.
One of many Acts of Genocide committed by USA. Native Americans, Slavery, War in Philippines 1898 -- 1902, Bombing of Japan 1945, Murder of about 1,500,000 civilians in Korea 1950-'53, Murder of about 1,000,000 civilians in Southeast Asia 1965-'73
Hell, I was up for nuking north and south Vietnam! (I think that is why I was not encouraged to make a career in the Army)
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not only necessary to end the war; they were necessary to win. US military planners were concerned that an invasion might fail. Please see Hell to Pay by D.M. Giangreco.
You mean; Bringing civilization to those still in the stone-age Carrying on what the rest of the world was already doing Kicking out the Spanish dictatorship Ending the second world war and saving millions of innocent lives Saving SK from a Stalinist dictatorship and famine which kills millions A valiant attempt to save South Vietnam/Laos/Cambodia from genocide which kills millions?
Japans emperor waited days after the first nuke was dropped. If he would have just surrendered after the first one then the second wasn’t needed. This just shows that indeed a second was needed and that the second was on the hands of the emperor. many more civilians and soldiers would have died then the bombs took out.
Compared to ? ? ? Heaven? Do tell! Or just a trite barb? The Japanese people were culturally advanced from a medieval society to the modern world. & secure. Suffering malnutrition, typhus, tuberculosis and all sorts of dysentery types imaginable - The Japanese People were treated! Reprogrammed for "democracy" & baseball too under General MacArthur's Supreme Administration. It took "the bombs" to instill in the Japanese people by the words of their Emperor, "to endure the unendurable. . " Moi No Apologies!
I had read something interesting, that after the first one was dropped on Hiroshima, President Truman was very sure Japan was going to imminently surrender, but he was convinced to destroy Nagasaki to force the surrender to take place immediately, since the Russian Soviets were quickly mobilizing into the area and the US strategists were concerned the Soviets might occupy parts of Japan if the situation was not quickly resolved and stabilized. In other words they devastated Nagasaki for psychological effect on the Japanese, to end the war just a little bit sooner to make sure the Russian Communists would not have a chance to take Japan.
The Soviets had no pacific fleet capability for a large scale landing on any of the Japanese home islands.
How is the fact that the Soviets had no ability to carry out large scale landing operations not relevant? The Soviets started pouring into Manchuria the very same day Nagasaki was bombed.
Not having much of a Pacific fleet is not the same thing as not being able to carry out large scale landing operations. Russia bordered very close to Northern Japan. With the US Pacific fleet and Japanese forces continuing to fight, there would be less resources to put up much of a resistance. It certainly would have quickly ended the war, with the Japanese having to fight on two fronts, with the Russians coming from the North and the fighting the American fleet in the South, but the US wanted to be the one to win the war and so be able to have full control over shaping the conquered Japan. If Russia had engaged in fighting they would have doubtless made some claims and demands. Think about the division of Germany into East and West. Having a fleet would not be as important if there was very little resistance put up to invasion, which there would be if Japan was in the process of imminently losing and becoming more militarily weak and exhausted. It would also be very difficult for the American fleet to put pressure on Japan while at the same time guarding the Sea of Japan to keep Russian forces from landing. Some of it has to do with geography. The Sea of Japan has several chokepoints which would make it more difficult for the American fleet to maintain supply lines in. The Russians could have put mines in those straits, for example, or targeted aircraft against any ships as they had to pass through those narrow areas. Remember the Soviets were pouring into Korea at the time and it was not known whether the Soviets would take South Korea and then be able to completely control the southern (Korea) strait. US military advisers knew full well this was imminently going to happen and would happen rapidly. Part of the invasion of Manchuria involved taking control of the northeastern coast of Korea at the same time.
This is a well thought out scenario. Following this line of thought, I could see why Nagasaki was bombed to knockout Japan, before the Soviets were able to pose a threat to mainland Japan. It only took 12 days for the Soviets to over run Manchuria, and reach their objects, I think the main one being full encirclement of Japanese forces in Manchuria via occupying the northern part of Northern Korea. The Soviets were a military juggernaut at the end of the war, so I can see how that could have factored into the decision to bomb Nagasaki.
