Should the atomic bombs been dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

[oralloy]

It depends on the situation. I know that's not a good answer, but that's really all I can say. If the atomic bombs weren't used, Japan might have become the new world superpower and we'd all be speaking Japanese to this day. But when they were used, they caused millions of deaths and many more afterwards due to the radiation.

You can say that dropping the bombs ended the war and may have saved the world as we know it, but there's a cost. There's always a cost. And when nuclear weapons are involved, I think the costs are going to simply be too high.

Actually, reputable estimates of A-bomb deaths top out at around 200,000 for both cities combined, including radiation deaths.

Everyone else, never forget that while the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki might have been necessary to prevent further lives from being lost, roughly a quarter of a million lives were lost in both areas. A quarter of a million. That is more people than your entire family and everyone you've met combined.

Think carefully on whether or not that many lives being lost is part of an 'ends-justify-the-means' situation, because Hitler thought his ends justified the means, and we all know how that turned out.

No more than 140,000 at Hiroshima (and that includes 20,000 soldiers).

No more than 80,000 at Nagasaki.

 

[oralloy]

No. The atomic bombs were unnecessary and according to reports released by the government a year later, we knew this at the time.

Actually, we had no inkling as to what would make Japan surrender until they actually asked to surrender (which only happened after both A-bombs).

US war planes were going unmolested over the skies of Japan and had effectively run out of military targets. The army of Japan was, at the time, looking to surrender in whatever way allowed them to "save face," and according to the report, even if we had done absolutely nothing, would have surrendered unconditionally.

A few days before the bombs were dropped, the Japanese Army showed interest in ending the war in a ceasefire (like the way the Korean War later ended), but even if they had had time to pursue that, it isn't terribly likely that we'd have seen that as a reason not to drop the A-bombs.

The first time the Japanese Army was willing to consider surrender was when Hirohito ordered them to, which was only after both A-bombs.

While the bombing of civilians to prevent the deaths of soldiers is the essence of terrorism, and therefore unjustifiable, the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not necessary on any grounds. It has been suggested, and I think quite correctly, that these were not military bombings, but political, meant to send a strong message to the growing power of the USSR. Don't mess with the US. We're insane.

Hiroshima was a huge military center and Nagasaki held important weapons factories.

These were not attacks on civilians. They were overt strikes on military targets.

 

[dungeonmaster]

like I said in my previous post it was japans fault anyways for not just invading the US like they shoulda, they had tanks and infantry with the fleet that attacked pearl harbour but chickened out.

 

[oralloy]

Once again, according to a report released a year later by the government, we knew at the time that if we had stood by and done absolutely nothing, Japan would have quickly surrendered unconditionally.

It may well be that the bombs were unnecessary in hindsight. But we certainly didn't know it "at the time".

The only person who thought that "at the time" was Ike, who was not involved either with the A-bombs or with the Pacific theater. And Ike never convinced anyone else that he knew what he was talking about.

 

[oralloy]

Should the bombs have been dropped? Absoloutely, it stopped a potentially long conflict and allowed the USA to get it's ass over the pond and help out a little more directly than simple trade.

Should it have been dropped on 2 civilian targets selected for no reason other than to maximise the blast through their terrain features? Absoloutely not. A military target would have been far more suitable and Hiroshima/Nagasaki as targets would no doubt be considered a breach of the Genaeva Convention nowadays.

Hiroshima was a huge military center with tens of thousands of soldiers and the most important military headquarters in Japan. I'm at a loss as to how this could be construed as "not a military target".

Nagasaki was an industrial town with important weapons factories.

 

[oralloy]

Look, this situation had a shitty ending anyway you look at it. From America's viewpoint it was either (since we know that the Japanese would fight to the last man) we invade Japan and risk losing hundreds of thousands of lives of our soldiers or Japanese soldiers or we drop a bomb that does a lot of damage and kills a lot of innocents. So put yourself in Truman's shoes for a minute.

Truman wrote in his own autobiography that the bombings were completely unnecessary. He expressed a lot of regret. The idea that Japan was not going to surrender, that this report doesn't exist, that an invasion would have been necessary is an American delusion. We won, we rewrote the history. You bought it.

Wait no. Sorry. Stupid memory problems. From EISENHOWER's autobiography:

"Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary. ... I thought our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of face."

Yes, and of all the military people who expressed regret over the bombs in hindsight, Ike is the only one who can say that he argued that the bombs were unnecessary before they were used.

But Ike was not in the chain of command either for the bombs or for the Pacific theater, and he never convinced anyone that he was right.

 

[Skyfall]

1st bomb: 99.99% NO! - It's a desecration against nature

How is it a desecration against nature?. Nuclear fission is a natural occurrence in the very star that gives us life. It is quite a common occurrence in nature, maybe I am nitpicking your statement but still I thought I had to point that out.

Desecration of nature is not about artificial occurrence, but how badly an event has affected the natural environment and the living things in and around it.

 

[beddo]

This was a crime against humanity on a massive scale.

Crimes against humanity generally involve the direct targeting of civilians.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were both targeted for their military value (especially Hiroshima).

War Crimes include the targetting of areas where there is likely to be a dense population of civilians. London, Paris and New York all have military value, would it be acceptable to drop a nuclear bomb on them? This would be considered a War Crime without doubt.

The fact remains that a large number of civilians died because of very powerful indiscriminate weapons, that is a war crime.

No consideraton was taken of the innocent civilians that were killed by the bombs. This is by definition a war crime.

That is true. But Japan was inflicting such brutal atrocities on the world that people felt they had to be stopped by any means necessary.

Many countries have inflicted brutal atrocities. However, with population increases and technological developments they did seem to become more frequent in the 20th century.

Still, Russia was never stopped with such force given the atrocities they commited. Like I have said, Japan was close to surrender. As far as justifying mass murder to 'stop' atrocities, well the idea is contrived. Two wrongs don't make a right.

Much of Europe especially Britain, Germany and France had inflicted atrocities over much of the world.

 

[oralloy]

3. Reports show Japan had been attempting to surrender since 43'. The one and only condition was they wished to retain their ceremonial figurehead Emperor.

Japan did not attempt to surrender until August 10, 1945, which was the day after the second A-bomb was dropped on them.

The condition that Japan asked for was that Hirohito retain all his prerogatives as sovereign ruler of Japan. We refused the request and they then surrendered unconditionally.

We were about a week away from dropping the next A-bomb on them when they surrendered.

Japan would have surrendered even if atom bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated.

The Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs did not defeat Japan, nor by the testimony of the leaders who ended the war did they persuade Japan to accept unconditional surrender.

That report is in hindsight. It does not reflect what was known when the bombs were dropped.

 

[JakePwnsAtLife]

Well, from an objective, historical viewpoint, they wouldn't have surrendered until the last man, and the military tactics officers knew this. It actually probably saved lives as horrible as it sounds...and the atomic bomb really didn't have that much more destroying power, it was just in one swoop rather than a five hour raid. When the United States bombed Tokyo at night, it killed the same number of people, it was just less talked about. Tactics wise, it was a smart move on their part to end the war. Moral wise, it was a terrible thing to do. All I've got to say on the subject.

 

[Dragonearl]

Wow, you really need to get a grip on reality bro!. Civilians do what they have to do to survive in their daily existence. Not all civilians blindly follow their leaders views into war. The US war in Iraq is a prime example where the people don't represent the leaders view all the time. You can lament all you want about Israel being hindered by terrorists hiding behind civilians, and that is a real hinderence but I hope you realize that accomplishing objectives and committing war crimes is a thin line that should not be crossed. Besides the military of all people know the importance of not cillians civilians in engagements, why else do they spend millions of dollars in developing the latest in precision guided weapons. If civilians are so easily expended as you say, why does the army still not use the Vietnam era "dumb bombs" instead of the modern laser guided ones? Why because intentional civilian casualties is a war crime.

That was my point. Modern views on civilian casualties/total war put ridiculous restrictions on soldiers. As far as I'm concerned, civilians should be given one chance: hand over all military personnel and equipment and surrender (or all civilians simply leave the target area until the battle's over). If they don't do either, then that's too bad. They are now targets.
I would rather see generals level cities than bother facing mass urban combat. Civilians should never have priority over your own soldiers.


Cornwind makes a good point. I'd like to say I try and stay objective, but judging myself is not exactly objective in and of itself. Debating the bombs is still a valid discussion in my view, if only to see how many people are foolish enough to say no. On the other hand, it's also amusing to see how many people say yes while clearly having no clue what they're talking about.

Finally, some people have pointed out how the atomic bombs were not war crimes because no one else calls strategic bombing a war crime. As I believe I've stated, that's a slippery slope. Every major combatant in WWII decried strategic bombing as a war crime, while simultaneously doing it themselves. In a sense of objectives, I believe that strategic bombing in the kind that Britain and Germany committed were not necessarily crimes, but they were not justifiable either. Even after it should have become clear that bombing a civilian populace for terror purposes wasn't working, it continued. For the British, it was an act of pure vengeance.

Nonsense on many levels here. One of your problems is that you are emotional instead of rational. How do you expect an entire city, no, 2 entire cities to evacuate all their civilians?. And how in gods name are civilians supposed to force military personnel to hand over the weapons and abandon their duties???. Don't be ridiculous, you can't let feelings and blind patriotism become more important than innocent people's lives.

First, you must separate the people running a country from the people living in the country. Not everyone in Nazi Germany hated the Jews and wanted to see them gassed. Likewise, not everyone in Japan wanted to attack Pearl Harbor and kill Americans. To whine that the Japanese started it is a silly schoolboy attitude and to claim retribution on the civilians is just downright bullying. Stop hiding behind the flimsy words by saying, "It's war!" as if to point out that playing foul is expected during wartime. It isn't!, and the military has rules for this. That is why there is a war crimes tribunal and a code of conduct during warfare.

Secondly, the lives of people who are utterly detached from the act of war and are killing no one should never be the target of a lethal attack. This is why 9/11 was such a horrific event, remember? It was the loss of innocent civilians and private property that makes it so abhorrent. Our nuclear terrorist attacks on Japan were far, far worse. I can accept a certain amount of civilian casualties that are an unfortunate consequence of military engagement with armed forces, but that is something entirely different and on a much smaller scale.

 

[oralloy]

This was a crime against humanity on a massive scale.

Crimes against humanity generally involve the direct targeting of civilians.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were both targeted for their military value (especially Hiroshima).

War Crimes include the targetting of areas where there is likely to be a dense population of civilians. London, Paris and New York all have military value, would it be acceptable to drop a nuclear bomb on them? This would be considered a War Crime without doubt.

The fact remains that a large number of civilians died because of very powerful indiscriminate weapons, that is a war crime.

I am not sure the military value of those cities was as great as the military value of Hiroshima (nuking Hiroshima would be closer to nuking the Pentagon).

But I agree that the A-bombs were war crimes because of the excessive civilian death.

I just dispute the notion that we were targeting civilians.

 

[Spicy meatball]

Wow, you really need to get a grip on reality bro!. Civilians do what they have to do to survive in their daily existence. Not all civilians blindly follow their leaders views into war. The US war in Iraq is a prime example where the people don't represent the leaders view all the time. You can lament all you want about Israel being hindered by terrorists hiding behind civilians, and that is a real hinderence but I hope you realize that accomplishing objectives and committing war crimes is a thin line that should not be crossed. Besides the military of all people know the importance of not cillians civilians in engagements, why else do they spend millions of dollars in developing the latest in precision guided weapons. If civilians are so easily expended as you say, why does the army still not use the Vietnam era "dumb bombs" instead of the modern laser guided ones? Why because intentional civilian casualties is a war crime.

That was my point. Modern views on civilian casualties/total war put ridiculous restrictions on soldiers. As far as I'm concerned, civilians should be given one chance: hand over all military personnel and equipment and surrender (or all civilians simply leave the target area until the battle's over). If they don't do either, then that's too bad. They are now targets.
I would rather see generals level cities than bother facing mass urban combat. Civilians should never have priority over your own soldiers.


Cornwind makes a good point. I'd like to say I try and stay objective, but judging myself is not exactly objective in and of itself. Debating the bombs is still a valid discussion in my view, if only to see how many people are foolish enough to say no. On the other hand, it's also amusing to see how many people say yes while clearly having no clue what they're talking about.

Finally, some people have pointed out how the atomic bombs were not war crimes because no one else calls strategic bombing a war crime. As I believe I've stated, that's a slippery slope. Every major combatant in WWII decried strategic bombing as a war crime, while simultaneously doing it themselves. In a sense of objectives, I believe that strategic bombing in the kind that Britain and Germany committed were not necessarily crimes, but they were not justifiable either. Even after it should have become clear that bombing a civilian populace for terror purposes wasn't working, it continued. For the British, it was an act of pure vengeance.

Nonsense on many levels here. One of your problems is that you are emotional instead of rational. How do you expect an entire city, no, 2 entire cities to evacuate all their civilians?. And how in gods name are civilians supposed to force military personnel to hand over the weapons and abandon their duties???. Don't be ridiculous, you can't let feelings and blind patriotism become more important than innocent people's lives.

First, you must separate the people running a country from the people living in the country. Not everyone in Nazi Germany hated the Jews and wanted to see them gassed. Likewise, not everyone in Japan wanted to attack Pearl Harbor and kill Americans. To whine that the Japanese started it is a silly schoolboy attitude and to claim retribution on the civilians is just downright bullying. Stop hiding behind the flimsy words by saying, "It's war!" as if to point out that playing foul is expected during wartime. It isn't!, and the military has rules for this. That is why there is a war crimes tribunal and a code of conduct during warfare.

Secondly, the lives of people who are utterly detached from the act of war and are killing no one should never be the target of a lethal attack. This is why 9/11 was such a horrific event, remember? It was the loss of innocent civilians and private property that makes it so abhorrent. Our nuclear terrorist attacks on Japan were far, far worse. I can accept a certain amount of civilian casualties that are an unfortunate consequence of military engagement with armed forces, but that is something entirely different and on a much smaller scale.

Fkn excellent!. It's just appalling to find so many people that just blindly see civilian casualties as a justifiable loss as long as the individual goals can be achieved in the long/short term.

 

[beddo]

The US was expected to abide by the Geneva convention as was each country, state, nation, group and military personnel. Clearly there was a large population of civilians. The atomic bombings could have been reasonably expected to kill most of them, and it did. Thus if the civilian deaths were considered the US would have known that the act would be a War Crime and not gone ahead with it.

However, they did go ahead with it. Thus the Government obviously showed no ethical or moral consideration for the lives of those civilians who were to be murdered.

WW2 was hotbed of Geneva Convention violations. Violations against civilians seemed like they were commonplace, Look at Dresden, German POW, and Concentration camps like Buchenwald, The Japanese invasion of China, and other Asian countries, and The Soviets in Berlin. There are plenty more violations that you can look up, the 200,000-250,000 people killed in Japan were just a drop in the bucket.

Indeed, many people died horrifically. What's sad is that all of the lesons we learned we have started to ignore and even legislate against the safegaurds we put in.

Why would the U.S., Japan, Germany or Russia take the Geneva Convention seriously if no one else did at that time?

Okay, I see the argument you are making here but I must, disagree with the idea. If you're going to be as evil as those who commit War Crimes then what are you fighting for? You're only fighting for existence rather than a better way of being. Our grandparents and great grandparents fought for what was right,

There were hardly any groups that could enforce it, It was mostly an gentleman's agreement. It isn't like today where the UN could step in, and try to enforce the laws. The Geneva Convention was and still is only as strong as the nations willing to enforce it.

This is a natural weakness of a body that is only answerable to itself. This is my point though, the only way to be the better one is to act like it. It's not morally acceptable to commit a crime just because no one can stop you and/or will know about it.

At the time it was all out war, killing civilians, taking out factories, and hitting military targets at the same time was a very effective tactic. You kill many birds with one stone, You kill the will to fight, you kill the economy, you kill sources of vehicles, and weapons, and of course potential soldiers, and current soldiers.

After so many wars it was recognised how unnecessary and horrific civilian deaths are. That's why the Geneva convention and I might add many previous war rule agreements were made over the course of human history.

Ironically, targetting and killing civilians often strengthens the resolve of the whole country. In any case the war was more or less over and with Japan about to surrender and so many civilians in the line of fire, the bombings in Japan were completely unjust.

 

[Kaboose the Moose]

1st bomb: 99.99% NO! - It's a desecration against nature

How is it a desecration against nature?. Nuclear fission is a natural occurrence in the very star that gives us life. It is quite a common occurrence in nature, maybe I am nitpicking your statement but still I thought I had to point that out.

Desecration of nature is not about artificial occurrence, but how badly an event has affected the natural environment and the living things in and around it.

so nature can't desecrate it self? that seems kind of odd... i guess the dinosaurs dieing out was a "desecration against nature" by that definition, and not just a natural occurrence, which in turn makes all of humanity fall under that heading, because we wouldn't have been able to evolve if such predators were around (assuming you believe in such things.)

 

[JWAN]

yes

more people would have died in a conventional invasion/naval blockade

the option was 2 nukes OR surround the mainland, start air and sea bombardment then send in hundreds of thousands, even millions of troops, more fire bombings as well
We gave them a chance to surrender and they refused so we hit them again
that's what they got for being stubborn


or we could have just done the block aid thing but the military would have taken all of the food rations and that would have left the civilians to starve to death.

 

[Spicy meatball]

I am sorry but the events of August 6 and 9 are easily defined by one word. Terrorism!. Terrorism from the part of the US. Terrorism, according to the Academic Consensus Definition is: "Terrorism is an anxiety-inspiring method of repeated violent action, employed by (semi-) clandestine individual, group or state actors, for idiosyncratic, criminal or political reasons, whereby - in contrast to assassination - the direct targets of violence are not the main targets. The immediate human victims of violence are generally chosen randomly (targets of opportunity) or selectively (representative or symbolic targets) from a target population, and serve as message generators. Threat- and violence-based communication processes between terrorist (organization), (imperilled) victims, and main targets are used to manipulate the main target (audience(s)), turning it into a target of terror, a target of demands, or a target of attention, depending on whether intimidation, coercion, or propaganda is primarily sought" (Schmid, 1988 ).

So, technically, it was a terrorist act. Sorry, but it is true.

 

[Svenparty]

If the country you lived in, somehow became a target because of your countries leaders and you got Nuked would some of you still think that the people in Nagasaki"For the greater good" deserved to have their Unborn children destroyed before birth?

As raised previously not every single Japanese person wanted to "ATAKA DA PEARL HARBA" and not every single American wanted to "Slap a Jap" (As the old propaganda phrase was)

So Nein they did not deserve to be nuked(If you didn't already get which side I was on)

 

[MoganFreeman]

Short term, fewer lives were lost in the bombs exploding than would've been lost if we'd invaded the mainland by force. So yes, I think we made the right choice.

Long term, there is no way to tell what the proper choice is. The effects of either decision would be so incredibly far reaching that you would be comparing two completely different worlds.

 

[Sir Ollie]

Lets spin this abit, say opertaion Sealion failed (which it did) and Normandy failed Since Germany were developing Nuclear technology lets say Germany were to first to make a Nuke.

London would be obliterated and i don't really know a target for the US.

Anyway attacking a cilvian target would have a bigger effect, even though we may regret it now its in the past, to save lives making a full scale attack on Japan i suppose you can call it the "lesser of two evils" to save thousands of lives against the cost of thousands of lives.

Though decision, i suppose i would stop the attack but i rather not see the effect it may casue so for historic reasons i would let the attack happen.