Was nuking Nagasaki and Hiroshima right or wrong?

[X.,.Pandora.,.X]

In my opinion it was right, and if someone looks at the other options I think they would agree with me. But lets hear your opinions on this event in history

[Isard]

No, an attack on the stone islands outside of Tokyo Harbor would have been plenty to display our military might.

[X.,.Pandora.,.X]

yes, but how many nukes would that have taken? It took 2 on cities for them to surrender, much less somewhere off the coast.

[Isard]

chances are, they didnt even find out about the first one till the second went off.

[X.,.Pandora.,.X]

There were 3 days inbetween blasts, and we offered an unconditional surrender to japan's emporer himself, he knew about both blasts.

[Isard]

Do you know this for a fact that he knew about hiroshima before Nagasaki? That blast wiped out the area, communications would have been nonexistent.


Millions died.

It was possible to do it without that much bloodshed.

[X.,.Pandora.,.X]

Originally Posted by Aihwa

Do you know this for a fact that he knew about hiroshima before Nagasaki? That blast wiped out the area, communications would have been nonexistent.


Millions died.

It was possible to do it without that much bloodshed.

At the time Hiroshima was one of the biggest cities in Japan, it was a port for japans navy at the time. It is VERY unlikely he didnt find out in 2 days. Considering we game him an option of surrender and he warned him it would happen again.

Originally Posted by Human No More

It was a war crime, a direct attack on civilians with them as the main target and not even collateral damage, and if Japan had developed nuclear weapons in time, would have likely led to the destruction of the world.

The only other option was the invasion of Japan (codenamed X-Day) Japan had trained all civilians how to use guns in preparation for the invasion. (The emporer wanted to make it as costly to the Americans as possible) So it would have resulted in MILLIONS of casualties on both sides.

[Human No More]

It was a war crime, a direct attack on civilians with them as the main target and not even collateral damage, and if Japan had developed nuclear weapons in time, would have likely led to the destruction of the world.

[Human No More]

Unlikely since by then, although I admit most of my knowledge about WW2 is the Europe part, IIRC Japan had shortages of resources and production ability thanks to the war in the Pacific, and most of what they produced was generally inferior to the allies... Kamikaze are a good example, because they were simply trying to do the most damage with the resources they had... while it was sometimes effective, it reduced availability even further. There weren't 'millions' of deaths in Europe with the British and Russian invasions of German held territory, who had a better technological and industrial base and larger militaries.

[X.,.Pandora.,.X]

Originally Posted by Human No More

Unlikely since by then, although I admit most of my knowledge about WW2 is the Europe part, IIRC Japan had shortages of resources and production ability thanks to the war in the Pacific, and most of what they produced was generally inferior to the allies... Kamikaze are a good example, because they were simply trying to do the most damage with the resources they had... while it was sometimes effective, it reduced availability even further. There weren't 'millions' of deaths in Europe with the British and Russian invasions of German held territory, who had a better technological and industrial base and larger militaries.

Yes, but the germans, british, and russians had a "code of war." They didn't shoot medics, didnt kill civilians, ect (or wernt supposed to). They also SURRENDERD. The Japanese were told to fight till the last man AND the Japanese held back resources from going in in preparation for the expected invasion.

[Spock]

It basically goes like this. Of course it was a tragedy, but Truman wanted to observe the effects of WMD's on a fully functional society and he got his wish. Also there is the little thing that there would have been 1+ Million American troop casualties had they conducted a land invasion.

[Human No More]

So it's justified to kill millions of civilians who had no part in the war in place of people who volunteered and were trained to fight?

[Spock]

Originally Posted by Human No More

So it's justified to kill millions of civilians who had no part in the war in place of people who volunteered and were trained to fight?

I don't think that's what the American top brass was thinking at the time, or perhaps they did think of that and lied to themselves, justify the act internally before carrying it out externally. Personally I feel it wasn't justified considering there were alternatives such as detonating a WMD offshore, or at least somewhere where the Japanese could get the message.

[X.,.Pandora.,.X]

Originally Posted by Human No More

So it's justified to kill millions of civilians who had no part in the war in place of people who volunteered and were trained to fight?

Millions didnt die, people in general think this, but in reality less than a hundred thousand died. Still horrible, not nowhere near millions.

Originally Posted by Aihwa

Josie, and we bombed Berlin to its foundations.


And firebombed Tokyo nearly to the ground. We actually killed more people with napalm during our Tokyo air-raid than both Atomic bombings combined.

The Japanese did in 1930's invade china and killed, raped, and looted evrything they saw. Women, children, elderly, evryone. They didn't care. They were also the FIRST country to use biological warfare on another country. They used civilians in Okinawa as human bombs and human shields.

[Fkeu 'Awpo]

Japan should have surrendered.