Was Hiroshima and Nagasaki justified?

Dis · August 6, 2003, 01:22

Yes it's that time of the year again. This is actually the companion thread to my: was Pearl Harbour justified

. I was going to make it back then, but thought better of it.

What I like about this article, is it doesn't include the usual bullshit from western academics about the horrors of weapons of mass destruction. The Japanese themselves admit that the military fiercely opposed surrender and that was not likely.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/08/05/nyt.kristof/index.html

I've always theorized that the bombing saved Japanese lives. Yes, japanese lives. I won't even go into american lives. The losses of the Okinawa invasion are proof of this. Is that not enough justification?

And I didn't realize what Nelson Mandela said this year. It's hard to have so much respect for someone who doesn't understand history. He dropped a couple of notches in my book.

Ted Striker · August 6, 2003, 01:25

This was the very first debate I ever had on Apolyton.

The answer is yes the bombs were justified. They saved millions of lives on all sides.

In year 2003 it's not the right solution but in 1945 it was THE best possible solution available.

Al B. Sure! · August 6, 2003, 01:30

the Japanese were mass producing wooden kamikazi planes... those things alone would've killed more americans and japanese pilots than the a-bombs did... and don't forget how the germans had sent u-boats with nuclear material to the japanese... their nuclear program wouldn't have gone anywhere but that material could have been released against the invading americans...

MichaeltheGreat · August 6, 2003, 01:44

Speer - bullshit, they couldn't get those off the ground. The nuclear material they had was also useless, but the Japanese were training ten year old kids to use bamboo spears in invasion defense, as well is imposing such stringent rationing on everything that the winter of 1945-46 would have been hell for the Japanese, while the US prepared for the invasion.

I think the Nagasaki bomb was premature. After Hiroshima, the Japanese didn't believe what initial reports they got - they thought the whole thing was hysteria, but communication and transport was so bad they hadn't even gotten people credible to IJA HQ in Tokyo into Hiroshima to assess things firsthand.

Nagasaki wasn't even an intended target (that was Niigata), but it was the third alternate, and the only one that had clear weather when LeMay made the decision for the second drop. Had there been a week's delay, it's pretty likely the Japanese would have gone through the same aborted coup/assassination/peace process they did after Nagasaki, without the need for using the second bomb.

Nothing the Japanese could do in that time would affect US forces, so there was no particular need to drop the second one three days after the first.

Al B. Sure! · August 6, 2003, 01:57

MtG:

http://vikingphoenix.com/public/Japa...5/jp-abomb.htm

as for the kamikazis... i read that they had several thousand 'planes' availible to use for kamikaze purposes... and though he was probably exaggerating, when jap admiral Kantaro Suzuki told the Japanese gov't in June 1945 that he had thousands of aircraft and pilots ready for kamikaze missions, there was probably truth in his statements. they probably wouldn't be sending out real planes or their piloted v-1's, but i'm sure world war 1 style wood and canvas planes could be mass produced with the bare minimum to get them flying.

David Floyd · August 6, 2003, 02:28

MtG,

Quote:

Nagasaki wasn't even an intended target (that was Niigata),

Actually, the primary was Kokura, IIRC.

Al B. Sure! · August 6, 2003, 02:35

yeah thats right... nagasaki was a mistake... always found it odd that such a historical city was wiped out by the allies... but i figured if they did it to dresden they could just as easily do it to nagasaki.

one anti-bomb position that always annoys me is the "there's no problem nuking the yellow man" theory... don't yall hate this arguement that somehow the US wouldn't have used the bomb on the white germans but loved to use it on the japanese? talk about bullshit ideas...

David Floyd · August 6, 2003, 02:38

Nagasaki had a couple of points that made it a target.

First, it hadn't yet been heavily firebombed, and was relatively intact.

Second, it had two major factories, a steel works, and the large Mitsubishi shipyards (which, incidentally, made the torpedos used at Pearl Harbor).

Thirdly, it's location relative to Kokura was an advantage - that is, it was on the opposite side of a mountain range, the idea being that if Kokura was fogged, Nagasaki would be clear.

MichaeltheGreat · August 6, 2003, 03:10

Quote:

Originally posted by David Floyd
MtG,

Actually, the primary was Kokura, IIRC.

Prior to the orders being given, the intent originally was to hit Niigata, on the Sea of Japan side, with land access to Tokyo, the idea being the Japanese C&C could assess their likely future more easily if they didn't have to cross USA owned seas and airspace. You couldn't divert a mission from northwestern Honshu to southern Kyushu due to the distance, so Niigata was never put on the actual tasking order for Bock's Car (the B-29 sent up to drop the bomb.) on the 9th, because the weather forecast for the Niigata area was almost complete cloud cover.

Somewhere in my collection of stuff, I have a photo of ground zero as it is today, taken from my bedroom window in the apartment I lived in when I was in Nagasaki. The Mitsubishi factory is back, as is the naval base.

Al B. Sure! · August 6, 2003, 03:13

Quote:

the apartment I lived in when I was in Nagasaki.

thats settles it, mtg... you are the most worldly (in the good way) person i have ever encountered. how old are you by the way?

Dis · August 6, 2003, 03:15

well I didn't see him at the Poly meet, I still have my doubts whether he actually exists

He may be a computer ai after all

Al B. Sure! · August 6, 2003, 03:17

so the legend goes...

MichaeltheGreat · August 6, 2003, 03:21

Quote:

Originally posted by Albert Speer
MtG:

http://vikingphoenix.com/public/Japa...5/jp-abomb.htm

You have to watch a bit for any site that uses "Japan Inc." in it's address, or anywhere else.

They shipped two loads of Uranium Oxide on type IX U-boots. That does not a real nuclear program make. Among many things, the Uranium compound of choice for separation at that time was Uranium Hexafluoride. The Japanese had none of the necessary centrifuging facilities to make enough enriched Uranium for a bomb in any reasonable time frame, they didn't have adequate engineering time, or machining capability for the mechanical package, nor did they have a bomber of any type that could carry a realistic sized bomb package. The whole country didn't have a thousandth the computational capacity available at Los Alamos. All the Japanese had was some Uranium and a vague fantasy, plus a small number of talented physicists. Even if left alone (other than the routine pace of bombing with no special targeting), they wouldn't have been able to make a bomb within even five years, and the country would have collapsed far sooner than that anyway.

Quote:

as for the kamikazis... i read that they had several thousand 'planes' availible to use for kamikaze purposes... and though he was probably exaggerating, when jap admiral Kantaro Suzuki told the Japanese gov't in June 1945 that he had thousands of aircraft and pilots ready for kamikaze missions, there was probably truth in his statements. they probably wouldn't be sending out real planes or their piloted v-1's, but i'm sure world war 1 style wood and canvas planes could be mass produced with the bare minimum to get them flying.

They'd still need engines, or to be towed from other planes and deployed as gliders. "Reality" was more along the lines that insane and impossible home defense orders were issued, and everyone reported compliance, although reality was orders of magnitude different. We were routinely attacking Japanese airfields on the ground, and we owned the Inland Sea at that time, so there was virtually no fuel and next to nothing flying. The reason the A-bomb planes went in practically alone was simple - the Japanese were so limited in fuel, planes and ordnance that they wouldn't fly unless there was what they thought was a critical threat - and a lone bomber, or a small group, wasn't worth the limited fuel available to go after it.

MichaeltheGreat · August 6, 2003, 03:25

Quote:

Originally posted by Albert Speer

thats settles it, mtg... you are the most worldly (in the good way) person i have ever encountered. how old are you by the way?

43.

BTW, my ex-brother-in-law was one of those ten year olds training with the bamboo spears I mentioned.

MichaeltheGreat · August 6, 2003, 03:28

Quote:

Originally posted by Dissident
well I didn't see him at the Poly meet, I still have my doubts whether he actually exists

He may be a computer ai after all

The border crossing was a ***** that day (typical summer weekend), for both walking and driving. Plus I had to work.

Zylka · August 6, 2003, 03:48

Little known fact: Nelso Mandela isn't all he's made out to be. A "dark past" is all I'll say. Anyone else with the knowledge like to share?

yavoon · August 6, 2003, 04:24

I'd like to lodge a complaint. to ask "is hiroshima justified" but then switch the wording to necessary in the poll isnt being consistent. worse yet u switch from necessary to should, then to needed? whoa.

Geronimo · August 6, 2003, 04:36

MTG, I think the chemistry to derive the uranium hexafluoride from uranium oxide would have been one of the least daunting steps in the production of suitable bomb material.

If the facts in the article could all be believed, it seems that Japan would have been totally precluded from building an A-bomb only by it's lack of computational capabilities and by the general disruption of the allied bombings.

FrustratedPoet · August 6, 2003, 06:05

I don't dismiss the "saved more lives than it took" argument, however I can not possibly accept that the massacre of thousands upon thousands of innocent civilian lives could ever be morally justified. It's just wrong in any context.

MikeH · August 6, 2003, 06:10

Agreed.

Harovan · August 6, 2003, 06:31

Using nuclear weapons on civilians is a crime tenfold worse than, say, flying a plane in a building, and its cruelty is topped only by the crimes of the nazis themselves.

FrustratedPoet · August 6, 2003, 06:34

Well that should warm the debate up rather nicely.

Zylka · August 6, 2003, 06:42

Quote:

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
Using nuclear weapons on civilians is a crime tenfold worse than, say, flying a plane in a building, and its cruelty is topped only by the crimes of the nazis themselves.

Ecthy · August 6, 2003, 06:59

both bombings were absolutely necessary to preserve freedom and peace throughout the entire world

David Floyd · August 6, 2003, 07:01

MtG,

Niigata was originally one of four priority targets (others being Hiroshima, HQ of Japanese 2nd Army and an industrial target, Kokura, an industrial target, and Kyoto, a major industrial city). Kyoto was replaced by Henry Stimson with Nagasaki, which I'm sure you know.

Now, Niigata may have been considered a priority target, but it was never the primary or secondary target for either mission - the first mission's priority order was Hiroshima, Kokura, and Nagasaki, and the second mission's order was Kokura, then Nagasaki. Again, because of the presence of Kokura on the priority list, Niigata was precluded because of distance.

David Floyd · August 6, 2003, 07:02

Quote:

both bombings were absolutely necessary to preserve freedom and peace throughout the entire world

Yeah, sorta like Dresden, huh?

Ecthy · August 6, 2003, 07:04

same there

Ecthy · August 6, 2003, 07:05

hold no grudge, David... debates like these are totally nonsensical, I can't but bullshit them

Proteus_MST · August 6, 2003, 07:20

I don´t think they were necessary.

After all I have read to date,
it seems that even without the Bombings the Japanese Government was more and more ready for Peacetalks.
So I don´t think, that the A-Bombs have significantly shortened the war.
I think it was maybe less than a month. The Number of american and japanese) Soldiers saved never ever justifies the much higher number of Civilians casualties due to the Bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

And, if you had to test the new Weapon, one Bomb should have been sufficient. Afterwards you already knew how much Damage this Weapons produce (as you,without doubt had Planes flying over Hiroshima afterwards and taking Photographs).
And it was also sufficient to demonstrate the power of american Weapons to the Tenno.
And so I think especially the second Bomb was by no means justified.

CerberusIV · August 6, 2003, 07:50

The political situation at the time made use of the A bombs inevitable. Germany had surrendered and Japan was beaten. The politicians were thinking about what next. Dropping at least one bomb shortened the war and saved US lives - that was Truman's concern, not Japanese lives. It also sent a powerful signal setting out America's claim to influence the post WW2 world.

Was it justified? At the time, yes. By our current standards, attitudes and knowledge of nuclear weapons, no.

Hindsight is wonderful, particularly for the amount of BS it can generate.