[Rational Thinker]

(Original post by Arbolus)
Auschwitz served no real purpose - the only reason it and other extermination camps existed was because the Nazi leadership didn't like Jews. Germany would have been no worse off if they had been allowed to live. With the atomic bombs on the other hand it was a choice between hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilian dead, or a million Americans and tens of millions of Japanese (both military and civilian). Yes, it was a terrible thing to do, but it was far better than the alternative and that's why it can be justified.

To the Nazi's Auschwitz did indeed serve a purpose it to kill Jews, Gypsies and other the Nazi's didn't regard as the "Aryan race". I don't think dropping the atom bomb was better than the alternative. The creation of the Atom bomb led not only to many deaths, but also the fact more were made and other countries acquired them meant that a hideous weapon was created, a weapon that could cause mass destruction and also as a result of the atom bomb being made the hydrogen bomb was also made a weapon that can cause even more destruction.

[Rational Thinker]

(Original post by Rhadamanthus)
Why do people continually insist upon analysing peoples' actions in a vacuum. It is important to consider the aims of both the Nazis and the Americans. The Nazis were the only group of people in modern history who made the extermination of another group of people their primary goal. They employed every form of industrial technology available to carry out the extermination of every Jewish man, woman and child from the entire European continent, along with enslaving gypsies and other 'undesirables'. In carrying out the Final Solution to the Jewish Question and advocating the destruction of an entire people, the Nazis saw the death of millions of Jews as an end in itself and rather just a means to an end. The Americans had no such aims when it came to Hiroshima and Nagasaki - none whatsoever, and the Hiroshima-Nagasaki revisionism that is so prevalent today is more than just historically inaccurate.

To the Nazi's the final solution was a means to an end the end was to kill all those the Nazi's viewed as "undesirable" and therefore stop what the Nazi's saw as the "polluting" of the "Aryan Race". It was not an end in itself. The view of America's aim you have in unrealistic. America wanted to bully Japan and the rest of the world by using the atom bomb it could show its sick dominance. Stalin did the same thing by causing a famine in Ukraine in the 1930's. It was a horrible power trick.

[Rhadamanthus]

(Original post by Rational Thinker)
To the Nazi's the final solution was a means to an end the end was to kill all those the Nazi's viewed as "undesirable" and therefore stop what the Nazi's saw as the "polluting" of the "Aryan Race". It was not an end in itself. The view of America's aim you have in unrealistic. America wanted to bully Japan and the rest of the world by using the atom bomb it could show its sick dominance. Stalin did the same thing by causing a famine in Ukraine in the 1930's. It was a horrible power trick.

No, the end goal was the extermination of the Jewish people. Hitler directed his bureaucracy, army and populace into furthering this aim, often distracting resources from the war. The use of the bomb in Japan was to bring a timely end to the war, however shocking the tactic may seem.

[Suetonius]

The goal of Nagasaki was to test 'Fat Man' using yellow-skinned "guinea pigs". It had no sway over convincing Japan to surrender. Neither did the thousands killed in bombing raids after Nagasaki which most people forget.

[cr34m]

Let's not forget that it could have been ANYBODY who could have done it. Let's not forget the arms race between the USA and USSR. If the USA didn't drop it, somebody else would have. Frankly, I'm tired of this irrational hatred towards the USA. Focus on your own country's ****, because guess what, your country isn't that great either.

Nobody's is.

[Suetonius]

(Original post by Annoying-Mouse)
I'm skeptical to the validity of anyone who uses the word "certain" when dealing with counter-factual history which isn't a field that's taken seriously and rightfully so. Also, according to this website, they're basing their information on data that wasn't available to the president.

There was long-distance calling, 3 days is a long time. Think of all the hostage situations where the person escalates quickly if the demands are not met. You have to act quickly. Also, if any more than 3 days were given, you would risk evacuation and allow Japanese to form a plan. It's like you wanting something of someone then you kidnap his daughter and he still doesn't give it to you. If you allow him more time, he gets the police involved and forms a strategic solution that doesn't require him to give up that thing and get his daughter. You kill her and kidnap the next daughter then he won't play around and will act straight-away.

What a ridiculous analogy. Do you seriously believe that in three days the Japanese government was going to "form a plan" and a "strategic solution" to somehow turn the war on its head? Even though it took over three years for them to be pushed back through the Pacific? Japan was on the edge of total defeat even before Hiroshima, and if there was ever going to be an "evacuation" it would be the only logical response given the devastation inflicted by the U.S. Air Force (the firebombing of Tokyo, Hiroshima, etc.), which amounted to war crimes. There can be no moral justification for directly and deliberately causing over 200,000 civilian deaths for no practical reason. For your information, the Strategic Bombing Survey is not "counter-factual history". It was a retrospective analysis, conducted in 1946, about the state that Japan was in at the time of the atomic bombings. Only the revisionists of history believe that there was any meaningful threat from Japan, or that the atomic bombings brought an end to the war. All the evidence suggests the opposite.

Christ, I mean, some people are happy enough to deny that particular genocides occurred, but know for sure they mustn't go far enough to justify them. Yet in today's culture it's somehow acceptable for people to say "oh we have no need to deny it, of course the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of Japanese occurred, and a damn good thing too". You scarcely hear such depraved opinions even among neo-Nazi circles.

[Rhadamanthus]

Even if the goal was to test the bomb on the Japanese, this does not equate to an American desire to exterminate the Japanese people. His analogy is still bunk.

[Rational Thinker]

(Original post by Rhadamanthus)
No, the end goal was the extermination of the Jewish people. Hitler directed his bureaucracy, army and populace into furthering this aim, often distracting resources from the war. The use of the bomb in Japan was to bring a timely end to the war, however shocking the tactic may seem.

And what was the extermination of the Jews and all the other people who were killed by the Nazi's part of thats right the "purifying" of the Aryan race.

[abdiz12]

If dropping the atomic bomb on Hiroshima was justified, then the Holocaust was justified.

[MrFlash1994]

(Original post by Harveys)
THats ok dont let your opinion get in the way of facts

but the fact remains that they ignored an ultimatum on 27 July 1945 after enduring the worst conventional bombs could do. A powerful argument remains that the Bomb saved allied and Japanese lives.

The fact remains that they didn't surrender

Yea just ignore what I wrote completely. And your fact, actually doesn't prove or disprove your argument or mine. However I'm sure you'll agree that the Japanese were losing the war by 1945 and were going to surrender. Your arguing that the bomb could have protected allies, but from what? A crushed Japanese army? And what would it protect the Japanese from? More bombs?

I'm not sure but the ultimatum probably contained terrible terms which no country would agree too. Surrendering is different to accepting an ultimatum.

[nexttime]

(Original post by Harveys)
Of the 23,000 Japanese soldiers defending Iwo Jima, only 216 were taken alive.

OR this on March 10th Tokyo was fire bombed It is thought that 100,000 people were killed in the raid and another 100,000 injured. They still didn't surrender!!!!!!!!!
By the way 16sq miles of the city was destroyed in that raid only.

On March 12th, a similar raid took place on Nagoya. The raid was less successful as the fires did not join up and just over 1 square mile of the city was destroyed. On March 13th, Osaka was attacked. Eight square miles of the city were destroyed. Nearly 2.5 square miles of Kobe was also destroyed by incendiary raids. In the space of ten days, the Americans had dropped nearly 9,500 tons of incendiaries on Japanese cities and destroyed 29 square miles of what was considered to be important industrial land.

The Americans believed that the massive damage done to Tokyo by the fire raids would have persuaded Japan’s leaders to surrender but they did not. Instead, the B-29 bomber would be needed for another raid – an atomic one. On August 6th, the Enola Gay took off for Hiroshima. On August 9th, Bockscar took off for Nagasaki. Japan surrendered shortly after.


reasons been

One is the culture of the Japanese at the time. For centuries the Japanese had a warrior class called the samurai. The samurai followed Bushido, or the way of the warrior, which was an honor code that preaches that honor, duty, and loyalty to the emperor and local warlord are the absolute virtues that can be achieved. As a result, a loss of honor would mean that the dishonored samurai would be expected to commit Seppuku, or ritualistic suicide, which involves a samurai taking his sword, stabbing himself with it, and cutting out his own liver. The wound was very painful and could take quite a while to die from, anywhere from a few minutes to a week. The most common way in which a samurai could be dishonored would be by being defeated in battle. However, fighting to the last man and arrow (or in this case, round of ammo) and holding ones position till the death was considered a great honor.


Does this sound like a nation that is willing to give up?

By the last years of the war, everyone, men and women, over the age of thirteen was a part of a sort of National Guard, and were under the same rules as the rest of the military, which was in turn fighting under a modified code of Bushido which dictated that they never surrender and leave behind the wounded. Another aspect of Japan's culture was that of a group mentality. About ninety-nine percent of the Japanese people were, at the time of World War Two, direct decedents from the original nomadic Mongolian tribes that crossed over into Japan from the Korean Peninsula. They inhabited a land of which only twenty percent was flat enough to farm. Entire towns had to work together to maintain tiny rice paddies carved into hillsides that were irrigated by a community network. Disagreement among the common people against their ruler or with each other was unthinkable and impractical.

On the whole, as long as the military oligarchy wanted the war to continue, the majority of the people would be willing to follow through. The Nuclear Bombs being dropped finally got the military oligarchy to be willing to give up the fighting, and that is what brought them to the peace table, under the condition that the emperor remain in power.

Even after the bombs were dropped, the Emperor's speech never mentioned surrender; just that it was in the best interest of Japan to cease fighting. Had America invaded, the Japanese would have kept on fighting unless given the order to stop. Not only would many American lives have been lost cleaning out all of the fighting forces, everyone in Japan over thirteen was a part of that fighting force. The Japanese people would have been decimated to a point of no return.

The fire bomb raids were equally despicable - thanks for bringing that up. I can't believe you would talk about those raids as if they were actually tactically useful. They were viscous attacks that actively intended to kill civilians. The very definition of terrorism.

(Original post by cl_steele)
that may be but they would have gone down kicking and screaming, considering the vast bulk of them considered surrender to be the most dishonourable end and would fight to the last man just imagine the difficulty of invading and subduing them, would make Afghanistan and Iraq look like a walk in the park...

And yet, it was extremely easy. Of course conventional warfare could not have continued so the authorities surrendered. But this picture of a crazed race willing to give anything for their country... where was the afghanistan/iraq type picture? How many ambushes did the americans deal with? How many train lines blew up? How many assassinations? Even the French put up a better fight than the Japanese did after occupation.

The picture painted of 9 million samurai warriors willing to die for no purpose is surely a ludicrous stereotype. They didn't all commit suicide when they were defeated, funnily enough. They were human too. The island bloodbaths were at the height of the war on islands where retreat was impossible, in jungle where encounters were especially close, and if you think americans weren't also to blame you are extremely naiive. The media's extensive publication of japanese war crimes and anger over pearl harbour manifested in what commanders openly acknowledged as "an unwilling to take prisoners" amongst troops. Americans mutilated japanese casualties, nailing bodies to trees and president Roosevelt was even presented with gifts made from the bones of Japanese soldiers. The allies actually had to implement education campaigns to stop their troops killing surrendered japanese 1944 onwards. The Australian handbook given to soldiers actually said that unless a Japanese soldier had both palms up and open, they were to be shot on sight, gun or not, white flag or not. There are always 2 sides to a story.

The point being, it wasn't 'a few civilians vs millions of troops' - it was killing hundreds of thousands of innocents vs negotiation and a less barbaric demonstration of nuclear power which could easily have also worked.

[unclej]

(Original post by Arbolus)
With the atomic bombs on the other hand it was a choice between hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilian dead, or a million Americans and tens of millions of Japanese (both military and civilian). Yes, it was a terrible thing to do, but it was far better than the altecrnative and that's why it can be justified.

you have fallen victim to exagerated figures qnd propaganda lies, a mainland invasion was not needed and so neither were the bombs. Japan were willing to surrender and would have done so sooner if Truman would have accepted a conditional surrender.

[Rhadamanthus]

(Original post by Rational Thinker)
And what was the extermination of the Jews and all the other people who were killed by the Nazi's part of thats right the "purifying" of the Aryan race.

There's plenty of evidence to suggest that Hitler and the Nazis' mania about exterminating the Jews always took precedence over their quasi-mythological theories of the 'Aryan race'.

[Rational Thinker]

(Original post by Rhadamanthus)
There's plenty of evidence to suggest that Hitler and the Nazis' mania about exterminating the Jews always took precedence over their quasi-mythological theories of the 'Aryan race'.

Once again you are missing the point killing the Jews was just a part of somethingg bigger in the Nazi's view. This is why up until the war plans were made to transport the Jews to prevent what the Nazi's views as "contamination". Adolf Eichman was the one in charge of this he sent them to other countries who then sent the Jews back.

[thunder_chunky]

The estimated losses the USA alone would have suffered was something like 500,000 GI's. Throw in the rest. I think that it had been a long and brutal war and the powers that be saw a way to end conclusively so they took it. It was certainly questionable morally and always will be. Tactically it made sense.

[Revilo1]

I don't think the dropping of the atomic bombs was justified, because - as other people have said - they could easily have used the bombs somewhere else as a show of power, killing as few civilians as possible. I also think that the Allies should have faced war crime trials, but of course that was never going to happen and is entirely unrealistic to expect them to occur - you can't punish the generals who led you to victory. However, this doesn't mean it is fine that they weren't tried as war criminals. And I have this view for the other atrocities carried out by the Allies too, not just Nagasaki and Hiroshima. But back to the point of the thread.

I also fail to see how the fact that American lives would have been lost is a justification for the use of atomic bombs either. Why is an American soldier's life more valuable than a Japanese civilian's life? And I doubt the only other option to using atomic bombs was a total invasion of Japan - surely an invasion of just the key areas would be sufficient. It's not like Japan actually posed any sort of threat to the USA at this time.

[cl_steele]

(Original post by nexttime)

And yet, it was extremely easy. Of course conventional warfare could not have continued so the authorities surrendered. But this picture of a crazed race willing to give anything for their country... where was the afghanistan/iraq type picture? How many ambushes did the americans deal with? How many train lines blew up? How many assassinations? Even the French put up a better fight than the Japanese did after occupation.

The picture painted of 9 million samurai warriors willing to die for no purpose is surely a ludicrous stereotype. They didn't all commit suicide when they were defeated, funnily enough. They were human too. The island bloodbaths were at the height of the war on islands where retreat was impossible, in jungle where encounters were especially close, and if you think americans weren't also to blame you are extremely naiive. The media's extensive publication of japanese war crimes and anger over pearl harbour manifested in what commanders openly acknowledged as "an unwilling to take prisoners" amongst troops. Americans mutilated japanese casualties, nailing bodies to trees and president Roosevelt was even presented with gifts made from the bones of Japanese soldiers. The allies actually had to implement education campaigns to stop their troops killing surrendered japanese 1944 onwards. The Australian handbook given to soldiers actually said that unless a Japanese soldier had both palms up and open, they were to be shot on sight, gun or not, white flag or not. There are always 2 sides to a story.

The point being, it wasn't 'a few civilians vs millions of troops' - it was killing hundreds of thousands of innocents vs negotiation and a less barbaric demonstration of nuclear power which could easily have also worked.

I think youre simplifying the Japanese cause far to much here its well known the Japanese army was one that would quite regularly fight to the last man if ordered to and if that wasnt possible would rather kill themselves, there are several accounts of the Americans giving them no quarter as even after theyd surrendered they'd go loco and lets not forget the infamous kamikazee pilots, just imagine being on the deck of that war ship when a fighter plane bursting with explosives hits you like a tomahawk missile and thats thousands of miles away from Japan so again imagine what it would have been like to invade them without a show of such definitive force the Japanese would cower before you, they didnt nuke these cities out of some sadistic love of vapourising civillians they did it to send a clear and decisive message to the Japanese that they were finished and it worked, ive heard a couple of people argue the point that it was also a message to the USSR to 'know their place' in the new world order, so to speak, which isnt to far fetched if you think about it is it?

Im not saying the Americans were angels im just saying see it from their perspective, they had no desire to see any more of their boys get killed and from what ive heard the pacific theatre made the european theatre look like peanuts [slight over exageration but you catch my drift] my Grandad fought in the soloman isles, some the stories he experienced and heard from his friends of Japanese forces were horric ... they took very few pow's and when they did they more often than not worked them to death anyway, this war was a war of tit for tat and all or nothing the allies were justified in giving no quarter to the Japanese, not only because they couldnt be trusted but because of the horrific war crimes theyd committed that put what the Americans to 'crimes' to shame, take what they did in China those crimes were more repugnant than anything the allies could dream up.

but it all boils down to this, end the war in a few days by killing a lot of civillians [which lets be honest was the norm by this point in the war, every nation was doing it] or have a long slow march up the Japanese mainland incurring thousands more dead on both sides than the bombings caused [most likely] at the end of the day they may be civillians but in total war, no one is exempt and its perfectly reasonable to see why the Americans did what they did, as far as im concerned it was still an abhorrant decision both in its scope and field but it was the lesser of two evils in the long run...

[nexttime]

(Original post by cl_steele)
I think youre simplifying the Japanese cause far to much here its well known the Japanese army was one that would quite regularly fight to the last man if ordered to and if that wasnt possible would rather kill themselves, there are several accounts of the Americans giving them no quarter as even after theyd surrendered they'd go loco and lets not forget the infamous kamikazee pilots, just imagine being on the deck of that war ship when a fighter plane bursting with explosives hits you like a tomahawk missile and thats thousands of miles away from Japan so again imagine what it would have been like to invade them without a show of such definitive force the Japanese would cower before you, they didnt nuke these cities out of some sadistic love of vapourising civillians they did it to send a clear and decisive message to the Japanese that they were finished and it worked, ive heard a couple of people argue the point that it was also a message to the USSR to 'know their place' in the new world order, so to speak, which isnt to far fetched if you think about it is it?

Im not saying the Americans were angels im just saying see it from their perspective, they had no desire to see any more of their boys get killed and from what ive heard the pacific theatre made the european theatre look like peanuts [slight over exageration but you catch my drift] my Grandad fought in the soloman isles, some the stories he experienced and heard from his friends of Japanese forces were horric ... they took very few pow's and when they did they more often than not worked them to death anyway, this war was a war of tit for tat and all or nothing the allies were justified in giving no quarter to the Japanese, not only because they couldnt be trusted but because of the horrific war crimes theyd committed that put what the Americans to 'crimes' to shame, take what they did in China those crimes were more repugnant than anything the allies could dream up.

but it all boils down to this, end the war in a few days by killing a lot of civillians [which lets be honest was the norm by this point in the war, every nation was doing it] or have a long slow march up the Japanese mainland incurring thousands more dead on both sides than the bombings caused [most likely] at the end of the day they may be civillians but in total war, no one is exempt and its perfectly reasonable to see why the Americans did what they did, as far as im concerned it was still an abhorrant decision both in its scope and field but it was the lesser of two evils in the long run...

I've said this repeatedly already but one last time... those were NOT the only 2 options. Japan was threatened with "total annihilation" before Hiroshima, but at no point was the force of an atom bomb communicated. There was no attempt to demonstrate the force in a low-density civilian area. There was very little pause before the second bomb. They just went straight to the killing.

And you're right - this was the norm by this time in the war. The fire-bombings were just as disgraceful. However, that is in no way an excuse. It was norm in Japan to kill POWs, it was norm in auchwitz to gas jews. These people still have to take responsibility for their actions.

It was total war before. By 1945, the result was certain.

Obviously i can also see why it was done. However, the choice to do it as it was done showed a complete neglect for civilian life. Other options could have been explored. At the very least, its criminal negligence and 190,000 counts of man slaughter. Very least.

[Harveys]

(Original post by nexttime)
I've said this repeatedly already but one last time... those were NOT the only 2 options. Japan was threatened with "total annihilation" before Hiroshima, but at no point was the force of an atom bomb communicated. There was no attempt to demonstrate the force in a low-density civilian area. There was very little pause before the second bomb. They just went straight to the killing.

And you're right - this was the norm by this time in the war. The fire-bombings were just as disgraceful. However, that is in no way an excuse. It was norm in Japan to kill POWs, it was norm in auchwitz to gas jews. These people still have to take responsibility for their actions.

It was total war before. By 1945, the result was certain.

Obviously i can also see why it was done. However, the choice to do it as it was done showed a complete neglect for civilian life. Other options could have been explored. At the very least, its criminal negligence and 190,000 counts of man slaughter. Very least.

As someone has already pointed out it was TOTAL WAR whole countries where at war, that included the civilians

Also do not forgot whilst WW2 is within living memory, it wasn't fought with modern technologies.

They could not then destroy military and industry places with pin point precision.
The best they could do was carpet bomb an area. NASTY, HORRIBLE abhorrent in modern times yes I agree. But the best they could do, then.

In fact we couldn’t precision bomb with great accuracy until the late 20th century. So how we can fight a war now, is not the same as how they could fight a war.

To claim it was manslaughter is plainly wrong.

[Dux_Helvetica]

(Original post by gagaslilmonsteruk)
Recently, I read the reason for building it was originally not to use on Japan, but to use it on the Nazis.

Had the Allies really been backed into a corner by the Axis, then use of an atomic bomb on Nazi Germany may have been justified. Although to be honest there was no need to drop the atomic bomb on an already-decimated Germany.