Poll: Was It Wrong To Drop The Atomic Bombs In Japan?

[Brad Shepard]

This may sound mean, but like it or not, it happened, and we cant change the fact it did.

OT: they where warned a number of times.

 

[secretsantaone]

They were going to surrender literally the day after the bombs were dropped.
The war would have been won by the americans even if they hadn't dropped the bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The Japanese knew the americans had nuclear weapons, and they also knew how destructive they were. as I said: they would have surrendered without the bombs dropping.
So, as usual millions of people die for no reason, except now they died in the blink of an eye.
(by the way, I don't use a capital letter at the beginning of the word "americans" in this post, because of the huge disrespect I have for their actions at the end of the war, the atomic bombs.)

The Japanese wouldn't have surrendered, they had three days between the first and the second bomb and they didn't. Their culture was so patriotic and xenophobic they wouldn't surrender to conventional warfare.

I like how most of the people condemning the Americans have anime avatars.

 

[CapnDork1337]

I find it amusing that the thing people keep coming back to is that it saved lives. You dropped a nuke on a city. What you should be saying is it saved american soldiers lives. Because it sure as hell didn't save civilian Japanese lives.

 

[Christemo]

i would´ve understanded it slightly better if they blew a military area. hitting a 100% innocent city was just wrong. wish the Ruskies had bombed them (sorry for any americans, but theres so much wrong with your government throughout history).

 

[Brandon237]

Well yeah, seeing as Japan was on their way to sign a truce.

Que?
This is not accurate, to my understanding.

In my view, it was justified. If it did not happen, mainland Japan would have been invaded. The Japanese would have fought to the last breath. Countless American and Japanese troops and Japanese civillians would have died on the Journey to Tokyo. 3 million casualties predicted in Tokyo civillians alone, were the projected figures.

Yay, someone sees the light. The japanese soldiers were absolutely fanatical and would fight until the last man. The fact that they didn't surrender after the first bomb is proof.

-The Japanese had virtually no Navy or Airforce to speak of.

-The Americans had blockaded Japan, meaning they couldn't get any imported recources, which is nearly everything. lol

The japanese still had many ground soldiers and would fight to the last, Japan would starve its entire population long before it would give into a siege.

-Winston Churchill in his book ("The World At War") said that the bombs did not play any part in the defeat of Japan.

-The only reason people think that the bombs won the war in the Pacific is due to American Propagada.

Winston Churchill was British and his country at no point in time actually fought the Japanese, so he cannot speak. I agree that the USA uses a lot of propaganda, but not to this level. We also have many reliable history sources from different areas of the world to say that it was the best decision. Japan didn't fight like a normal country did, so a different kind of warfare was needed to "safely" defeat them.

Now, I'm not trying to force your vote by saying these things, I would like some insight into your thoughts not just on the bombing but the points I have listen above.

Very ironic statement. And saying it isn't going to stop anyone from doing just that. Really. The only way to prevent this is the power of intelligent statement. Think your arguments through a bit.

They bombs were necessary to stop a fanatical and well dug in opponent. Conventional fighting methods would be far worse for EVERYONE involved.

America also wanted to warn Russia not to mess with them as tensions were mounting long before the cold war.

 

[Brandon237]

if there is one civilian casualty...
you fucking messed up!

so no you don't nuke city's.

Name one war in which you know that there were no civ casualties. I thought so. Crippling only an army is no longer possible in modern... combat.

 

[secretsantaone]

Winston Churchill was British and his country at no point in time actually fought the Japanese, so he cannot speak.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Pacific_Fleet

 

[Ithera]

The Americans were itching to make use of their super weapon, and I think the Japanese were preparing to do things the hard way?

Well, they got the hard way. Right/wrong? Well... perhaps humanity needed a costly lesson in monstrous overkill. Not a single bomb has been used since.

 

[Squoze]

I studied this debate in history class! Aside from the belief at the time that the nukes would bring about a quick end to the war, Truman wanted to show the Soviets that the US wasn't going to be jerked around. Remember, the USSR had plans to invade Japan. Therefore, Truman was under pressure to make the Japanese surrender in order to prevent the Soviets from landing on the Japanese homeland. Had this happened, Stalin would have demanded to be a partner in Japan's reconstruction process. A situation similar to a divided Germany/Berlin is a very likely possibility had the US not used atomic weaponry.

 

[yanipheonu]

Imagine if they had to INVADE JAPAN? That's probably as hellish as an atom bomb. Though I'd never want to make the decision between the two, so I'm not going to pretend to know what was best.

 

[serialver]

Two bombs was excessive. It seemed to me more of a show of force to the world and Russia, as well as wanting to play with their new toy.

 

[yoyo13rom]

No, it wasn't.

The American's said

We're gonna drop this bomb on yo' ass and it's gonna really fuck your shit up, so surrender now

but Japan didn't do anything.
America dropped it and Japan got buggered up. Then America warned then that they would do it all again if they didn't surrender, and they still didn't. They got another bomb dropped on them. Then they surrendered. It was the fault of the stubborn Japanese emperor.
It was war. During war, you don't think of the other country, but your own.

Ok this really, really, really, pisses me off!!!! So there are 3 possible endings for now(warning, this is just a side note, regarding what may happen after I post this; this doesn't directly regard the subject):

Spoiler

1. I have my facts wrong(but I doubt it, I mean it was the only History class I actually listend to the facts!), and I'll be ridiculed.
2. The Escapists(most of them) haven't been attentive to a particular major detail in History class(witch bugs me) although simply your country-here I'm referring directly to America-(don't wanna be a racist/jerk about it, but some countries leave parts of the truth untold so they can justify what they did, or simply out of shame; I mean just look at the Germans, I'm sure they don't go all full detail of WW II in classes)
3. I should stop hanging out on this site, before I lose all my approval(and love) points towards the community.

Ok from what I know(I'm sorry but I'm 100% percent sure I heard his during History class), America bombed Hiroshima, because of a misinterpretation of what Japan said. They used a word with a double meaning("we'll think about it" and "no"; can't recall if these were the exact meanings regarding the document). And America went for the "no" meaning and dropped the bomb.
And that clearly was fair.
Ok, let's say they got the message right, and they understood that Japan was taking into consideration surrendering. But did they give Japan a chance to discos the terms of surrender, to think about it, to see what resources were they willing to give when they surrender, and what they weren't?(If your in a castel under attack, and your opponent gives you till X to surrender, do you surrender immediately when he proposes? NO! I think a normal man would need a little time to think about it.)

Any way, let's move on. For those who said (America needed to give them a lesson): wasn't the first bomb enough? + They didn't attack a military location, they bombed, undefended crummy little villages, just to show how awesome they are.

Oh, and for those how say that Japan need a lessons for teaming up with Germany: you're a hypocrite thinking that what America did was any different form the genocides the natzis did.

 

[Rakkana]

Killing civilians in war is ALWAYS wrong, and despite all of the positive effects it had I will never argue it was a good thing.

couldn't have said it better myself...

 

[CruelSpider]

Imagine if they had to INVADE JAPAN? That's probably as hellish as an atom bomb. Though I'd never want to make the decision between the two, so I'm not going to pretend to know what was best.

This is the main reason that they decided to drop the bombs, or so we've been told.
The U.S. government came to the conclusion that more lives would have been lost had we invaded Japan. Dropping the bombs was the best of the two poisons.

 

[bladeofdarkness]

no
it was ruthless, but it wasn't WRONG
it ended the war much sooner and with a lOT less loss of life on both sides

no doubt it was a terrible experience
but it was still better then letting the war continue for another year and cost millions of japanese, and hunderds of thousends of american lives

 

[Lyinginbedmon]

My opinion on the matter is that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were two of the most abominable war crimes in history, crimes which I believe the United States should be held accountable for and prosecuted accordingly.

However, since we're now 65 years on from the events and most of the people involved on almost all levels are dead, and at the time the US was responsible for operating the Nuremberg Trials anyhow, pretty damn fat chance of that. Which is appalling really.

 

[8-Bit Grin]

'Reg42' has it down to a science. Seriously, we warned them and they ignored it.
Boom.
We told them we'd do it again. They ignored it.
Boom.
They decided their shit had been sufficiently fucked up, and surrendered.
We win the war, our history marks us as heroes, everyone else's as dicks. The world keeps spinning.
-F

 

[Manatee Slayer]

Wow, this is the first time when I haven't been yelled out of the room for saying that I think we should have done it.

Good, I'm glad you get to express your opinion but to be honest I'm surprised that across the 18 pages no one has been banned. Looks like I joined the right forum. :-D

Very ironic statement. And saying it isn't going to stop anyone from doing just that. Really. The only way to prevent this is the power of intelligent statement. Think your arguments through a bit.

Considering I voted no and agree with a lot of the people who done the same I do not find it hypocritical at all, because I really wasn't trying to turn people's votes, I really did want to know what people thought and I also got some responses to the stuff I found out, which I' happy about. Also, the people who posted did not seem to be swayed by the points I made in the first post, and neither was I when I first found them out. Most people see it as something that needed to happen but was still a horrible thing to do.

 

[Jeezy]

Not sure why half of you think Japan was already planning to surrender. The whole reason we dropped bombs instead of an invasion because the Japanese were willing to throw however many people it took to try to hold any land. Look at how many died for little tiny bit of land in the Pacific. If we didn't drop the bombs there probably wouldn't be any Japanese left at the end of the war. Also the Japanese leadership still wanted to fight after only one bomb so the second one was needed.

 

[gim73]

A 'crime against humanity' eh? Perhaps the same could be said of all weapons. Mines, bombs and grenades throw off shrapnel that tears off limbs and effectively removes soldiers from the battlefield as less than half a man. Chemical neurotoxins attack the soldier and assault him, leaving him gasping and in excrutiating pain. Bullets embed themselves into soldiers, often causing death and horrid sucking wounds. Flame throwers burn everything they touch, scarring people for life (btw, these are banned). Wanna get to less technological weapons? Swords and spears cut you open and leave you suffering on the battlefield with your guts all over the place. Maces and other blunt weapons cause internal bleeding and broken bones.

What exactly makes a massive shock wave followed by a fireball and radiation such a crime against humanity?

It's not the manner of how it kills or wounds it's victim, it's the use of it. Conventional weapons are made to be used against other soldiers, "legitimate" uses so to speak. But nuclear weapons are pretty much designed to wipe out cities full of civilians, which makes it comparable to the holocaust in a way.

So then, the MILLIONS of civilians killed by conventional weapons in WW2 was just fine because they were 'legitimate' weapons, but the hundred thousand or so that were killed by nukes was wrong because the weapon is 'illegitimate'? So tell me, was it bad because a single plane destroyed these towns rather than hundreds of planes over the course of an entire night. Events like the tokyo firestorm, where over 100000 people were killed by 'conventional' weapons in a single attack.

Nuclear weapons were never 'designed' to be used against civilians. It was always politicians who chose the targets as civilian support. The thing that is amazing is that a nuke has never actually been used against an enemy military force.

BTW: Oppenheimers famous 'I have become death, destroyer of worlds' quote didn't happen at the bomb test. He said that years later during an interview. Eyewitnesses at the bomb test remember him saying something about it being bigger than he expected.