Yaphett Kotto
Member
You need to retake history if you ask why there was a second nuclear strike on Japan.
well one edge firebombings have over nukes is the lack of radiation.
I can.
Then that's not an argument. If you're not arguing in favor of preventing civilian deaths, what is your point?
Tell that to the people that started the war.
You're right, we have all of these smart tomahawk missiles with laser and satellite targeting, we should have just sniped the Japanese leadership. Thanks for your important hindsight insights.
You can go ask all the dead Asians who were murdered, raped, tortured, experimented on, and conquered, what they think are war crimes. It was not only necessary but to suggest it is a war crime on any level compared to what the imperial Japanese army did is insulting.
I found it! It was from the 70 year thread. It was better than I remembered.
Originally Posted by typist
I would have started by dropping supplies and information on Germany. Food for the hungry. Dollars, francs and pounds - about 130 billion marks worth. Photos of families. Pictures drawn by children. Photos of children playing together, with captions like: "two of these are Jewish, can you tell which ones?" Leaflets too, questioning the futility of war, promoting compassion and so on. I would drop all my guns, without bullets, and broken fragments of artillery equipment. Books from the greatest authors, art from the greatest painters, and music from the greatest composers. All the treasures of my people.
Then I would write a letter and make sure everyone read it. It would tell the Germans that me and my people were coming over the border, unarmed and well-fed, to march on Berlin and put the leaders of the Nazi party on trial for their crimes. It would ask the people of Germany for their support in this. The letter would predict the possible massacre that the German military would inflict on foreign protesters. It would also beg the common soldier to wake up, and refuse to follow such mad orders. But the letter would emphasise, massacre or not, the protest would go on to the last man, woman and child. Some things are worth dying for
That would be the gist of it anyway. There was something like 20 million combat deaths in WW2, estimates vary. That's like three and a half Holocausts. Better to die a misguided idealist than have that much blood on your hands. If the protesters were all killed and the Nazi party kept its power, then it's better to be dead than a member of the human race anyway. Just my preference though, would probably be carted off to an asylum for even suggesting it
The problem with this line of thinking is that there's no reason it can't be used against them in the future with chemical or nuclear warfare. The winner writes the books so any horrific attempt at ending war will be deemed 'necessary'. The U.S had every option available to them at that point in the war and bombing civilian cities is what they chose to do; I understand their reasons for not wanting to sacrifice their troops in an extended campaign, but it makes the act no less deplorable. Either way what's done is done.
As much as I'd like to think the human race has learned something about the conflict, it doesn't look like we have learned nearly enough. As usual we learn too little, too late and all of a sudden we have another page of history.
The civilians deserved the punishment for the war crimes of their army?
What would acknowledging it entail? Perhaps never using nuclear weapons again in the last 70 years?I feel like it's very much up for debate whether or not the two nukes (and all the firebombing) really was necessary, but it certainly was a war crime no matter how you spin it. Just because your enemy is evil doesn't mean that you can be evil too and just pretend like it's his fault. Acknowledging that would be a good first step.
No.The civilians deserved the punishment for the war crimes of their army?
Imperial Japan committed some of the most heinous actions this world has ever seen. With no intention of stopping, seeing no flaw, and their divine right to conquer.
The world would have taken any action to stop this. You're kidding yourself if you think otherwise. Conditional surrender was not on the table at any point.
"Imperial America committed some of the most heinous actions this world has ever seen. With no intention of stopping, seeing no flaw, and their divine right to conquer.
The world will never take any action to stop this. You're kidding yourself if you think otherwise. Conditional surrender was not on the table at any point."
Just as accurate, and bombing American civillians is just as bad too.
Killing innocent people is never ever a necessity.
We should probably take this into account when we say an invasion would have killed many more innocents. The bomb was supposed to kill and destroy much, much more than it did.
I feel like it's very much up for debate whether or not the two nukes (and all the firebombing) really was necessary, but it certainly was a war crime no matter how you spin it. Just because your enemy is evil doesn't mean that you can be evil too and just pretend like it's his fault. Acknowledging that would be a good first step.
What would acknowledging it entail? Perhaps never using nuclear weapons again in the last 70 years?
Perhaps continued development of weapons designed to minimize civilian casualties?
Development of convention of war around the same?
Massive investments in developing a former enemy into a partner in economics and mutual defense?
The loss of life was horrific, taught the world lessons about hopefully never having it happen again. People in this thread who want to argue about whether it was necessary or a war crime - to what end, given where we have arrived, and the fact that total unrestrained war is rare when compared with ww1 and 2. What is it you want, other than to signal your retroactive displeasure at a horrific and complicated series of events that cannot be changed? I'd understand the effort of anyone in this thread were cheering for the bombs and using the situation as done go-forward guide on what we should continue to do. Since nobody is doing that here, whoyouyalkingto.gif?
The thing about these captain hindsight warriors is that they have no alternative to any of the realities. I mean, we literally have someone suggesting on this page that the way to defeat Germany was to bombard them with children's drawings and March into Germany unarmed. It's not to be taken seriously.No.
The implication here is that elsewhere in the Pacific rim, many other innocent civilians were suffering war crimes daily under the subjugation of the Japanese military. In other words, there seems to be inordinate value placed on Japanese civilian lives and no consideration for the suffering of others in Asia, who undoubtedly got faster reprieve via this method compared to a conventional land invasion.
Imperial Japan committed some of the most heinous actions this world has ever seen. With no intention of stopping, seeing no flaw, and their divine right to conquer.
The world would have taken any action to stop this. You're kidding yourself if you think otherwise. Conditional surrender was not on the table at any point.
MacArthur subsequently testified at joint hearings before the Senate's Committee on Armed Services and Committee on Foreign Relations to discuss his dismissal and the ”Military Situation in the Far East."
”I shrink—I shrink with a horror that I cannot express in words—at this continuous slaughter of men in Korea," MacArthur lamented during the hearings.
”The war in Korea has already almost destroyed that nation of 20,000,000 people. I have never seen such devastation. I have seen, I guess, as much blood and disaster as any living man, and it just curdled my stomach the last time I was there. After I looked at the wreckage and those thousands of women and children and everything, I vomited ... If you go on indefinitely, you are perpetuating a slaughter such as I have never heard of in the history of mankind."
”We burned down just about every city in North Korea and South Korea both," recalled Gen. Curtis LeMay. ”We killed off over a million civilian Koreans and drove several million more from their homes, with the inevitable additional tragedies bound to ensue."
"Imperial America committed some of the most heinous actions this world has ever seen. With no intention of stopping, seeing no flaw, and their divine right to conquer.
The world will never take any action to stop this. You're kidding yourself if you think otherwise. Conditional surrender was not on the table at any point."
Just as accurate, and bombing American civillians is just as bad too.
Sick burn!
I recognize context is not a part of your intention to discuss anything, and hope you do so in the future.
Try going up to a Holocaust or Rape of Nanking survivor (or just a survivor of Germany and Japan's countless other atrocities) and say how America's actions in helping to liberate them were actually just as bad.
There are many users in this thread that pretty much say "It was necessary, so we did it, end of the story." That's not acknowledging that it was a war crime and pure evil at all.
Acknowledging that it was wrong, on the political side, would include that you'd actually and actively work on a world with no weapons of mass destruction, instead of cementing a status quo that favors a couple countries with nuclear weapons while it bans all the others from pursuing them.
That's not a defense.
We were talking about ww2, which you continue to ignore and have no answer for how to stop the Axis' ongoing atrocities beyond continually repeating platitudes.I'm talking about recent America (Vietnam, Iraq, Handorus, Afghanistan, Lybia, Yemen..etc)
I'm talking about recent America (Vietnam, Iraq, Handorus, Afghanistan, Lybia, Yemen..etc)
We were talking about ww2, which you continue to ignore and have no answer for how to stop the Axis' ongoing atrocities beyond continually repeating platitudes.
You're giving me two options, if both involve deliberately killing civillians, then fuck those options. There is a huge difference between collateral damage and intentionally decimating entire towns.
Every innocent death is a tragedy and every killing of one is an act of evil. The capabilities of nuclear weapons to do so much more quickly hence makes them more evil, but beyond that there's nothing special about them. Within the context of a war plagaued by death and destruction at massive scale for everyone involved, its not anymore evil than the rest of the war.
On that note, I would love to live in a world where everyone gets along and there is no war through mutual understanding. I'm all for a world without weapons of mass destruction, but I see that more as an effect of having gotten to the point where humanity is no longer in conflict rather than something that will actually push humanity towards such a state. The status quo with nuclear weapons at least prevents a war on the scale of WWII. Even with globalization and such, I don't think such peace would be maintained as the world exists now without MAD.
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Sure it's more "evil". Firebombing and nuclear weapons were specfically used to kill as many civilians as possible... War is terrible anyway, but there is a difference between, say, trying to bomb a factory for warplanes on the one hand and just bombing a whole city to ashes on the other.
I also don't think the status quo prevents massive wars. To a certain extent it's luck that we are still living on this planet (watch "Fog of War" with McNamara for instance). The status quo also makes it much more likely that more and more nations develop nuclear weapons.
No there isn't. Thousands were burned alive in Toyko, was that somehow better? I dare you to come up with a 3rd option that doesn't involve Japanese civilians suffering greatly. We had two countries that wanted world domination in Japan and Germany and weapons that were not precise like you have today. Anything less than total surrender by the Japanese would have guaranteed attempts at retribution down the line by the Japanese.
I want an option that doesn't deliberately target innocent people so that in the future people don't say "this act of genocide is for the greater good".
Collateral damage is stomach-turning too, but there's a massive difference between that and leveling entire cities.
What you can't seem to get through your head is that there were none.
What you can't seem to get through your head is that there were no such options.
I still find it utterly abhorrent how instead of targeting military targets, the US decided to hit the softest of targets and wipe out entire cities, man, woman , child & all other life, there is no justification, people who mitigate it disgust me, and are no doubt the same people who absolutely hate terrorists who hit soft targets to win their war, not seeing how this is the same thing on a greater scale
RIP to those innocents
Head to head war doesn't involve targeting civilians on purpose. Japan was getting weaker and losing its allies at the time.
Head to head war doesn't involve targeting civilians on purpose. Japan was getting weaker and losing its allies at the time.
?
Sure it's more "evil". Firebombing and nuclear weapons were specfically used to kill as many civilians as possible... War is terrible anyway, but there is a difference between, say, trying to bomb a factory for warplanes on the one hand and just bombing a whole city to ashes on the other.
I also don't think the status quo prevents massive wars. To a certain extent it's luck that we are still living on this planet (watch "Fog of War" with McNamara for instance). The status quo also makes it much more likely that more and more nations develop nuclear weapons.
Head to head war doesn't involve targeting civilians on purpose. Japan was getting weaker and losing its allies at the time.
You need to retake history if you ask why there was a second nuclear strike on Japan.
It was horrific, but ultimately hundreds of thousands or more could have been potentially killed due to war.
Got the proof there?
I think we've been through this countless times before and the proof just isnt there that they were on the verge of surrender... and the surrender that was discussed wasn't even unconditional surrender. Which was the only way to end the war.
Actually Japan was on the brink of surrender before we dropped the bombs. We didn't know it, granted, but they were.
The firebombing of Tokyo was horrific and what forced their hand before the nukes were ever dropped. Totally unnecessary.
I think this is going nowhere, I won't be able to convince you and you won't be able to convince me.
Head to head war doesn't involve targeting civilians on purpose. Japan was getting weaker and losing its allies at the time.
Got the proof there?
I think we've been through this countless times before and the proof just isnt there that they were on the verge of surrender... and the surrender that was discussed wasn't even unconditional surrender. Which was the only way to end the war.
I have seen it in a History channel show on it and reading over a few articles - but like I said, we didn't know it. Also, there is no way to truly confirm it (the notion they were on the verge of surrender was from insiders in the Japanese gov't, but no one knows if they were being honest).
Head to head war doesn't involve targeting civilians on purpose. Japan was getting weaker and losing its allies at the time.