[hyakushiki1234]

I think that with regards to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Allied bombing was extremely disproportionate and unnecessary. There are a few reasons for this:

1: Japan was in dire straits at that stage of the War. Its military was severely depleted, its food supplies running low and there was no way that the Japanese could have turned the situation around. Surrender was inevitable without the bombs. The counter-argument is that the Japanese would have fought to the bitter end regardless of the situation had the bombs not been dropped, but I find this eminently difficult to believe based on sheer practicality. In a matter of months, the Japanese would have been reduced to a choice of starvation or surrender anyway.

2: The bombs were dropped on civilian cities. The idea that the US scared the Japanese into surrender could have just as easily applied if the Americans demonstrated the A-Bombs by dropping them on military facilities or even in the countryside. While Hiroshima and Nagasaki were major military production cities, those facilities could have been just as easily destroyed by conventional fire-bombing. In no way is the A-Bomb justifiable - because it was an avoidable attack on civilians.

Conventional firebombing is easier to justify, although some bombings were taken too far (ie, in Dresden). Such bombings were necessary, however, to destroy military production facilities that would ultimately help us win the war.

Of course, it goes without saying that this is a hugely grey area that noone will ever have a definitive answer to.

[cl_steele]

(Original post by hyakushiki1234)
I think that with regards to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Allied bombing was extremely disproportionate and unnecessary. There are a few reasons for this:

1: Japan was in dire straits at that stage of the War. Its military was severely depleted, its food supplies running low and there was no way that the Japanese could have turned the situation around. Surrender was inevitable without the bombs. The counter-argument is that the Japanese would have fought to the bitter end regardless of the situation had the bombs not been dropped, but I find this eminently difficult to believe based on sheer practicality. In a matter of months, the Japanese would have been reduced to a choice of starvation or surrender anyway.

2: The bombs were dropped on civilian cities. The idea that the US scared the Japanese into surrender could have just as easily applied if the Americans demonstrated the A-Bombs by dropping them on military facilities or even in the countryside. While Hiroshima and Nagasaki were major military production cities, those facilities could have been just as easily destroyed by conventional fire-bombing. In no way is the A-Bomb justifiable - because it was an avoidable attack on civilians.

Conventional firebombing is easier to justify, although some bombings were taken too far (ie, in Dresden). Such bombings were necessary, however, to destroy military production facilities that would ultimately help us win the war.

Of course, it goes without saying that this is a hugely grey area that noone will ever have a definitive answer to.

With regards to your first point i think it may well have been true that japan was already a sinking ship by this point but as demonstrated by the Americans in their island hoping campaign the Japanese did fight to the very bitter end as due to their culture surrender was the ultimate insult to their pride, thus i think they justified it on the grounds that if it was that hard to take even such small islands the losses in taking mainland japan would have, in the americans eyes, justified the complete destruction of the cities.

I do agree with your last point though it is a question that can never have a real answer to, there is evidence pointing to either conclusion, of course with hindseight its easy to critisise such a move but given the circumstances at the time both with regards to defeating the 'empire of the sun' and wider implications like asserting their place as dominent super power over nations such as the USSR it was probably easily the best option, right?