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

[Darkenwrath]

-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 were terrified by the thought of the Russians coming, due to the fact they had lost to them before and that they would probably take over the country and install communism.

-Many high ranking officials were against the attack saying it was unnesisary and that the Japanese were ready to surrender anyway.

-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.

All true however you forgot to mention the simply fact that the Japanese had the philosophy "death before betraying the emperor!" if America had tried to step onto Japanese soil they would have to fight a war of attrition to the very last man.

Japan would simply of not surrendered til it had no other option and the entire Japanese people would throw themselves against the American invaders. America simply dropped the A bomb instead.

There was absolutely no other weapon even remotely like it before, it devastated an ENTIRE city, one bomb, if you had told the Japanese we can level your cities with one bomb they would of laughed in your face prior. Nearly everything was flattened and people were vaporized, before their minds had time to register the fact "we're screwed," then came the after effects, fallout, the black rain, blindness, it completely shell shocked the Japanese nation.

America then dropped a second one, which yes in my opinion was unnecessary, Japan surrendered immediately afterwards partly because America stated "tokyo next" to them. In my opinion the second bomb was used purely out of spite.

 

[EMFCRACKSHOT]

I understand your way of thinking, and I get that at the time it was probably the only way the Americans could see forward. Yes, it did avoid large scale invasion of Japan. Yes, it did lead the Japanese to properly surrender.

However, in hindsight I believe that the ends don't justify the means.
They had bombed Tokyo, but they hadn't attacked Hiroshima or Nagasaki yet - so alot of people were there.
If the fighting had been street-to-street they would have had a lot more of a chance to evacuate Hiroshima and Nagasaki (it's not like they realised that the bomb threats would actually come true - this kind of thing hadn't happened before really). It wasn't just that there were civilians involved... there was a high concentration of civilians in those cities, in comparison to the places in other countries that had been bombed or invaded, where they had been able to get more people away from the cities.

I know that Japan had killed a ridiculous amount of the chinese, and their kamikaze techniques were very dangerous, but there was still a possibility of a relatively quick truce. I just don't see why it was impossible for the Americans to arrange some sort of conditional surrender rather than using the bombs to force the end of Japan's involvement in the war.

The allies were unwilling to accept a conditional surrender. Especially after all of the war crimes. And there was no way they could have forced a quick truce without invading mainland japan.
As to your first point, Japan was too small for any large scale evacuation from the cities. And all major cities would have been heavily bombed and shelled before an attack.
Imagine the firebomb raids on tokyo happening over and over again, but to all japanese cities. As horrible as it was, the bombing of hiroshima and nagasaki was preferable.
What should also be considered is that this result left a lot of japans infrastructure intact and allowed them to rebuild faster.

 

[ImSkeletor]

It wasn't completely necessary to do it, however, would the Americans have engaged them on land we would have lost many more men to the Japanese armies because at the time those soldiers would not have surrendered until the Emperor had given the final word. The bomb was our way of telling them "we aren't fucking around here"

This guy is exactly right. Many, many MANY more people would have died if we did a full land invasion which we would have had to do. I had an arguement with some one after a class about this.

 

[DarkRyter]

War in itself is wrong.

/thread.

 

[Manatee Slayer]

I think DarkRyter wins. lol

 

[DarkSpectre]

After the United States took Saipan the civilian populace committed mass suicide rather than surrender. The governing powers at the time imagined what this would be like when they invaded the mainland and were horrified. Sure they knew they could win it by conventional means, but if the civilians would just commit suicide like on Saipan then if they could get the government to surrender another way it would cause a lot less casualties on both sides. The estimated cost of lives was into the several millions. Horrifying losses to a nation that had already lost nearly an entire generation worth of men.

 

[Teddy Roosevelt]

Well, typically this is an opinionated subject. I don't believe so, because even from a humanitarian point of view the bombs were the better choice.

If you argue the loss of life, would you rather lose 500,000 or so Japanese or 1,000,000 Americans as the invasion estimates stated? You couldn't even use, like you could in some other situations, the argument that the user thinks and allied life is more valuable, because he would have lost more. The loss of human life was less than it would have been without the nukes.



Otherwise, Japan would not have surrendered lest we showed them our bombs, and not knowing how many of these bombs we had, and with the fear of God in them as a result of being hit by nuclear bombs, they surrendered. The punch line is that there was fighting a couple of days after the surrender. The emperor surrendered due to nuclear bombs, but even then there were some who were not ready to lay down their arms.

I'd say no. Japan was already prepared to surrender. America gave them a chance, and they refused because Russia appeared to be the larger threat. America did it to prove them wrong.

False. The Soviets were preoccupied in Germany, and even afterwards, they would have had no interest in Japan, as there was no conflict between them. The only reason Stalin invaded Hitler was because Hitler hit him first with the intent to crush his nation. Even with Hitler gobbling up land around him, Stalin was more concerned with the industrialization of the USSR, and he would have been after he defeated his foe.

From pretty much every standpoint, Japan was bound to lose. Their industry was pretty much dead... hell, their whole infrastructure was blown to hell, but they would not have surrendered with those bombs. In order to win without the bombs we would have had to go in and crush every little pocket of resistance, as the Japanese people would have fought tooth and nail to keep us away. The status of their infrastructure meant nothing to them. It was all about fighting until the bitter end.

I'm not sure if you are condemning Truman or not, but I do know that proving Japan wrong was not a part of it, unless it was proving them wrong about their superiority over us.

 

[Fox242]

The other alternatives to the atom bombs were a naval blockade that would have starved most of the Japanses population or an invasion which would have killed off most of the Japanese in Japan and cost hundreds of thousands of Allied casualties. Those options would have resulted in horrendous body counts and a prolonging of a war that was essentially over. The bombs may have caused thousands of lives, but they ended the war and they wound up saving millions of Japanese civilians in the long run. Also, the leaders of the Japanese military were preparing to take down the whole country and population with them rather than face the shame of surrender. Look up the Kyujo Incident and you will see my point. Ture, the bombs were absolutely horrifying in terms of the damage that they caused, but they were the lesser evils when compared to the options of invasion or starvation.

 

[Tharwen]

I think they dropped them to test what their effect would be. They knew the size of the explosion, estimated dead etc., but I expect they wanted to test the psychological effect on the country. It's a total dick move to do that sort of thing to civilians, though.

 

[Ham_authority95]

The Japanese where pretty financially and industrially fucked.

Plus, the moral was at an all time low for the Japanese troops.

They would have surrendered anyway, so no, it was a bad idea to drop the bomb.

 

[almostgold]

-They attacked us first. In war, 'proportional retaliation' is a joke.

-As for civilians dead, keep in mind two things: 1)There was a draft. This changes things from now. Why does simply being a certain age and sex make it okay for you to die in war, but not others? and 2)the support for the war was TOTAL in Japan. My history teacher junior year gave us a speech about this (very liberal teacher, not the type to drum American propaganda). Even in America, there were a few scattered peace groups that objected to the war. In Japan, there wasn't. None. At all.

-This is a country that refused to surrender after one bomb was dropped. And after two and a Russian invasion, there was a failed coup against the Emperor to try to keep Japan fighting.

-It saved lives. Hundreds of thousands to millions of Lives. Preferable to both sides. Few facts: The Japanese cabinet had approved a measure extending the draft to include men from ages fifteen to sixty and women from seventeen to forty-five (an additional 28 million people). The War Ministry gave an order to execute Allied prisoners of War (over 100,000) in case of an invasion. Those aren't even US military estimates, which you could argue are skewed. Those are straight from the Japanese themselves. (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debate_over_the_atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#Preferable_to_invasion ). If we had not dropped those bombs, I honestly believe that we would be sitting here now arguing about why America didn't. The pro-bomb group would be the same people arguing against it now, saying the same arguments (crime against nature not to drop it, cost innocent Japanese lives, etc.)

 

[MajorKris]

In the end, it saved more lives.

Most people don't debate whether dropping the first atomic bomb was wrong, but whether or not it was necessary to drop a second. I personally don't think we needed to bomb Japan twice. I personally think the second bombing was unnecessary considering that even when we asked for a unconditional surrender, but didn't even attempt to remove their Emperor from power after they did so.

Japan did try to surrender after the first atomic bomb. But because they would not unconditionally surrender, we dropped the second.

 

[CloggedDonkey]

It was not fair, but neither was invading the island, or having a prolonged air and NAVY campaign. They had to choose the lesser of three evils: bomb the shit out of Tokyo until all of the Japanese where dead, invade the island and loose thousands, possibly millions of lives, or destroy two tiny farming towns to show the Japanese that they are not messing around. and we had no idea they where surrendering until they did, the broadcast went out at 12:00, and we where launching a B-52 with a third bomb headed for Tokyo at 12:05.

 

[Mortons4ck]

I think it is necessary to keep in mind that the Japanese civilians died without committing any crime other than being Japanese. It is likely that most of the civilians had no stake in the say of the war, and thus died for a way for America to simply say, "Hey, stop this."

The Japanese government would have (and did) gladly sacrificed their civilians if they thought it would give them an edge militarily.

Yes, yes, and all that. You can also waggle your finger at Pearl Harbor as an excuse as well. But, the fact is: many people died that were in no way a part of the military. It is like shooting a person in the face in the ghetto and saying, "He COULD be a drug dealer in the future!"

At the Battle of Okinawa, the Japanese Army killed 100,000 Japanese civilians. Through starvation, encouragement of suicide, using them as human shields, or just killing them because of their differing dialect to cut down on potential spies.

My point being, their number was up either way. Those civilians would have either died by our bombs, or died by being sent out ill-equipped by their government to defend their Emperor from the gaijin land invaders. Civilian woman were being trained by their government to attack invaders with bamboo spears, children were taught by their government to run under tanks and detonate themselves. No matter how you look at it, they were dead.

 

[Dr Snakeman]

I voted yes.
The thread asked if it was morally wrong to kill thousands of people in nuclear fire.
However, the alternative would also be wrong, but far, far more tragic. So, it was necessary, if morally unacceptable. It was really a question of the lesser of two evils.

 

[Ham_authority95]

War in itself is wrong.

/thread.

An undeniable truth. Same with many other wars in history.

 

[ModsDeleteThisAccountPlease]

Truman was faced with this:

A) Plan, prep, and support a long term invasion of the Japanese homeland filled with civilians ready to defend there home land, against a government who refused to surrender (The key officials were still for the war). Risking millions of American lives, even more Japanese civilians, and lay utter waste to all of Japan?

or

B) Drop the most devastating weapon of the war onto 2 main Japanese cities (If I'm correct, Nagasaki and Hiroshima both had important military structures), kill thousands of civilians, and irradiate the near by land, but end the war right there and then, saving countless American and Japanese lives?

Obvious choice would be B.

 

[Mr.Gompers]

I feel that no, it was not wrong, not when the costs of the alternatives are considered. As many others have stated, the cost of an invasion would have been much greater than the costs of the bombs. People keep saying it's wrong to kill civilians, however, have you considered the fact that many of the American soldiers were civilians drafted into service?

Even if Japan was willing to surrender, which I have heard that it was, they had to go through the Russians, who were not willing to pass such news along to the Americans, as they wished to invade Manchuria.

Finally, I feel that Japan is lucky that it didn't get worse considering things like the Rape of Nanking.

 

[Deathkingo]

I think it is necessary to keep in mind that the Japanese civilians died without committing any crime other than being Japanese. It is likely that most of the civilians had no stake in the say of the war, and thus died for a way for America to simply say, "Hey, stop this."

The Japanese government would have (and did) gladly sacrificed their civilians if they thought it would give them an edge militarily.

Yes, yes, and all that. You can also waggle your finger at Pearl Harbor as an excuse as well. But, the fact is: many people died that were in no way a part of the military. It is like shooting a person in the face in the ghetto and saying, "He COULD be a drug dealer in the future!"

At the Battle of Okinawa, the Japanese Army killed 100,000 Japanese civilians. Through starvation, encouragement of suicide, using them as human shields, or just killing them because of their differing dialect to cut down on potential spies.

My point being, their number was up either way. Those civilians would have either died by our bombs, or died by being sent out ill-equipped by their government to defend their Emperor from the gaijin land invaders. Civilian woman were being trained by their government to attack invaders with bamboo spears, children were taught by their government to run under tanks and detonate themselves. No matter how you look at it, they were dead.

I disagree. It is true that the Japanese were doing terrible things to civilians, but there is not proof that they were done to each and every person in Nagasaki. However, by this point we are simply arguing over the chaos theory, which is pointless. Good conversation, though!