The only regret i have about hiroshima and nagasaki...

[beyelzu]

was that we couldnt come up with cooler names for the two bombs.

well and on a large timeline i regret nuclear proliferation.


alright adora this is the spot for discussion of the bombs.

ill get to it this afternoon for sure

[beyelzu]

You, Bey, like many individuals I get into such conversations with, make the grave mistake that just because one finds the eventual historical actions committed by one side in a war abhorrent, one is laying all blame at their feet

This is a common stance taken by those trying way too hard to defend their shaky position. And I'm not even going to start on your historical inaccuracies.

Point is, I'm not laying all blame for the ending of Japan's part in the war at the feet of the US Army, though their decision was ultimately the one that resulted in the means of the end, which, for your righteous record, I find an evil on-par with the atrocities committed by the Japanese in the war, not because of the death toll but because of the true reasoning behind it. So don't try and pull the pathetic, cheap, and inhumane "They were killing more people than we were" bullshit with me, boyo.

yeah but our killing people with the bombs stopped them from killing people.

us killing germans stopped hitler from rounding up people and putting them in gas chambers.

all actions arent equal. there are real moral consequences for actions including wars

as fucked up as it is, in the real world sometimes nuking two fucking cities is the best strategic and moral option.

and if you think it doesnt matter tell that to the koreans who loved us till recently whole heartedly cuz we saved them twice.

take your the japanese are morally equivalent to the us well the us are probably worse to the chinese where japan was testing plague on real live chinamen.


these things do indeed matter.

stopping the deaths of 100k people a week, over a million a month and avoiding a prolonged invasion with the resulting loss of life is also a very fucking good thing

[beyelzu]

what do you think the true reasoning behind the dropping of the bomb was?

tactical advantage for the us and hopefully force a surrender???

[beyelzu]

oh and what historical inaccuracies are you referring to???

by all means lets start.

when a country attacks another county the first country certainly has a right to defend themselves. when the initial aggessor country is violating human rights and the attackee fucks up the aggressor up and ends those human rights violations, i think you definitely get to charge the stopping of the civil rights violatins in the net good column on your whether or not this was moral scorecard.

[beyelzu]

while i made this thread for adora and/or liv anyone else wno wants to talk to me is of course welcome to stop by and tell me to fuck off

[But]

fuck off

[But]

Seriously, I would say that it wasn't necessary, but inevitable, given the mentality of the people at the wheel in politics and the military-scientific complex. They had their big fat throbbing cock out and there wasn't any way they were going to put it away before giving someone a good fuck.

[erimir]

I was under the impression that part of the reasoning was that they didn't want Russia being part of the invasion of Japan, which would mean that Russia's sphere of influence would have been larger and possibly would have resulted in Japan being divided up like Germany.

[beyelzu]

I was under the impression that part of the reasoning was that they didn't want Russia being part of the invasion of Japan, which would mean that Russia's sphere of influence would have been larger and possibly would have resulted in Japan being divided up like Germany.

i have often seen this argument made only it normally goes like this "the us didnt need to drop the bomb japan was going to surrender anyway and we only dropped the bomb to make a point with russia."


did it play a role in the decision, possibly, but there were real tactical reasons for bombing the two cities and russia wasnt part of the primary reasons for dropping the bomb.

that said it certainly made a hell of a statement.

[beyelzu]

Seriously, I would say that it wasn't necessary, but inevitable, given the mentality of the people at the wheel in politics and the military-scientific complex. They had their big fat throbbing cock out and there wasn't any way they were going to put it away before giving someone a good fuck.

not necessary? really?

if the bombs werent dropped how do you see the war ending?

[fragment]

did it play a role in the decision, possibly, but there were real tactical reasons for bombing the two cities and russia wasnt part of the primary reasons for dropping the bomb.
How do you determine the primary reasons? I'm no WWII historian, but I did a bit of brief reading when the subject came up yesterday, and was interested to learn that the Soviets had not only agreed to declare war on Japan at Yalta, but invaded Japan-controlled Manchuria on August 8 - that's after Hiroshima but before Nagasaki. Seems to me the US had a strong interest in a quick capitulation of Japan that had more to do with Russia than with saving lives.

Apparently, one historian has even argued the Soviet invasion was a more important factor in forcing Japan's surrender than the A-bombs were. I'm not capable of judging that claim, but if so even your basic premise that the A-bombs ended the war is questionable.

[But]

not necessary? really?

if the bombs werent dropped how do you see the war ending?

Ended by the Russians, who didn't have the bomb and didn't give a shit about their own casualties. This would have helped saving American soldiers, but of course that wasn't the point. The priorities list was something like:

1. Power
2. Intimidating the Russkies
3. American soldiers' lives

...

74. The price of tea in China
75. The lives of Japanese civilians

[Watser?]

How do you determine the primary reasons? I'm no WWII historian, but I did a bit of brief reading when the subject came up yesterday, and was interested to learn that the Soviets had not only agreed to declare war on Japan at Yalta, but invaded Japan-controlled Manchuria on August 8 - that's after Hiroshima but before Nagasaki. Seems to me the US had a strong interest in a quick capitulation of Japan that had more to do with Russia than with saving lives.

Apparently, one historian has even argued the Soviet invasion was a more important factor in forcing Japan's surrender than the A-bombs were. I'm not capable of judging that claim, but if so even your basic premise that the A-bombs ended the war is questionable.

I won't claim that I am a WWII historian either but I have heard the case made about the second bomb especially.

[beyelzu]

did it play a role in the decision, possibly, but there were real tactical reasons for bombing the two cities and russia wasnt part of the primary reasons for dropping the bomb.
How do you determine the primary reasons? I'm no WWII historian, but I did a bit of brief reading when the subject came up yesterday, and was interested to learn that the Soviets had not only agreed to declare war on Japan at Yalta, but invaded Japan-controlled Manchuria on August 8 - that's after Hiroshima but before Nagasaki. Seems to me the US had a strong interest in a quick capitulation of Japan that had more to do with Russia than with saving lives.

Apparently, one historian has even argued the Soviet invasion was a more important factor in forcing Japan's surrender than the A-bombs were. I'm not capable of judging that claim, but if so even your basic premise that the A-bombs ended the war is questionable.

well there is certainly the timeline to consider.

i dont think that it is accepted or true that the japanese surrendered because of russia. it was the obliteration of two cities that caused the surrender. i think that is accepted history.

im not familiar with the historian that you are referring to, do you have a link by any chance?

[beyelzu]

as to the necessity of the second bomb in particular, at that point japan had not surrendered and iirc was planning to defend their islands in order to hopefully inflict enough casualties on the us that the us would lose their stomach for the war.

they werent planning on surrendering before the bombs.

we had to show that we could destroy their cities at will*



*they had no way of knowing that we couldnt drop a third bomb

[beyelzu]

not necessary? really?

if the bombs werent dropped how do you see the war ending?

Ended by the Russians, who didn't have the bomb and didn't give a shit about their own casualties. This would have helped saving American soldiers, but of course that wasn't the point. The priorities list was something like:

1. Power
2. Intimidating the Russkies
3. American soldiers' lives

...

74. The price of tea in China
75. The lives of Japanese civilians

so you see multiple invasions by the us and the ruskies????

what kind of death toll and collateral damage do you think that would have entailed?

[Watser?]

i dont think that it is accepted or true that the japanese surrendered because of russia. it was the obliteration of two cities that caused the surrender. i think that is accepted history.

im not familiar with the historian that you are referring to, do you have a link by any chance?

I have heard it argued that the Russian invasion (and the amazing speed of their advances) was the deciding factor on the Discovery Channel if that counts :D

[beyelzu]

:dddp:

[beyelzu]

for the record what i know about hiroshima and nagasaki i learned at ii, both the arguments made there and assorted links, and i owe a thanks to vork for making so many posts about the subject.

you might want to check out his blog on the subject

http://michaelturton.blogspot.com/2005/07/hiroshima-time-again.html

[beyelzu]

help i have no idea why my post shows the whole page it was just supposed to be a link

[fragment]

The historian was a mention on a wiki page. I'm not reading too much into it - could be some inaccurate piece of revisionism that some random threw in during an edit war. That said, given that some factions of the Japanese Government were aiming for a negotiated surrender whereby Japan held onto some territory outside of Japan, I think we can at least agree that the invasion of Manchuria was a factor in making that position less tenable.

Also, I've run into enough people who seem to think the US was the major factor in the defeat of Nazi Germany to make me a little suspicious of "accepted history" in the English-speaking world. I'm throwing this stuff up not because I think it's right, but because I want better sources before I consider the opposing position to be right.

[Watser?]

There is also the top of that blog page at the top of this page

Very weird

[fragment]

bey, that's a bug in the link parsing. You'll have to edit the junk out and make it [ url=xxxxd ] my link [ /url ]

[beyelzu]

any idea why it does that fragment?

[beyelzu]

There is also the top of that blog page at the top of this page

Very weird

maybe that was cuz im part of the html group, dunno but it seems fixed to me now

[fragment]

any idea why it does that fragment?
There's a plug-in that recognises links. When it sees them it hits the page linked to, parses it to find the title, and writes that into the link.

Occasionally there's something in the html that breaks the parsing.

[godfry n. glad]

Any initiative, in peacetime, or wartime, has the potential of addressing more than a single concern.

The use of atomic weapons served a couple of purposes. Japan was exceedingly nationalistic and its power structure was riven with accomodationist/militarist divisions. The Japanese militarists were using the potential entrance of the Soviet Union as a rationale to hold out even against a home island invasion....The US military did not wish to utilize such a bold tactic, because it was viewed to be too costly in terms of US personnel needed to undertake such a venture. However, the Russians had promised at Yalta to formally enter the war six months from the date of the Yalta Agreement, which they honored and immediately invaded Manchuria. It took that time from the cessation of hostilities in Germany to ship sufficient troops and provisions across the Asian land mass.

With the completion of the Trinity test, the US had a new weapon. It did not know the actually efficacy of such a weapon in real usage, but it promised to be a real impressive product. They thought they might end the war, without an invasion and without having to wait out a blockade of materials into Japan. As it happens, it was determined that Japan had just three days of food supply prior to their surrender. The only real option to invasion would have produced nationwide starvation, potentially killing far more noncombatants than both atomic bombs. So, acquiescence to the dual bombing as a clear sign that Japan would not endure and should surrender, saved thousands, probably millions of Japanese lives and millions more from enduring starvation and depravation...and probabaly widespread disease.

That said...I still think that the Nagasaki bomb was more of a statement to the Russians. It said "we have more of these". Of course, it made that same statement to the Japanese and pushed an already tettering governmental structure into final, and unconditional, surrender.

Curiously, the Soviets were promised a hand in the victory over and post-war occupation of Japan. They had to be satisfied with the (Chinese) lands they grabbed from the Japanese colony in Manchuria. The US would have no part of the Soviets administering postwar Japan. The US renegged on its part of the Yalta Agreement, as I understand it.

[fragment]

Tsuyoshi Hasegawa (http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/hasegawa.htm) is the historian I mentioned.

[beyelzu]

That's because it was not a major factor in the surrender. Hirohito mentioned Soviet entry once, on the 13th, during this whole period. Suzuki explained Japanese thinking in December, saying that the major issue was the landings. Once the Japanese realized that air power alone could annhilate the forces at the beachhead and reduce US losses to insignificant levels, the game was up. This was corroborated by Kido. The Emperor also wrote a letter to his son a week after surrender, which did not mention Soviet entry either. Additionally, after the Soviets had entered, the Council and the Cabinet both refused in separate votes to end the war. In other words, Soviet entry was not a major factor in the decision to end the war.

this is one issue im not very familiar with.

[beyelzu]

Tsuyoshi Hasegawa (http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/hasegawa.htm) is the historian I mentioned.

maybe i should read his book

"Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japan."


pretty sure i know what he is going to advocate.

:tmgrin:

[fragment]

Go out on a limb, bey, let us know your prediction

[godfry n. glad]

That's because it was not a major factor in the surrender. Hirohito mentioned Soviet entry once, on the 13th, during this whole period. Suzuki explained Japanese thinking in December, saying that the major issue was the landings. Once the Japanese realized that air power alone could annhilate the forces at the beachhead and reduce US losses to insignificant levels, the game was up. This was corroborated by Kido. The Emperor also wrote a letter to his son a week after surrender, which did not mention Soviet entry either. Additionally, after the Soviets had entered, the Council and the Cabinet both refused in separate votes to end the war. In other words, Soviet entry was not a major factor in the decision to end the war.

this is one issue im not very familiar with.

The timing of the entry of the Soviets was not a Japanese issue, but an American one. The US wanted a quick and early unconditional surrender so that they would not have to share the occupation of Japan with the Soviets.

A blockade, the only other reasonable answer to a direct invasion of the home islands, would have been protracted and quite ugly. Probably more ugly, in the end, than the two atomic weapons inflicted upon the hapless Japanese public. In the end, it would have resulted in the US sharing the occupation of Japan with the Soviet Union, at least, and possibly other allied powers, as well. The US wanted total control in Japan. Both bombings, by the way, were gross violations of US war-making policies, but they'd already pissed away those moral constraints with carpet bombing in Germany (most notably Dresden) and the fire-bombing of Tokyo and other Japanese cities.

[fragment]

I should point out that, while I find the historical details interesting, I'm with Adora in that I think a determination of the morality of the A-bomb decision (and plenty of other war-time decisions) doesn't just rest on comparing numbers of deaths between two courses of action.

[godfry n. glad]

Nor do I. The matrix of factors considered most likely made such considerations, but they were probably weighed with othe considerations as well. There was no single determinant....even the weight of casualties on either or both sides.

[beyelzu]

Go out on a limb, bey, let us know your prediction

i really would like to read his perspective, i will if i can get it cheaply.

[beyelzu]

I should point out that, while I find the historical details interesting, I'm with Adora in that I think a determination of the morality of the A-bomb decision (and plenty of other war-time decisions) doesn't just rest on comparing numbers of deaths between two courses of action.

disagree if yo udont consider number of deaths and the effects on people's lives you are left unable to make a decision at all.

is it the best criteria :shrug:

but being dead definitely sucks more than being alive and minimizing deaths is a good thing.

[Ari]

I have an issue with them choosing targets partly based on how much civilian damage could be done. Obviously one point was demoralization but I think that could have been done while attempting to reduce, not increase, civilian deaths.
At least that's what I understand from gov papers weighing which targets to hit.

[InTheServiceOfZeke]

the only regret i have about bombs is that they aren't used exclusively on the people who believe they solve problems.

michael :)

[beyelzu]

ok, i wasnt aware that the targets were picked to maximize civilian deaths


got a link?

[InTheServiceOfZeke]

fuck the nuclear shit. it is far worse that tokyo was fire-bombed and most of the targets were indeed civilian. i don't know how you could argue otherwise after witnessing the aftermath and the ordinance used (not exactly accurate) and i even think mcnamara admits that in 'fog of war'...i could be wrong about that.

do you agree with the fire-bombing of tokyo? probably not if you invest in real estate or raw materials for building....

michael :)

[Ari]

ok, i wasnt aware that the targets were picked to maximize civilian deaths
got a link?
I may be misremembering the report but I'll find a link. Obviously it wasn't their only reason but I remember it to be high on the list, which included an untouched area to really show off the damage as well as containing a military target.

Here (http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB162/index.htm) is a site with what looks to be a large number of documents, which I found while searching. The documents I'm thinking of are the notes from the first and second target committee meetings.

[InTheServiceOfZeke]

there is a lot of profit in rebuilding after a war, but i'm sure that has nothing to do with things. a person would have to be paranoid to think this way...

[beyelzu]

fuck the nuclear shit. it is far worse that tokyo was fire-bombed and most of the targets were indeed civilian. i don't know how you could argue otherwise after witnessing the aftermath and the ordinance used (not exactly accurate) and i even think mcnamara admits that in 'fog of war'...i could be wrong about that.

do you agree with the fire-bombing of tokyo? probably not if you invest in real estate or raw materials for building....

michael :)

it was effective which is why they switched to incendiary bombs as opposed to conventional bombing.

[InTheServiceOfZeke]

oh...so...100 000 people burned to death, but none were targeted?

terrible aim.

but hey...got rid of those shitty wood buildings. concrete is the western way...


michael :)

[fragment]

disagree if yo udont consider number of deaths and the effects on people's lives you are left unable to make a decision at all.

For the record, I didn't say don't consider deaths at all, just that it's insufficient.

[Kyuss Apollo]

fuck the nuclear shit. it is far worse that tokyo was fire-bombed and most of the targets were indeed civilian. i don't know how you could argue otherwise after witnessing the aftermath and the ordinance used (not exactly accurate) and i even think mcnamara admits that in 'fog of war'...i could be wrong about that.

do you agree with the fire-bombing of tokyo? probably not if you invest in real estate or raw materials for building....

michael :)

it was effective which is why they switched to incendiary bombs as opposed to conventional bombing.

The psychological effect also of a SINGLE bomb inflicting that much damage, was...quite effective. How can you prevent even a single bomb from landing?

Offtopic I know but this is also why W's stupid missile shield is the stupidest thing I've ever heard come out of his mouth.

[California Tanker]

I have an issue with them choosing targets partly based on how much civilian damage could be done. Obviously one point was demoralization but I think that could have been done while attempting to reduce, not increase, civilian deaths.
At least that's what I understand from gov papers weighing which targets to hit.

That's the problem with trying to relate to WWII thinking from a 21st Century point of view. By 1945, ariel bombing of civilian targets had been going on for five years by all sides, from the Blitz, through the V1/V2 attacks, the Thousand Bomber Raids, and the firebombings of Dresden or Tokyo. This was total war, the enemy to be defeated wasn't just the opposition's military, but the opposition's nation to include the people who constituted that nation. We today know nothing like that mentality. So what if they killed civilians? More dead enemy, from their perspective. Today, we disapprove of that line of thinking but given the criteria of the time, the weapons just made the standard procedure even more effective, just like any other improvement in weapons development.

Indeed, atomic weapons were envisioned as being not the weapons of last resort and deterrance as they are now, but as being standard battlefield equipment. It was expected that the next war would, by default, be fought by soldiers slinging A-weapons around left, right and centre, and nobody had a problem with that. It's part of the reason that the US Army was caught a little short-footed in Korea.

the only regret i have about bombs is that they aren't used exclusively on the people who believe they solve problems.

One could argue that they seemed to solve America's immediate Japanese problem of 1945.

NTM

[godfry n. glad]

Sorry, CT...not true.

There were existing protocols on aerial bombing as early as 1907. The US pushed for more explicit bans on aerial bombing in the early twenties.

Here's the section from the Geneva Conventions - Aerial Bombing of Cities section of wiki:

Aerial bombardment and international law
International law up to 1945
International law relating to aerial bombardment before and during World War II rests on the treaties of 1864, 1899, 1907 which constituted the definition of most of the laws of at that time — which, despite repeated diplomatic attempts, was not updated in the immediate run up to World War II. The most relevant of these treaties are the Hague Conventions of 1907 because they were the last treaties ratified before 1939 which specify the laws of war on aerial bombardment. Of these treaties there are two which have a direct bearing on this issue of bombardment. These are "Laws of War: Laws and Customs of War on Land (Hague IV); October 18, 1907"[3] and "Laws of War: Bombardment by Naval Forces in Time of War (Hague IX); October 18, 1907"[4]. It is significant that there is a different treaty which should be invoked for bombardment of land by land (Hague IV) and of land by sea (Hague IX) [5]. Hague IV which reaffirmed and updated Hague II (1899) [6] contains the following clauses:

Article 25: The attack or bombardment of towns, villages, habitations or buildings which are not defended, is prohibited.
Article 26: The Commander of an attacking force, before commencing a bombardment, except in the case of an assault, should do all he can to warn the authorities.
Article 27: In sieges and bombardments all necessary steps should be taken to spare as far as possible edifices devoted to religion, art, science, and charity, hospitals, and places where the sick and wounded are collected, provided they are not used at the same time for military purposes.
The besieged should indicate these buildings or places by some particular and visible signs, which should previously be notified to the assailants.[6]

In 1923 a draft convention, promoted by the United States was proposed: The Hague Rules of Air Warfare, December, 1922-February, 1923",[7] There are number of articles which would have directly affected how nations used aerial bombardment and defended against it; these are articles 18, 22 and 24. It was, however, never adopted in legally binding form. [8]

The subordination of the law of air warfare to the law of ground warfare was arguably established by the Greco-German arbitration tribunal of 1927-30. It found that the 1907 Hague Convention on "The Laws and Customs of War on Land" applied to the German attacks in Greece during World War I:[9] This concerned both Article 25 and Article 26.

The U.S. Air Force Law Review argues that "if international law is not enforced, persistent violations can conceivably be adopted as customary practice, permitting conduct that was once prohibited"[10] Even if the Greco-German arbitration tribunal findings had established the rules for aerial bombardment, by 1945, the belligerents of World War II had ignored the preliminary bombardment procedures that the Greco-German arbitration tribunal had recognized.[11]

In response to a League of Nations declaration against bombardment from the air[12], a draft convention in Amsterdam of 1938[13] would have provided specific definitions of what constituted a "undefended" town, excessive civilian casualties and appropriate warning. This draft convention makes the standard of being undefended quite high - any military units or anti-aircraft within the radius qualifies a town as defended. This convention, like the 1923 draft, was not ratified, nor even close to being ratified, when hostilities broke out in Europe. While the two conventions offer a guideline to what the belligerent powers were considering before the war, neither of these documents came to be legally binding.

After the war the judgement of the Nuremberg Trials,[14] the records the decision that by 1939 these rules laid down in the 1907 Hague Convention were recognised by all civilised nations, and were regarded as declaratory of the laws and customs of war. Under this post-war decision, a country did not have to have ratified the 1907 Hague conventions in order to be bound by them [15].

In 1963 the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the subject of a Japanese judicial review in Ryuichi Shimoda et al. v. The State. The review draws several distinctions which are pertinent to both conventional and atomic aerial bombardment. Based on international law found in Hague Convention of 1907 IV - The Laws and Customs of War on Land and IX - Bombardment by Naval Forces in Time of War, and the Hague Draft Rules of Air Warfare of 1922–1923 the Court drew a distinction between "Targeted Aerial Bombardment" and indiscriminate area bombardment, that the court called "Blind Aerial Bombardment", and also a distinction between a defended and undefended city.[16] "In principle, a defended city is a city which resists an attempt at occupation by land forces. A city even with defence installations and armed forces cannot be said to be a defended city if it is far away from the battlefield and is not in immediate danger of occupation by the enemy."[17] The court ruled that blind aerial bombardment is only permitted in the immediate vicinity of the operations of land forces and that only targeted aerial bombardment of military installations is permitted further from the front. It also ruled that, in such an event, the incidental death of civilians and the destruction of civilian property during targeted aerial bombardment was not unlawful.[18] The court acknowledged that the concept of a military objective was enlarged under conditions of total war, but stated that the distinction between the two did not disappear.[19] The court also ruled that when military targets were concentrated in a comparatively small area, and where defence installations against air raids were very strong, that when the destruction of non-military objectives is small in proportion to the large military interests, or necessity, such destruction is lawful.[18] So in the judgement of the Court, because of the immense power of the bombs, and the distance from enemy (Allied) land forces, the bombing of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki "was an illegal act of hostilities under international law as it existed at that time, as an indiscriminate bombardment of undefended cities".[20]

Not all governments and scholars of international law agree with the analysis and conclusions of the Shimoda review, because it was not based on positive international humanitarian law. Colonel Javier Guisández Gómez, at the International Institute of Humanitarian Law in San Remo, points out:

In examining these events [Anti-city strategy/blitz] in the light of international humanitarian law, it should be borne in mind that during the Second World War there was no agreement, treaty, convention or any other instrument governing the protection of the civilian population or civilian property, as the Conventions then in force dealt only with the protection of the wounded and the sick on the battlefield and in naval warfare, hospital ships, the laws and customs of war and the protection of prisoners of war.[11]

This leaves the legal status of aerial bombardment during World War II ambiguous and open to other interpretations, for example one of the reasons given by John Bolton, U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, for the USA not agreeing to be bound by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court is that

A fair reading of the [Rome Statute], for example, leaves the objective observer unable to answer with confidence whether the United States was guilty of war crimes for its aerial bombing campaigns over Germany and Japan in World War II. Indeed, if anything, a straightforward reading of the language probably indicates that the court would find the United States guilty. A fortiori, these provisions seem to imply that the United States would have been guilty of a war crime for dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This is intolerable and unacceptable.[21]

[California Tanker]

There were existing protocols on aerial bombing as early as 1907.


I'd say that's unlikely as the first time an airplane dropped a bomb on anything was 1911.

The US pushed for more explicit bans on aerial bombing in the early twenties.

Yet they were never accepted by the rest of the world. There are two things to note here. The first is that most likely nobody at the time knew the devastation which could be caused by massed ariel attack. Remember that in 1923, bombers were still biplanes. Even the dreaded Zeppelin raids of WWI (which were conducted in response to French bombing raids of German cities) were of overall limited lethality. Note also the 1938 issue of 'what is defended', a question I was going to pose as soon as I read the first part of the post but before I got to the 1938 section.

The second, although more controversial, is the concept that in a case of such total war, adherence to any rules at all is more a concession than a requirement. The loser of WWII would not have received a "Fair Play Award" after all. Thus, since there was no legal restriction in force preventing ariel bombings, and as it was a case of playing for keeps, it was bombs away over cities with little compunction. It's a lot easier to talk about being civilised in warfare when not actually partaking in a war at the time.

NTM

[Clutch Munny]

massed ariel attack

:chin:

[viscousmemories]

Incidentally Vorkosigan (Michael Turton) made some interesting posts on this subject here a couple years ago, starting here (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?p=99359#post99359).

[Adora]

yeah but our killing people with the bombs stopped them from killing people.
Again, you're delineating an either/or blame situation in the war. This is never the case, as I have pointed out in the previous thread. I do not place all blame for the end of Japan's part in the war at the feet of the Americans, nor do I place it all at the feet of the Japanese.

If it had gone another way, eg more carpet bombing, blockading, or any other too-intensive process that was eventually discarded in favour of their new toy, I still wouldn't. The blood of civillians that die during a conflict in their own country are as much on the hands of their leaders as they are on any invading forces. Especially when - as is usually the case - they are mostly starving bastards just trying to survive in absolutely horrible situations.

us killing germans stopped hitler from rounding up people and putting them in gas chambers.
I find this argument difficult to stomach considering your moral-by-numbers stance. The final tally of murdered persecuted-non-combatants at the end of the war in Germany was great enough to be labelled an atrocity. "Stop" is stretching the truth a bit further than is logical. "Slowed down a bit" is probably closer to the reality.

best strategic and moral option.
And I'd agree with this, if I believed half the propaganda printed about the ultimate US military decision. The fact is, I don't. I'm far too cynical to believe the US did it really because they were such caring bastards that they gave two fucks for the lives of their sworn and hated enemies, ruled under the thumb of equally incompetent military idiots, and whether more would die via firebombing, nuking or starvation over a protracted period of time. Puhlease get a reality check. The only thing they gave a fuck about was that their Big Bomb made their dicks hard. That is not a "moral option". And it only counts as a "strategic" option by a hair's breadth.

to the koreans
I don't think that phrase means what you think it means. Do you mean the North or the South? Which "we" are you referring to? And how recently?

where japan was testing plague on real live chinamen.
And the US gave immunity and repatriation to European death-doctors to prevent the information they discovered during their work for Germany falling into Russia's hands. What's your point about "violations of human rights" again? Please, name one war, one honest-to-god war, where the US has ever really*, given a shit about human rights?

*Note: Reality =/= Propaganda. Remember this fact. If you have an issue with this, please refer to Godfry's post re:US war policies & previous bombings in Germany and Japan.

and the effects on people's lives
You keep saying this and this is what I keep trying to point out to you: No other country in the world has suffered a single, short, intense event the way Japan has with the bomb. This was a weapon that killed so many people in such a short time that we still can't comprehend it now. It is something the nation, as long as it exists in some form of the way it is now, will never forget, ever. It's a cultural scar on-par with US slavery, the German holocaust, and such paradigm-defining historical incidents. It transcends time and place, like a memory of an attack a victim keeps living over and over again because it had such a big impact on them. Whether or not the victim deserved the attack isn't the point. It wasn't just a "regular" weapon attack such as carpet bombing, cavalry invasion, drawn-out troop battles, etc etc, as had been known up to that point. The nuclear bomb ushered in the new age of weapons technology, and you simply can't seperate the country that was the victim of that first step from the step itself.

I'm certain I still haven't made clear what I'm trying to get across in the last paragraph, because I'm not satisfied with it myself. I'm not saying it would have been better one way or another - by any sides' numbers or death count or moral balance over the other - to choose another path. That's the problem with hindsight on a time dominated by the military: You will never have the truth, or anything vaguely resembling it, because of the nature of the institution itself dominating the time period. That doesn't mean I have to accept phrases like "necessary", "morally right" or "inevitable" to describe the event that did happen, especially an event I understand to have been brought about for cynical and gross reasons, and which had such an ineffable effect on the country it happened to. In fact, it means I have even less reason to accept them than I would if it was a time of peace for the nations in question.

[beyelzu]

When i said koreans i was referring to south koreans and as to how recently, well among the younger generation, think below thirty,there is a rising tide of anti american sentiment but most older koreans still appreciate what the us has done for them.

and i have largely anecdotal evidence from several friends i have had that lived in and grew up in south korea.

i think the bomb was pretty obviously a strategic choice, and all the editorializing in the world wont change that.

as to the bulk of your post concerning morality, i will have to think about it, you raise some excellent points that i hadnt considered.

how would you decide whether or not the bomb was strategically necessary and/or expedient?

[But]

i think the bomb was pretty obviously a strategic choice, and all the editorializing in the world wont change that.


Of course. But strategic != moral.

Also, a military and economic superpower's priorities according to which they make their strategic choices are seldom the ones they sell to the public.

[godfry n. glad]

There were existing protocols on aerial bombing as early as 1907.


I'd say that's unlikely as the first time an airplane dropped a bomb on anything was 1911.

Read the quote, CT. "Laws of War: Bombardment by Naval Forces in Time of War (Hague IX)".

I presume it is in reference to naval shelling. The extension to aircraft is merely a quibble over means.

The US pushed for more explicit bans on aerial bombing in the early twenties.

Yet they were never accepted by the rest of the world. There are two things to note here. The first is that most likely nobody at the time knew the devastation which could be caused by massed ariel attack. Remember that in 1923, bombers were still biplanes. Even the dreaded Zeppelin raids of WWI (which were conducted in response to French bombing raids of German cities) were of overall limited lethality. Note also the 1938 issue of 'what is defended', a question I was going to pose as soon as I read the first part of the post but before I got to the 1938 section.

Yes, but aerial bombing's effectiveness against military targets, particularly naval targets was more than adequately demonstrated in 1921. I also believe that the United State unilaterally declared that it would never engage in aerial bombing of civilian populations. The US stood by its moral guns all of about 15 years, if that.

The second, although more controversial, is the concept that in a case of such total war, adherence to any rules at all is more a concession than a requirement. The loser of WWII would not have received a "Fair Play Award" after all. Thus, since there was no legal restriction in force preventing ariel bombings, and as it was a case of playing for keeps, it was bombs away over cities with little compunction. It's a lot easier to talk about being civilised in warfare when not actually partaking in a war at the time.

NTM

There was (as already noted and reiterated) "legal" restriction upon aerial bombardment of civilian populations. We ignored it because the Axis ignored it (anybody remember Guernica - before The Great Patriotic War?), thereby lowering ourselves to the standards of our heinous opponent.

By the time we got to the end of the war against heinous and venal despots it didn't matter that we'd wipe out complete cities of noncombatants - we'd already lost our "moral compass".

Camel - nose - tent.

[Adora]

When i said koreans i was referring to south koreans and as to how recently, well among the younger generation, think below thirty,there is a rising tide of anti american sentiment but most older koreans still appreciate what the us has done for them. and i have largely anecdotal evidence from several friends i have had that lived in and grew up in south korea.
That's the same in many countries around the world at the moment. Old couts in my own country who still crawl into the RSLs on the weekends think we did the right thing following the US like Paris's chihuahua into Iraq, but most of the people protesting it in the streets were those under 40 (though there were a lot over 40). Just because one generation thinks one event that ultimately came down to the US saved their country X generations ago, doesn't mean the next generation is going to think they walk on water.

how would you decide whether or not the bomb was strategically necessary and/or expedient?
People with better knowledge of the military histories have made better arguments about it here. But I've pointed out my problem with these: I don't believe military histories. The reasons we get told the military did things are rarely, if ever, the real reasons behind it. See my previous post about my skepticism of the US military really giving a fuck whether the Japanese starved, burned or were nuked.

[beyelzu]

if you are going to unilaterally disregard history in such a fashion i dont know how in the world you could ever argue that any action is wrong.


and i dont expect south koreans to love the us forever.

my point was that south koreas damn sure appreciated our ending the war in japan.

and i in general i dont think that leaders make decisions on morality for the most part they make strategic decisions whether or not a decision was moral i think depends on the effects of that decision

so i really dont think that it matters why the us dropped the bomb.


also, adora, you have repeatedly described dropping the bomb in a harsh fashion, i dont see how you can make a judgment call if you dont trust history

[Adora]

if you are going to unilaterally disregard history
I'm doing no such thing. I'm showing healthy skepticism towards an institution that has been proven time and time again to have lied about its motivations, actions, and then lied about its lying. Military =/= "history".

and i in general i dont think that leaders make decisions on morality for the most part
I think they do. They simply make decisions based on a morality that values very little except lies and ego.

so i really dont think that it matters why the us dropped the bomb.
I think it does. All value judgements to all things are judgements of motivations and situations, not the actions themselves. It's the fundamental way we work. The only reason you're judging the dropping of the bomb as acceptable is because you're judging it based on a set of perceived situations and motivations.

also, adora, you have repeatedly described dropping the bomb in a harsh fashion, i dont see how you can make a judgment call if you dont trust history
I shall repeat: MIlitary =/= history. Please at least try and understand this before you hit the reply button again. The testimonies recorded in the documentary in the original thread are part of history, but that doesn't make them part of military propaganda or military histories, which are the things I distrust.