The only regret i have about hiroshima and nagasaki...

[viscousmemories]

Incidentally Vorkosigan (Michael Turton) made some interesting posts on this subject here a couple years ago, starting here.

[Adora]

Originally Posted by bey

yeah but our killing people with the bombs stopped them from killing people.

Again, you're delineating an either/or blame situation in the war. This is never the case, as I have pointed out in the previous thread. I do not place all blame for the end of Japan's part in the war at the feet of the Americans, nor do I place it all at the feet of the Japanese.

If it had gone another way, eg more carpet bombing, blockading, or any other too-intensive process that was eventually discarded in favour of their new toy, I still wouldn't. The blood of civillians that die during a conflict in their own country are as much on the hands of their leaders as they are on any invading forces. Especially when - as is usually the case - they are mostly starving bastards just trying to survive in absolutely horrible situations.

Originally Posted by bey

us killing germans stopped hitler from rounding up people and putting them in gas chambers.

I find this argument difficult to stomach considering your moral-by-numbers stance. The final tally of murdered persecuted-non-combatants at the end of the war in Germany was great enough to be labelled an atrocity. "Stop" is stretching the truth a bit further than is logical. "Slowed down a bit" is probably closer to the reality.

best strategic and moral option.

And I'd agree with this, if I believed half the propaganda printed about the ultimate US military decision. The fact is, I don't. I'm far too cynical to believe the US did it really because they were such caring bastards that they gave two fucks for the lives of their sworn and hated enemies, ruled under the thumb of equally incompetent military idiots, and whether more would die via firebombing, nuking or starvation over a protracted period of time. Puhlease get a reality check. The only thing they gave a fuck about was that their Big Bomb made their dicks hard. That is not a "moral option". And it only counts as a "strategic" option by a hair's breadth.

to the koreans

I don't think that phrase means what you think it means. Do you mean the North or the South? Which "we" are you referring to? And how recently?

where japan was testing plague on real live chinamen.

And the US gave immunity and repatriation to European death-doctors to prevent the information they discovered during their work for Germany falling into Russia's hands. What's your point about "violations of human rights" again? Please, name one war, one honest-to-god war, where the US has ever really*, given a shit about human rights?

*Note: Reality =/= Propaganda. Remember this fact. If you have an issue with this, please refer to Godfry's post re:US war policies & previous bombings in Germany and Japan.

Originally Posted by bey

and the effects on people's lives

You keep saying this and this is what I keep trying to point out to you: No other country in the world has suffered a single, short, intense event the way Japan has with the bomb. This was a weapon that killed so many people in such a short time that we still can't comprehend it now. It is something the nation, as long as it exists in some form of the way it is now, will never forget, ever. It's a cultural scar on-par with US slavery, the German holocaust, and such paradigm-defining historical incidents. It transcends time and place, like a memory of an attack a victim keeps living over and over again because it had such a big impact on them. Whether or not the victim deserved the attack isn't the point. It wasn't just a "regular" weapon attack such as carpet bombing, cavalry invasion, drawn-out troop battles, etc etc, as had been known up to that point. The nuclear bomb ushered in the new age of weapons technology, and you simply can't seperate the country that was the victim of that first step from the step itself.

I'm certain I still haven't made clear what I'm trying to get across in the last paragraph, because I'm not satisfied with it myself. I'm not saying it would have been better one way or another - by any sides' numbers or death count or moral balance over the other - to choose another path. That's the problem with hindsight on a time dominated by the military: You will never have the truth, or anything vaguely resembling it, because of the nature of the institution itself dominating the time period. That doesn't mean I have to accept phrases like "necessary", "morally right" or "inevitable" to describe the event that did happen, especially an event I understand to have been brought about for cynical and gross reasons, and which had such an ineffable effect on the country it happened to. In fact, it means I have even less reason to accept them than I would if it was a time of peace for the nations in question.

[beyelzu]

When i said koreans i was referring to south koreans and as to how recently, well among the younger generation, think below thirty,there is a rising tide of anti american sentiment but most older koreans still appreciate what the us has done for them.

and i have largely anecdotal evidence from several friends i have had that lived in and grew up in south korea.

i think the bomb was pretty obviously a strategic choice, and all the editorializing in the world wont change that.

as to the bulk of your post concerning morality, i will have to think about it, you raise some excellent points that i hadnt considered.

how would you decide whether or not the bomb was strategically necessary and/or expedient?

[But]

Originally Posted by beyelzu

i think the bomb was pretty obviously a strategic choice, and all the editorializing in the world wont change that.

Of course. But strategic != moral.

Also, a military and economic superpower's priorities according to which they make their strategic choices are seldom the ones they sell to the public.

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by California Tanker

I'd say that's unlikely as the first time an airplane dropped a bomb on anything was 1911.

Read the quote, CT. "Laws of War: Bombardment by Naval Forces in Time of War (Hague IX)".

I presume it is in reference to naval shelling. The extension to aircraft is merely a quibble over means.

Yet they were never accepted by the rest of the world. There are two things to note here. The first is that most likely nobody at the time knew the devastation which could be caused by massed ariel attack. Remember that in 1923, bombers were still biplanes. Even the dreaded Zeppelin raids of WWI (which were conducted in response to French bombing raids of German cities) were of overall limited lethality. Note also the 1938 issue of 'what is defended', a question I was going to pose as soon as I read the first part of the post but before I got to the 1938 section.

Yes, but aerial bombing's effectiveness against military targets, particularly naval targets was more than adequately demonstrated in 1921. I also believe that the United State unilaterally declared that it would never engage in aerial bombing of civilian populations. The US stood by its moral guns all of about 15 years, if that.

The second, although more controversial, is the concept that in a case of such total war, adherence to any rules at all is more a concession than a requirement. The loser of WWII would not have received a "Fair Play Award" after all. Thus, since there was no legal restriction in force preventing ariel bombings, and as it was a case of playing for keeps, it was bombs away over cities with little compunction. It's a lot easier to talk about being civilised in warfare when not actually partaking in a war at the time.

NTM

There was (as already noted and reiterated) "legal" restriction upon aerial bombardment of civilian populations. We ignored it because the Axis ignored it (anybody remember Guernica - before The Great Patriotic War?), thereby lowering ourselves to the standards of our heinous opponent.

By the time we got to the end of the war against heinous and venal despots it didn't matter that we'd wipe out complete cities of noncombatants - we'd already lost our "moral compass".

Camel - nose - tent.

[Adora]

Originally Posted by beyelzu

When i said koreans i was referring to south koreans and as to how recently, well among the younger generation, think below thirty,there is a rising tide of anti american sentiment but most older koreans still appreciate what the us has done for them. and i have largely anecdotal evidence from several friends i have had that lived in and grew up in south korea.

That's the same in many countries around the world at the moment. Old couts in my own country who still crawl into the RSLs on the weekends think we did the right thing following the US like Paris's chihuahua into Iraq, but most of the people protesting it in the streets were those under 40 (though there were a lot over 40). Just because one generation thinks one event that ultimately came down to the US saved their country X generations ago, doesn't mean the next generation is going to think they walk on water.

how would you decide whether or not the bomb was strategically necessary and/or expedient?

People with better knowledge of the military histories have made better arguments about it here. But I've pointed out my problem with these: I don't believe military histories. The reasons we get told the military did things are rarely, if ever, the real reasons behind it. See my previous post about my skepticism of the US military really giving a fuck whether the Japanese starved, burned or were nuked.

[beyelzu]

if you are going to unilaterally disregard history in such a fashion i dont know how in the world you could ever argue that any action is wrong.


and i dont expect south koreans to love the us forever.

my point was that south koreas damn sure appreciated our ending the war in japan.

and i in general i dont think that leaders make decisions on morality for the most part they make strategic decisions whether or not a decision was moral i think depends on the effects of that decision

so i really dont think that it matters why the us dropped the bomb.


also, adora, you have repeatedly described dropping the bomb in a harsh fashion, i dont see how you can make a judgment call if you dont trust history

[Adora]

Originally Posted by beyelzu

if you are going to unilaterally disregard history

I'm doing no such thing. I'm showing healthy skepticism towards an institution that has been proven time and time again to have lied about its motivations, actions, and then lied about its lying. Military =/= "history".

and i in general i dont think that leaders make decisions on morality for the most part

I think they do. They simply make decisions based on a morality that values very little except lies and ego.

so i really dont think that it matters why the us dropped the bomb.

I think it does. All value judgements to all things are judgements of motivations and situations, not the actions themselves. It's the fundamental way we work. The only reason you're judging the dropping of the bomb as acceptable is because you're judging it based on a set of perceived situations and motivations.

also, adora, you have repeatedly described dropping the bomb in a harsh fashion, i dont see how you can make a judgment call if you dont trust history

I shall repeat: MIlitary =/= history. Please at least try and understand this before you hit the reply button again. The testimonies recorded in the documentary in the original thread are part of history, but that doesn't make them part of military propaganda or military histories, which are the things I distrust.

[-FX-]

Originally Posted by beyelzu

while i made this thread for adora and/or liv anyone else wno wants to talk to me is of course welcome to stop by and tell me to fuck off

Originally Posted by But

fuck off

Originally Posted by beyelzu

i dont think that it is accepted or true that the japanese surrendered because of russia. it was the obliteration of two cities that caused the surrender. i think that is accepted history.

I just watched this video, this morning.

The Real Reason why a Third Atomic Bomb was Never...

And then I came across this topic.

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Wild how stalkers will ramp up the screaming for attention.