Hiroshima and Nagasaki

[Túrin Turambar]

Bought up here because of relevance...

This was mentioned in the Al-Zarqawi thread.

Do you believe that the use of atomic bombs on Japanese Cities by the allied forces in WWII was justified?

[Jnyusa]

You already knew my vote, Lord M.

[Túrin Turambar]

I know, I'm just asking around.

This is a topic that happens to really interest me.

For those who opposed the bombs, how else would you have ended the war as swiftly and with as little loss of life, civilian and military, on both sides?

[Alatar]

I disagree with the use of the bombs. I don't have an alternative strategy, but that does not justify genocide. There is no alternative that would be worse.

[Túrin Turambar]

There is no alternative that would be worse.

The alternatives, as I see it, I either

a) leaving the Japanese Empire intact, letting them continue to commit atrocities in China and South-East Asia and leaving them posied to launch another war when they recover

b) fighting to the bitter end over years and bringing about the deaths of hundreds of thousands of allied soldiers and millions of Japanese

c) somehow starving the Japanese through a combination of mass bombing and blockade - a real genocide.

All of those are worse than killing 200,000 people and ending the war decisivley in a few weeks IMHO.

[Jnyusa]

how else would you have ended the war as swiftly and with as little loss of life, civilian and military, on both sides?

I actually don't know the military situation well enough to have an opinion about the alternatives. But I find myself doubting that the conversations they had while making the decision were much like the conversation we have in retrospect about its justification.

I take into account that this action set the precedent for use of nuclear weapons in war. It launched an arms race that also caused a great deal of suffering to a great many people on the 'guns and butter curve.' Many of the nuclear weapons created by that arms race are unaccounted for since the breakup of the Soviet Union, and others are in the hands of our enemies' allies. The technology has disseminated to many nations whose peace is fragile. In fact we do not yet know how high the death toll might rise from the introduction of nuclear weaponry into the game of war.

Jn

[Túrin Turambar]

I take into account that this action set the precedent for use of nuclear weapons in war. It launched an arms race that also caused a great deal of suffering to a great many people on the 'guns and butter curve.' Many of the nuclear weapons created by that arms race are unaccounted for since the breakup of the Soviet Union, and others are in the hands of our enemies' allies. The technology has disseminated to many nations whose peace is fragile. In fact we do not yet know how high the death toll might rise from the introduction of nuclear weaponry into the game of war.

The interesting thing, though, is that nuclear weapons were never used. In many ways, I credit Hiroshima and Nagasaki with this. It demonstrated their terrible power. I have to wonder if Nuclear bombs were not seen for the first time in Japan in 1945 whether they might have been seen for the first time in a nuclear war between the USA and USSR in the 1950s or 1960s.

[Jnyusa]

That's incalculable.

It's also possible that the arms race would not have gotten started at all if we had refrained from using them and pushed immediately for treaties to place this weaponry off-limits forever.

I do believe that what convinced the Russians they had to keep pace with weapons development was the knowledge that we ourselves were willing to use nukes in wartime.

Jn

[Túrin Turambar]

It's also possible that the arms race would not have gotten started at all if we had refrained from using them and pushed immediately for treaties to place this weaponry off-limits forever.

The USA might have, but would the USSR, China or the possibly-undefeated Japanese Empire? Arms races have always happened, and even if everyone agreed not to use nuclear weapons I imagine they still would have stocked them 'just in case'. Look at how, after the First World War, the very powers that agreed that war would no longer be a tool of foriegn affairs were turning out more and better warships and aircraft and keeping huge standing armies ready for action.

[Jnyusa]

Well, I think that every war has to judged on its own merits, so to speak. WWII did teach us one lesson we should have learned from WWI: Never give your enemy nothing to lose.

I don't know how close to defeat the Japanese really were at the time when we dropped the bombs. I know that we don't often get the truth about such things from our executive branch, as the recent WMD scandal should demonstrate. And yet, even there, the American people were not sceptical in spite of the fact that it was fairly recent news the extent to which the CIA had manufactured the existence of Russian arsenals during the Reagan Administration. I think we should be more sceptical about our leadership, and be better students of history. The main thing, really, is being capable of asking the right questions in timely fashion.

Jn

[Pearly Di]

That's incalculable.

It's also possible that the arms race would not have gotten started at all if we had refrained from using them and pushed immediately for treaties to place this weaponry off-limits forever.

I do believe that what convinced the Russians they had to keep pace with weapons development was the knowledge that we ourselves were willing to use nukes in wartime.

I'm with Jn.

All war is terrible, but the use of the atomic bomb 61 years ago introduced a new and frightful element into the history of warfare.

[superwizard]

All of those are worse than killing 200,000 people and ending the war decisivley in a few weeks IMHO.

My problem with the bombings are mostly the type of bombs used. The atomic bombs didn't just cause 200,000 people their effect is still seen today with people who are deformed or have cancer who weren't even born back then.

[Pearly Di]

Just so, superwizard ... it is the capacity of nuclear weapons for their terrible destruction on human life and the surrounding creation which is so very dark and so very, very frightening.



I think we have become desensitised to their ghastly capacity because of the end of the Cold War.

One of the most traumatic things I have ever seen, on the TV or cinema screen, was a horribly realistic drama produced by the BBC in 1984 called 'Threads', which portrayed, in unbelievably harrowing and gruesomely authentic detail, the effect of an all-out nuclear attack on Britain (the drama was centred on the city of Sheffield and was written at the height of the tensions between the US and the Soviet Union). The images from that play burnt themselves on my brain, and I've never forgotten them. US TV put out a TV feature film at the same time, called 'The Day After', but actually it was tame fare compared with the horrors that the BBC were prepared to show. The American survivors in 'The Day After' were all running about in a relentlessly sunny landscape, after the bombs fell. I don't think so.

'Threads' pushed up the membership of British CND overnight.

Here is its IMDB entry. I have to say that this brief outline does not do the play justice. It really is one of the most distressing things I've ever watched:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090163/

And the entry for 'The Day After':
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085404/

[Jnyusa]

Di, I saw that movie! And it is emblazoned in my memory as well. It did show here on PBS though I don't recall how long after the BBC showing.

Yes, I agree that nothing else like that has been made. When I was in college, they showed us civil defense films that were absolutely laughable. "In case of nuclear attack, jump into a ditch and throw your coat over your head." And in elementary school they had us practice by hiding under our desks. That our parents tolerated such tripe is just incomprehensible to me. But then, Vietnam convinced me that our parents secretly wanted us all dead while they decamped to the bunker with Dr. Strangelove.

Jn

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Interesting discussion. I don't have much to add at this point; my point of view is very similar to Jn's (big surprise that!).

[axordil]

When is total war, with attacks directed at civilian populations in an effort to break their will to fight, justified? More civilians were killed, by an order of magnitude, in non-nuclear bombings in English, German, and Japanese cities than by the nukes. Dresden, Hamburg and Tokyo (and probably others, those are just the ones I know of off the top of my head) all suffered casualties on the order of the A-bomb attacks in single bombing raids. And we won't even get into the atrocities in China or on the Eastern Front. Or the concentration camps. 45 million people died in WWII, mostly civilians, and "only" 200,000 to nukes.

But I object to the form of the question in general. Justifying things (or its opposite) in historical retrospect is dubious as an intellectual activity, not only because we know things the people at the time didn't, but because we cannot FEEL as they did.

A better question would be, given what we know now, under what circumstances, if any, would using a nuclear weapon be justifiable?

[Primula Baggins]

On the question of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I've read this: The Japanese were prepared to surrender that summer if the Allies would guarantee the personal safety of the Emperor—that he would not be tried for war crimes and possibly executed. The Allies wouldn't make this guarantee. If they had, the war would have ended before the bombs could be used.

I wrote a paper on this in school and came away with the strong impression that the U.S. was determined to find a way to use the atomic bomb. After all, it's hard to strategize effectively until you actually know what your superweapon can do against a real target.

[halplm]

what ax said

[Voronwë the Faithful]

What Prim said.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

That's interesting info, Prim. I've never heard of that before.

I am with Ax on justification in retrospect. We only know what happened AFTER the fact, and judging the use of the two nukes on that is dubious because we can't say that they knew these events would occur BEFORE they used the bombs.

From what I know of the Japanese in WWII they were prepared to fight to the last man. Surrender was not an option, unless the emperor commanded it.

I have a biography of Oppenheimer, the father of the bomb, that I have to get around to reading one of these days.