Hiroshima and Nagasaki: Was it right?

[Marius Fett]

The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were nuclear attacks during World War II against Japan by the United States at the order of U.S. President Harry S. Truman. After six months of intense firebombing of 67 other Japanese cities, the nuclear weapon "Little Boy" was dropped on the city of Hiroshima on Monday, August 6, 1945, followed on August 9 by the detonation of the "Fat Man" nuclear bomb over Nagasaki. These are the only nuclear attacks in the history of war.

 

The bombs killed as many as 140,000 people in Hiroshima and 80,000 in Nagasaki by the end of 1945, roughly half on the days of the bombings. Since then, thousands more have died from injuries or illness attributed to exposure to radiation released by the bombs. In both cities, the overwhelming majority of the dead were civilians, including women and children.

 

The mushroom cloud of "Little Boy" over Hiroshima:

 

 

The mushroom cloud of "Fat Man" over Nagasaki:

 

 

People continue to die today from radiation sickness and other illnesses caused by the bombs, and babies are still being born with deformities as a result of the same attacks.

 

The American Government, still maintain even today, that these attacks saved many more lives than they ended. That they prevented the thousands upon thousands of deaths that would have occured if America invaded Japan directly.

 

______

 

One question: WAS THIS RIGHT?

 

______

 

I understand that this will likely be a sensetive topic, so please keep it civil and none of the "Yeh we pwned teh Japs" talk that can be seen in other areas of the web.

 

Well, what do you think?

[Inyri]

One question: WAS THIS RIGHT?

No

 

Did it end the war quicker? Yes. Did it save (American) lives? Yes. Was it morally and ethically the right thing to do? Absolutely not.

 

The decision to bomb Japan was made to end the war quicker and to show our (America's) dominance. What's worse, Japan was already preparing their surrender when we bombed them.

 

If it was just a bomb it wouldn't have been such a big issue, but the fallout from these bombs has been punishing the innocents ever since. Sure, 'we didn't know what would happen.' I don't eat food if it's a funny color because 'I don't know what'll happen' and then act surprised when I get sick. I throw it away, because it's not right...

[Marius Fett]

^^AGREED.

 

Also, on the subject of America and nukes, isn't it the slightest bit hypocritical that the US is trying to stop other countries possesing Atomic Weapons, when THEY are the only ones to have ever deployed one in a wartime situation?

 

The US could have simply dropped the bombs in the sea, to demonstrate its power instead of not one but TWO cities full of innocent people, which would have still possibly damamged Japanese ships and maybe slight coastal damage, but at least then millions of people wouldn't have been killed.

 

Alternatively, they could have NOT USED THE BOMBS AT ALL.

 

Nuclear power is very useful i'll admit. But using it as a weapon against innocent people just to save the lives of YOUR OWN PEOPLE is nothing more than terrorism.

[Samuel Dravis]

Isn't it hypocritical of the Germans to strictly regulate Zyklon B? After all, didn't the Nazis use it in their death camps?

 

(sorry for Nazi-reference )

 

I'd venture to say no. Whether it's been used by one country or one hundred, who used it changes nothing about the inherent danger of the weapon in question. Especially considering the crazies that might get hold of them easier if everyone were able to get their own stockpile in the interests of 'fairness' or 'not being hypocritical'. Hypocrisy be damned. I don't want people to have anthrax, I don't want people to have genetically engineered superflus, I don't want people to have chemical weapons stockpiles and I don't want people to have nuclear weapons. Any people, really, though if I had to choose (and I do have to choose) I'd pick someone with more stability/control over someone with less. If this view is considered hypocritical then I am glad to be a hypocrite.

[Inyri]

The only hypocritical thing about the United States demanding other countries get rid of their nukes is the fact that we seem unwilling to get rid of ours... but really you could dedicate an entire thread to that discussion, so maybe we should just focus on the WW2 incident for the moment.

[Bee Hoon]

Also, on the subject of America and nukes, isn't it the slightest bit hypocritical that the US is trying to stop other countries possesing Atomic Weapons, when THEY are the only ones to have ever deployed one in a wartime situation?

Yes, it is, since they don't seem to think that they should stop churning out theirs. There's an acronym for the nuclear arms race that is strangely apt: "MAD". Technically, it stands for Mutually Assured Destruction, but the human race is the only species crazy enough to accumulate enough destructive power to destroy itself and much of the Earth.

 

Damn straight we're on top of the food chain:/ Anyway, as Inyri has said, ''tis a topic for another thread.

 

On topic:

No. It may be in retrospect, but never will I believe that nuclear warfare is warranted. There is one image that sums up the horror more sharply than any words ever can. Click here and scroll down to picture 12.

 

The left photograph shows the stone steps of the main entrandce of Sumitomo Bank which is only 250 meters from the hypocenter. It is believed that a person sat down on the steps facing the direction of the hypocenter, possibly waiting for the bank to open. By a flash of the heat rays with temperatures well over a 1,000 degrees or possibly 2,000 degrees centigrade, that person was incineratied on the stone steps.

[Pho3nix]

Not sure, of course on a human level It's terrible. But who knows how the war would've turned out if the U.S didn't drop the bombs. :/

[Marius Fett]

Just found this video: http://www.youtube.com/watchv=0n1rqHo4XyM&feature=related

 

If you don't find the video upsetting, then maybe look at a few of the comments:

 

...they got what was coming to them...

How can one say that the hiroshima bombings was wrong? Its so retarded it can barely get described properly in words.

 

It was a solution, killing maybe 30ish TIMES less civilians than the other solutions, PLUS soldiers dying.

 

The hiroshima and nagasaki bombings was a solution that can be described as nothing more than a miraclethough that worked miraculously.

F****** Japs bought it on themselves

 

I mean, how OFFENSIVE are these comments?

 

If these people truly believe that the atomic bombings on Japan were justified, then they must be really sick.

 

There are many comments saying that Japan deserved it because of Pearl Harbour.

Yeah, that was a terrible thing, but it was NOWHERE NEAR as destructive as the atom bombs.

 

What's worse, there is alot of racist abuse on the web targeting Japanese people saying they deserved it!

 

This is just my opinion, but it was a sad day for humanity, when the decision was made to kill, no, EXTERMINATE all those innoceent lives.

[Inyri]

The funny thing is that Japan didn't really do anything Britain hasn't done/tried. Britain just picked on more third-world countries so there wasn't much resistance. But we wouldn't dream of suggesting Britain deserves to get nuked because of their past Imperialism, would we?

 

Japan wanted to be on top. Sure they went about it wrong, but that doesn't justify nuking the hell out of them when there were other options available. Like let them surrender.

[JCarter426]

The reason Truman ordered the nuclear strikes was because Japan wouldn't surrender.

[Marius Fett]

I myself am British (Welsh) and i'll readily admit we have made our fair share of mistakes, just like USA, Japan, China and realistically speaking, alot of other countries if not nearly all of them.

 

But as you say Inyri, Nobody deserves to be the targets/victims of nuclear weapons, ESPECIALLY when ALL other options have not yet been fully evaluated and attempts have been made to put them into action.

 

There is one image that sums up the horror more sharply than any words ever can. Click here and scroll down to picture 12.

 

WOW. That image, indeed the whole article, really does give an insight into how evil and cruel mankind can be.

 

The reason Truman ordered the nuclear strikes was because Japan wouldn't surrender.

 

Actually, Japan were considering it. They were considering surrendering, though on four of their own conditions.

[Inyri]

The reason Truman ordered the nuclear strikes was because Japan wouldn't surrender.

Not according to what I've heard. The Japanese are a proud people, remember that. Just because they didn't say "hey we're going to surrender now" doesn't mean they weren't in the process of doing so, or at the very least planning it.

[DarthJebus05]

Of course it wasn't right, what were you thinking? I have half a mind to issue you a drug test.

 

The reason Truman ordered the nuclear strikes was because Japan wouldn't surrender.

 

What's worse, Japan was already preparing their surrender when we bombed them.

 

WW2 could have been prevented, if we all just got along. Which will never happen. Anyway, back to the original topic. Like Inyri said, Japanese were preparing to surrender, but America has to go "oh look at this, lets nuke a country so it can't recover for centuries!".

[JCarter426]

Not according to what I've heard. The Japanese are a proud people, remember that. Just because they didn't say "hey we're going to surrender now" doesn't mean they weren't in the process of doing so, or at the very least planning it.

 

True. However, the main concerns were that even if Japan were to surrender, the fighting would continue--which it did. Many in the Japanese military refused to believe or accept the surrender even after Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

 

Like Inyri said, Japanese were preparing to surrender, but America has to go "oh look at this, lets nuke a country so it can't recover for centuries!".

 

I highly doubt that was the idea. After all, today the US has a trillion dollar deficit, while Japan is mass-producing cars and HD-TVs.

[Bee Hoon]

America has to go "oh look at this, lets nuke a country so it can't recover for centuries!".

Not true. Japan is the most developed Asian country, but I don't think that you will ever find one Japanese who believes that nuclear weapons should exist.

 

The Japanese are a proud people, remember that. Just because they didn't say "hey we're going to surrender now" doesn't mean they weren't in the process of doing so, or at the very least planning it.

Very true. It takes a people who place the highest priority on honour to come up with the concept of voluntary seppuku.

[Marius Fett]

WWII just like WWI and indeed all other wars, were started basically due to a difference in ideas.

 

It's human nature to disagree, and also to fight for supremacy and to promote their ideas.

 

Staying on the example of WWII:

 

Hitler for example, tried to exterminate the Jews, BECAUSE THEY WERE DIFFERENT. The way Hitler saw it was that anything that was not German was filth, and he tried to make an example of the Jews, and almost succeeded in their extermination. What I find ironic though, is that Hitler himself was not German, he was Austrian.

 

The Holocaust, the War, all of it could have been avoided if all involved parties, behaved like mature adults and decided "Yeah, ok. You guys are different, you're entitled to your opinions, and we are to ours."

 

If people were willing to do this, there would be far fewer wars, and this earth would be a FAR better place.

[Inyri]

Like Inyri said, Japanese were preparing to surrender, but America has to go "oh look at this, lets nuke a country so it can't recover for centuries!".

Well that's not what I said.

 

As I think I mentioned, we had absolutely no idea what the ramifications of the atomic bomb were when we dropped them on Japan. We had done some field tests, but it wouldn't be until later that we found out "oh, every person who was there has developed cancer... curious." We don't permit drugs to go on the market without extensive testing and years of research. I'm baffled why we thought using a relatively untested nuclear device was bright.

 

We did it because we were desperate... to save face. People wanted the war to end, so instead of doing the smart thing we did the easy thing. Hey, wasn't there a quote like that in Harry Potter. "Soon we must choose between doing what is right and doing what is easy"? Damn, those authors are smart people... Let's vote J.K. Rowling into office?

[DarthJebus05]

That reminds me:

 

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=nZccnGspog0&eurl

 

Perfect example.

 

Well that's not what I said.

 

As I think I mentioned, we had absolutely no idea what the ramifications of the atomic bomb were when we dropped them on Japan. We had done some field tests, but it wouldn't be until later that we found out "oh, every person who was there has developed cancer... curious." We don't permit drugs to go on the market without extensive testing and years of research. I'm baffled why we thought using a relatively untested nuclear device was bright.

 

We did it because we were desperate... to save face. People wanted the war to end, so instead of doing the smart thing we did the easy thing. Hey, wasn't there a quote like that in Harry Potter. "Soon we must choose between doing what is right and doing what is easy"? Damn, those authors are smart people... Let's vote J.K. Rowling into office?

 

Sorry, didn't mean for it to look like you were saying America has to go "oh look at this, lets nuke a country so it can't recover for centuries!".. I was agreeing with you for this part: Like Inyri said, Japanese were preparing to surrender.

 

As for my history, when I transfered to another school, I had already missed most of WW2, so I'm a bit rusty.

[JCarter426]

The Holocaust, the War, all of it could have been avoided if all involved parties, behaved like mature adults and decided "Yeah, ok. You guys are different, you're entitled to your opinions, and we are to ours."

 

Well, it all could have been prevented if the victors of WWI hadn't been so adamant on making Germany suffer for starting the war. But did they learn? No, they did the same bloody thing after World War II, which got them the Cold War.

 

And what did that get us? Take a look at the Middle East. And what is the US doing in the Middle East today?

 

*sigh* People never learn...

[True_Avery]

Basically the bombs had been made, tested, but there was little idea to the actual damage they could do in a real situation. The war was about to end, as the Japanese did not want to surrender immediately because we had not promised them a stable government upon our occupation of them, and had not given an answer as to whether we would let their emperor stay in power. Americans didn't realize it, but that meant a lot more to the Japanese than they thought. The Japanese pretty much knew they had lost at that point, but the prospect of giving up their government and culture that had existed for hundreds of years was not a happy thought.

 

We were still technically fighting, and an invasion was estimated to cost tens of thousands of lives on both sides. The problem was, America was not listening to their pleas and concerns for their government. After all, we didn't even listen to the pleas of the Japanese-Americans we placed into internment in our own country. We were not prepared to negotiate, and the Japanese were not prepared to let their country fall.

 

We also demanded that the Japanese leave China. Now, while the Japanese -were- murdering Chinese by the thousands there, giving up that territory would crush them. They suspected Russia would send a force down into China once Japan had left and block the Japanese trade routes, destroying their economy from the outside in and taking them over once they were weak. Giving into the United State's demands was seen by many Japanese to be a form of suicide for the entire country.

 

In the end, we dropped Little Boy to push them to their knees and push the last of the Japanese politicians to vote for a surrender. The first bomb could be argued to have been at least a fair move, or even a good move by some points. Final nail in the coffin to assure there would be absolutely no resistance from the honor bound Japanese.

 

The second bomb, however, was dropped simply because we wanted to see what it could do. It was dropped because American's back then were racist jerks who put the lives of people down the drain for a science experiment. Fat man was dropped -just- as Japanese scientists went to make sure that Little Boy had actually dropped. They had to make sure that what had just happened had just happened. It was unneeded and there was absolutely no excuse, politically, scientifically, etc to ever have it leave the airfield. It was an excuse for America to flex its muscles, even though it had already crushed the crowd watching it to literal dust. The Japanese were ready to give in on Little Boy. Also, we were finishing a third, stronger bomb when Fat Man dropped and were considering using it as well.

 

I believe you can argue Little Boy being dropped. I do not believe that Fat Man is nearly as debatable, simply because it did not need to be dropped. At all.

 

Switching gears...

 

It isn't exactly right to call the Japanese the innocent party in this case, entirely. Their occupation of China is known as the second holocaust of World War II. They did some absolutely terrible things to the Chinese that have even been said to have been more abusive than the German treatment of Jews.

 

It might have been wrong to bomb civilians, but the people had a bad track record of racism themselves. I feel sorry for the civilians, but Japan (if kharma exists) had it coming to them.

 

In summary, World War II was messed up. Americans were racist jerks. The Germans were racist jerks. The Japanese were racist jerks. A lot of people had a lot coming to them. Luckily, by the end, at least some of the countries attempted to become friends and now have friendly ties to this day. We could have easily copied the decisions of the League of Nations and blamed all of it on a single country to spark another World War.

 

Unfortunately, we nearly sparked another World War with that little display of power.

 

This was part of a Legal Brief paper I did in High School for this:

USE OF ATOMIC WEAPONS

The United States Federal Government is suspected of using its power to enact unconstitutional and questionable action aimed at people of Japanese decent. At the end of World War II, the United States dropped two Atomic weapons on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, causing nearly 100,000 deaths or more, and, “If the United States had made it clear that Emperor Hirohito could stay on the throne, Japan would have surrendered and the bombs would not have been necessary( 1 ).” The two bombs that had hit Japan were used as a last effort to end the war before more deaths were caused. The United States, however, did not look very deeply into alternatives, and if they had given more thought onto terms of surrender, the bombs may have never been dropped. The United States used two unimaginably dangerous weapons on civilian cities without looking into alternatives, clearly abusing its power and military might as well. “The Japanese government has not had time to react to the Hiroshima bombing they had sent a military and scientific team to the city to report on what had happened. By the time they were sure that Hiroshima had been destroyed by an atom bomb, Nagasaki had also been hit( 2 ).” The shock of having an entire city disappear off the face of the earth in a massive explosion is a hard reality to take, and the Japanese wanted to make sure what was said really did happen. However, before they could make a decision or even really talk about the incident, the United States dropped the second bomb. Either the United States had believed the first bomb would not change the Japanese’s mind, or the defendant simply wanted to test a bigger bomb, because a bomb was dropped soon after the first one, clearly showing an abuse of power either way. “By September many of the survivors of the bombing were in the middle of a new nightmare. They had developed what was to be known as radiation sickness. About ten or fifteen days after the bombing the survivors began to lose their hair. Diarrhea and fever followed. They had lost the white blood cells needed to protect the body against disease. Many developed open sores. If the white blood cell count went too low, or the fever too high, they died. This happened to tens of thousands of people( 2 ).” The effects of the bomb lasted past the explosion, causing the deaths of many soon after and the illness of tens of thousands of people. The United States used these weapons on civilian targets, innocent cities, with a very good idea of what they were going to do. “Bohr called on the United States and Great Britain to share the bomb with the Soviet Union, He said they should put atomic weapons under international control. He said that if the United States tried to keep the bomb to itself, other countries such as the Soviet Union would rush to make their own atomic weapons. A nuclear arms race would start that would be a disaster for humanity(2).” Bohr claimed that if the bombs were kept in the defendants hands and the defendants hands only, other countries would soon want the technology and would try their hardest to make bombs better than the United State’s bombs. The defendant pushed this thought away, but no sooner had World War II ended that the Cold War began, bringing forth an age of fear and distrust as countries like Russia and the defendant tried to created more and more bombs until there were enough to destroy all human life upon the planet with the push of a button.

 

Defense/Counterarguments: USE OF ATOMIC WEAPONS

Weapons of such magnitude would never be used without cause, and the defendant had a couple that seemed to justify using Atomic weapons from a certain perspective. For instance, “Some wartime Japanese politicians have said that without the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the peacemakers of Japan would never have persuaded the strong military leaders to stop the war( 1 ).” Politicians within the Japanese government itself claim that the bombs were the only way to end the war. There could have been an invasion of Japan by the United States military, but that could have ended in thousands, if not tens of thousands of deaths on both sides with no foreseeable end. “Truman himself felt it was right to proceed with the plan to drop the bomb. He had three main reasons for this: first, the bomb would bring the war to an end; second, it would keep the U.S.S.R out of Asia; and third, it would test America’s new technology( 1 ).” These three reasons were the justification of dropping the bomb, and the first two would save many lives. An end to the war for Japan and the U.S.S.R in one swoop, and a technology that was still in infant form could be tested on the field for the first time.

[JCarter426]

Oh, I completely agree. You could argue for hours on end on whether a nuclear strike was justified.

 

But two nuclear strikes?

 

Not to mention what they did to Las Vegas in the '50s...

[Marius Fett]

We did it because we were desperate... to save face. People wanted the war to end, so instead of doing the smart thing we did the easy thing. Hey, wasn't there a quote like that in Harry Potter. "Soon we must choose between doing what is right and doing what is easy"? Damn, those authors are smart people... Let's vote J.K. Rowling into office?

 

Indeed there was! You may be joking here, but I honestly do believe that JK is a truly inspiring person.

 

She wrote those books, and millions of children have read them and through those books have discovered how terrible war is. Stories like HP are really not that far from real life!

 

Take away the magic, the wizards etc and what do you have?

 

A REAL example of what a REAL war is like. People are losing their parents like Harry did in those books EVERY DAY.

 

Yeah, those books are fiction. But are actually VERY CLOSE to real life.

[Web Rider]

WW2 could have been prevented, if we all just got along. Which will never happen. Anyway, back to the original topic. Like Inyri said, Japanese were preparing to surrender, but America has to go "oh look at this, lets nuke a country so it can't recover for centuries!".

 

Japan recovered politically, economically, and physically from the nuclear attacks in around 2 decades. Because of the nuclear attack on those cities, most of the Japanese infrastructure was left in tact, that is, they didn't get obliterated in the same manner that Germany did, and thus, retained the ability to rebuild faster.

 

Also, unlike Germany, the atomic bombings showed the Soviet Union, which documents have shown was planning an invasion of Japan towards the end of WWII, that Japan was OURS. Yes, a little international dominance, but this prevented the same sort of east/west situation found in Germany, which I think we can agree was greatly detrimental to the German state of affairs, a country that didn't re-merge until the end of the USSR.

 

Not according to what I've heard. The Japanese are a proud people, remember that. Just because they didn't say "hey we're going to surrender now" doesn't mean they weren't in the process of doing so, or at the very least planning it.

At the time, documents uncovered AFTER the fact have revealed that the Emperor wanted to surrender, however, the Japanese, being a proud people, particularly their military leaders, preferred to right to the death. Thus, the Emperor, who the military leaders knew was just a man, could do nothing against their will, lest he be removed and replaced with a new emperor.

 

Additionally, the Japanese requirements in the "conditional" surrender were something along the lines of maintaining territory captured from China in the war, islands taken in the southern pacific, retaining the emperor as god, and all sorts of things that essentially left Japan in the same state it was before it went to war. Which obviously, was a state that did nothing to deter it from going to war.

 

In response to some of those Youtube comments: it's hard to say that the Japanese did not have it coming. Japan launches a massive attack on Pearl Harbor, and how we lost track of 4 carrier fleets is beyond me, but in any manner, it devastated the Pacific Fleet, a fleet that was, by no understatement, quite the pride of the American Navy.

 

Furthermore, estimates of man-to-man fighting with Japan were in the millions. On both sides, and looked to extend the war for another decade. The Administration at the time knew that the Japanese would fight to the last man, woman and child, that was how they were raised. If the fact that they specifically designed planes to fly into ships doesn't prove that, I don't know what does.

 

For those of you saying "we didn't know what the bomb could do", in a way, we didn't. We were in a war and we needed a way to win, and in a way, we did know what it could do. We even sent the Japanese the test footage of the bomb, you can find the footage on Youtube. We said: "here's our war-ending weapon, we'll use it on you if you don't unconditionally surrender." They refused, so we used it on them.

 

Their first reaction to the first bomb was that it was a fluke, a one-time attack that had been pulled off through some sort of special setup in the city they had missed. And so to prove it wasn't, we used the second one, and bluffed that we had more. We had, of course, the facilities to do so, but it would have taken some time to ready another nuke or two. But by that time the Japanese military was finally being pushed back to their main islands, the Chinese were starting to really push back, and the Soviets were readying an invasion to the north.

 

Well, it all could have been prevented if the victors of WWI hadn't been so adamant on making Germany suffer for starting the war. But did they learn? No, they did the same bloody thing after World War II, which got them the Cold War.

 

huh? wha? no...No...NO.

 

dah! Historical ignorance makes my brain hurt! The English and the French and the Americans in WWII learned from the mistake of the treaty of Versailles and did not saddle Germany with a huge war dept, AND helped them to rebuild.

 

The Cold War was caused by escalations between the Soviet Union(Russia) and the United States. The Communists came out of nowhere advocating "capitalisim must die", and as a capitalist country, we kinda took offense to that. Thus the bickering went back and forth. Yes, it would have been better if people could have been mature about it, but this did not stem from what was done to Germany after WWII.

[mur'phon]

WWII just like WWI and indeed all other wars, were started basically due to a difference in ideas.

 

I disagre, usually it is more because of rescourses(sp?). Hitler ruled a country devastated by the terms of the "peace" after ww1 as well as the war itself. He managed to cut down unemployment and get the economy growing again using several methods, including spending huge amounts on the military. If he where to keep up growth, he needed to get something back from his investments......

 

On topic:

In my wiev the idea behind the firebombing/nuclearbombing is insane. It for the most part like this:"By deliberately killing civilians we are hoping that the civilians will blame their leaders, and force them to end the war.". Nice exept it asumes the people won't rally behind their leaders to fight the ones responsible.

[Marius Fett]

^^True, though Hitler was still destroying the Jews BECAUSE THEY WERE DIFFERENT

 

The Holocaust, like tha nuclear attacks and the Nanking massacre were TERRBLE ACTS OF TERRORISM.