The Real Reason We Bombed Japan

[snot]

From http://www.filmsforaction.org/news/the_real_reason_america_used_nuclear_weapons_against_japan_it_was_not_to_end_the_war_or_save_lives/ :

Like all Americans, I was taught that the U.S. dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in order to end WWII and save both American and Japanese lives.

But most of the top American military officials at the time said otherwise.

{He goes on to quote numerous high-ranking British as well as U.S. military officials, as well as historians and contemporary scientists, politicians, et al.}

* * * * *

The conventional wisdom that the atomic bomb saved a million lives is so widespread that … most Americans haven’t paused to ponder something rather striking to anyone seriously concerned with the issue: Not only did most top U.S. military leaders think the bombings were unnecessary and unjustified, many were morally offended by what they regarded as the unnecessary destruction of Japanese cities and what were essentially noncombat populations. Moreover, they spoke about it quite openly and publicly.

The article is a great read and seems very well-researched. I'm deeply skeptical of war in general, but even I was shocked.

[Press Virginia]

1. Nagasaki was a port city and manfactured

Weapons and ordinance. Hiroshima was the home of one of the Japanese army HQs.
The targets had to be within range, allow for weather and have some military significance.
Neither had previously been targeted by us bombers.

It wasn't a simple decision but it was an attempt to avoid a full scale invasion which would have resulted in hundreds of thousands more dead.

[840high]

45. ....

yes

[Spitfire of ATJ]

60. Both were also surrounded by hills thus containing the effects.

[Nye Bevan]

2. I keep hearing "the Japanese were ready to surrender".

Perhaps if they had simply sent a telegram actually surrendering, unconditionally, there would have been no need to nuke them?

[rhett o rick]

14. Why "nuc" civilian targets?

[Feeling the Bern]

41. Japan specifically targeted Chinese civilian populations in their carpet bombings of Chinese cities

Nary a sound or a problem with that. After all, the victims were just Chinese and the US didn't do it.

[ronnie624]

63. We bear more responsibility for our own government's conduct. n/t

[Feeling the Bern]

65. Yeah. . .Japan is innocent. We're wrong.

I love revisionism.

[ronnie624]

68. Your comments are irrational. n/t

[Feeling the Bern]

75. And your comments are historically idiotic

But with that, I will go back to my dissertation on the Rape of Nanking and you can continue to blame America first.

[Bigmack]

87. I don't blame America first...

I just feel we have no right to be all morally superior, what with our history...

Not absolving the Japanese.... not blaming America first..just pointing out some uncomfortable facts.

You want to talk genocide? How about the Native Americans in this country? How about the hundreds of thousands of Filipinos we killed and imprisoned during the Filipino insurrection? How about slavery? How about killing about 2 million Vietnamese in a war of choice? How about what we've done in the Middle East.

In sheer numbers killed - comparing the Japanese in their Empire phase to the US in our ongoing Empire phase - the US is far ahead.

Our advantage is that we won the wars...well, up until 1945, that is... and we get to write the history and leave out the parts that embarrass us.

[Feeling the Bern]

90. My mother is Mohawk.

[REP]

110. Have you done any research on Unit 731?

I think granting the members of that unit immunity was/is a disgrace.

Here's the Wiki article, for those who are unfamiliar (I'm sure you're aware of the atrocities they committed and were planning for the US):

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731

[Feeling the Bern]

124. I have done extensive research into it in Harbin and Shenyang.

[REP]

128. Ghastly beyond words.

[Bigmack]

135. ..don't forget the medical experiments we made on humans...

... like the LSD experiments done on unsuspecting people by the CIA and military.
And the Tuskegee experiments on untreated syphilis. Done on black men.
And the smallpox blankets given to the Indians.. in the colonies and in the West, too.

Nobody has clean hands...

[Feeling the Bern]

136. Anything to deflect responsibility of Japan's actions and throw it back on the USA

Blame America first.

[Bigmack]

138. Not first... but are you saying ONLY Japan has blame for inhuman actions? nt

[Feeling the Bern]

139. This post and the OP is about Japan and the Bomb. Not anything else

focus on the topic and stop deflecting it to your own personal agenda.

[Bigmack]

143. Yes, sir. Anything you say, sir. Questions of perspective are OUT. OK..I get it. nt

[Feeling the Bern]

144. So is your sarcasm. Ignored.

[blackspade]

69. That's using their brutality to justify our brutality

[Feeling the Bern]

74. The started a war, they got one.

Suck it up, admit your fault, offer an act of contrition (sincerely) and maybe people will start letting the past go.

Or should I just tell my wife that her great grandmother's gang rape in 1938 wasn't too important since we dropped a bomb on Japan?

[blackspade]

84. Your hatred blinds you.

[Feeling the Bern]

85. My hatred? You mean the 20 years of research in Japan and China I have done?

You mean the original research for my dissertation? Nice try there, buddy.

[blackspade]

88. Meaning what?

You can make all the claims of authority you want but that doesn't change the overall discussion; that attacks on civilians no matter who's doing them is unconscionable. There is no moral high ground here on either side when it comes to civilian atrocities. Trying to balance the scales of death on the backs of civilians no matter what side they are on is immoral.

[Bonobo]

95. Don't listen. He knows nothing about Japan.

Nor will he talk about the rape, cannibilization and 40 million dead during the Cultural Revolution as a result of the revered Mao.

[Marengo]

120. Your blather about the Cultural Revolution is nothing more than a diversionary tactic...

Entirely irrelevant to the conduct of Japanese forces in China. Hey, here's an idea, perhaps if Japan had left China alone the Guomindang could have focused on preventing the communists from seizing power. You know, those same communists that initiated the Cultural Revolution. Criticism of Japan's war of aggression does not equate a defense or justification of a domestic political event which occurred two decades after the removal of Japanese occupation forces. To insist so seems desperate on your part.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

86. Actually, not true

Economic historians point to our start of the economic war against Japan far earlier, with out blockades of oil, steel, tin, aluminum, and rubber.

[Feeling the Bern]

89. Japan started their march to conquest in 1898 when they attacked China

They started the wars.

[ProfessorGAC]

91. Blockades And Sanctions Are Not Inherently Acts of War

Starting a war of aggression and conquest is inherently so. Blockades and sanctions, as we have seen since the early 60's, are often useful to prevent the start of or further spread of armed conflict.

So, it makes no sense for you to refer to these blockades as starting a war.

GAC

[MADem]

115. What part of "military HQ" and "military resupply port"

make it unclear that these targets were anything but military?

The civilian population was warned ahead of time, too. Think this was clear enough?

Gov't documents in the public domain, exempt from copyright issues.

Front side of OWI notice #2106, dubbed the “LeMay bombing leaflet,” which was delivered to Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and 33 other Japanese cities on 1 August 1945.
The Japanese text on the reverse side of the leaflet carried the following warning: “Read this carefully as it may save your life or the life of a relative or friend. In the next few days, some or all of the cities named on the reverse side will be destroyed by American bombs. These cities contain military installations and workshops or factories which produce military goods. We are determined to destroy all of the tools of the military clique which they are using to prolong this useless war. But, unfortunately, bombs have no eyes. So, in accordance with America's humanitarian policies, the American Air Force, which does not wish to injure innocent people, now gives you warning to evacuate the cities named and save your lives. America is not fighting the Japanese people but is fighting the military clique which has enslaved the Japanese people. The peace which America will bring will free the people from the oppression of the military clique and mean the emergence of a new and better Japan. You can restore peace by demanding new and good leaders who will end the war. We cannot promise that only these cities will be among those attacked but some or all of them will be, so heed this warning and evacuate these cities immediately.” (See Richard S. R. Hubert, “The OWI Saipan Operation,” Official Report to US Information Service, Washington, DC 1946.)

Leaflets dropped on cities in Japan warning civilians about the atomic bomb, dropped c. August 6, 1945

TO THE JAPANESE PEOPLE:
America asks that you take immediate heed of what we say on this leaflet.

We are in possession of the most destructive explosive ever devised by man. A single one of our newly developed atomic bombs is actually the equivalent in explosive power to what 2000 of our giant B-29s can carry on a single mission. This awful fact is one for you to ponder and we solemnly assure you it is grimly accurate.

We have just begun to use this weapon against your homeland. If you still have any doubt, make inquiry as to what happened to Hiroshima when just one atomic bomb fell on that city.

Before using this bomb to destroy every resource of the military by which they are prolonging this useless war, we ask that you now petition the Emperor to end the war. Our president has outlined for you the thirteen consequences of an honorable surrender. We urge that you accept these consequences and begin the work of building a new, better and peace-loving Japan.

You should take steps now to cease military resistance. Otherwise, we shall resolutely employ this bomb and all our other superior weapons to promptly and forcefully end the war.

EVACUATE YOUR CITIES.

ATTENTION JAPANESE PEOPLE. EVACUATE YOUR CITIES.
Because your military leaders have rejected the thirteen part surrender declaration, two momentous events have occurred in the last few days.

The Soviet Union, because of this rejection on the part of the military has notified your Ambassador Sato that it has declared war on your nation. Thus, all powerful countries of the world are now at war with you.

Also, because of your leaders' refusal to accept the surrender declaration that would enable Japan to honorably end this useless war, we have employed our atomic bomb.

A single one of our newly developed atomic bombs is actually the equivalent in explosive power to what 2000 of our giant B-29s could have carried on a single mission. Radio Tokyo has told you that with the first use of this weapon of total destruction, Hiroshima was virtually destroyed.

Before we use this bomb again and again to destroy every resource of the military by which they are prolonging this useless war, petition the emperor now to end the war. Our president has outlined for you the thirteen consequences of an honorable surrender. We urge that you accept these consequences and begin the work of building a new, better, and peace-loving Japan.

Act at once or we shall resolutely employ this bomb and all our other superior weapons to promptly and forcefully end the war.

EVACUATE YOUR CITIES.

Source: Harry S. Truman Library, Miscellaneous historical document file, no. 258.

So your thesis, such as it is, is unsupported.

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol46no3/article07.html

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/primary-resources/truman-leaflets/

http://ww2days.com/nagasaki-leveled-by-a-bomb-2.html

[Hulk]

44. But they didn't, and they wouldn't.

Damn these rumors of bull shit!

We had young Americans dying on little shit hole islands in the Pacific and a military government that was NOT showing any signs of letting up.

The tragic action of nuking civilians, and even some of our own military as prisoners of war was a strategic decision not made lightly, and these ridiculous "theories" or "rumors" are insane.

I apologize for nothing. This maniac government waged rape and destruction on the world, and they killed thousands of innocent civilians as well as military young men and women; and would have continued until the last twisted son of a bitch fell on his sword.

The A bomb put a stop to their maniacal slaughter and defiant killing of Allied troops. They brought it on themselves. No shame, no regret. A sad day, but of THEIR making. I would do it again to bring that bloody mess to a screeching halt any day of the week.

Enough with the armchair, pious garbage.

[840high]

46. Well put. Thank you.

[Hulk]

53. I am shocked and astounded by posts of this nature.

Too many Americans have no Damned idea of what was happening in that time period. Another poster questions what we were doing with a naval base in the Pacific, as if that should somehow justify December 7th, 1941?

God Lord, we are a nation starved of historical facts....of ALL kinds.

[840high]

57. You have to wonder what

history is being taught.

[Hulk]

71. The answer to that is pretty simple

None

[PJMcK]

107. History is dust

Far too many younger people are flat out ignorant of history. Do you remember when President Bush's press secretary (I think it was Dana Perino) had never heard of the Cuban Missile Crisis? And yet the administration she worked for was rabidly at odds with Cuba.

One reason I enjoy reading the news is that it's the "first draft of history." Obviously, the events of our times will become the history of tomorrow. In my life, among my experiences are the assassination of a president, several terrible wars, the resignation of a president, economic disasters, major artistic achievements, major scientific achievements and the creation of Democratic Underground (wink) among many others. History is fascinating and instructive.

By diminishing our education system, Republicans have made it possible for their policies to be enacted because our public has been dumbed down and can't think critically.

[MADem]

112. Objecting to having a naval installation on an island territory of the USA

as if that were the "reason" the Japanese attacked us is as egregiously akin to telling a rape victim that they got into that "fix" because of what they were wearing.

It's just an asinine construct. I agree with your last comment--they just don't teach history properly anymore. There are people who think that Germany was our ally in WW2 and we were fighting the Russians!

[bearssoapbox]

77. You are right!

People just need to read about how the Japanese dug into every island that they inhabited and fought like rabid animals as long as they were alive.

It was an insane, maniacal war against the world, by insane, maniacal leaders that no regard for human life.

Not even their own countrymen were safe from their insanity and they would have taken the insanity around the world given the chance.

[pangaia]

127. "....and fought like rabid animals as long as they were alive. "

If it had been American soldiers fighting like that to defend positions, would you refer to them as 'rabid animals."

[Hulk]

130. "Rabid animals" is offensive...yes

And many of the Japanese fought like "rabid animals". Probably the first look at suicide attacks, where soldiers charged and blew themselves up, only to take their enemy with them.
Pilots who crashed their bomb laden airplanes into ships and other targets.
Yes, rabid animals.
Would you refer to American soldiers as "rabid snimals"? If they acted as such, yes.
We met this again in Korea, Vietnam, and today all over the Middle East. Yes...rabid animals is a damned accurate description.
Just what is your point.

[pangaia]

140. I think you just made my point.

Thank you for your reply.

[Feeling the Bern]

137. The Japanese invaded and conquered. Are you defending them?

Because it sounds like you are.

I guess everyone had it coming and the Japanese were just innocent people pushed to brutality.

[pangaia]

141. Am I defending the Japanese? No.

Where did I say that? I didn't.

[bearssoapbox]

142. I was just using the description that my grandfather and his brother used

when we would talk about their experiences and battles against them and the insane ferocity that they were fighting against while trying to push the japanese from islands that they had invaded, raped and pillaged and decimated.

I will use their description and what they thought of the way the japanese fought since they were there.

[eppur_se_muova]

121. Even after Nagasaki, hardliners wanted to continue the war by staging a coup against the Emperor:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%ABj%C5%8D_incident

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matsue_incident#From_V-J_Day_to_the_Matsue_Incident

Many of them later committed suicide, rather than face imprisonment. The world is better off without these bloody-minded militarists, who found their closest allies in European Fascists.

[Art_from_Ark]

50. There was no need to nuke them anyway

They had already lost the war. The US was attacking the Japanese mainland at will, and Japan could muster little resistance. Most of their major cities had been heavily bombed. The firebombing of Tokyo in March 1945 alone resulted in more than tens of thousands of deaths.

Most American military leaders questioned the necessity of the bombings:

http://www.colorado.edu/AmStudies/lewis/2010/atomicdec.htm

And long before the bombings, Japanese officials had been seeking ways to end the war:

"As early as the spring of 1944, a group of former prime ministers and others close to the Emperor had been making efforts toward bringing the war to an end. This group, including such men as Admiral Okada, Admiral Yonai, Prince Knonye, and Marquis Kido, had been influential in effecting Tojo's resignation and in making Admiral Suzuki Prime Minister after Koiso's fall. Even in the Suzuki cabinet, however, agreement was far from unanimous. The Navy Minister, Admiral Yonai, was sympathetic, but the War Minister, General Anami, usually represented the fight-to-the-end policy of the Army. In the Supreme War Guidance Council, a sort of inner cabinet, his adherence to that line was further assured by the participation of the Army and Navy chiefs of staff, so that on the peace issue this organization was evenly divided, with these three opposing the Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, and Navy Minister. At any time military (especially Army) dissatisfaction with the Cabinet might have eventuated at least in its fall and possibly in the "liquidation" of the antiwar members.

"Thus the problem facing the peace leaders in the Government was to bring about a surrender despite the hesitation of the War Minister and the opposition of the Army and Navy chiefs of staff. This had to be done, moreover, without precipitating counter measures by the Army which would eliminate the entire peace group. This was done ultimately by bringing the Emperor actively into the decision to accept the Potsdam terms. So long as the Emperor openly supported such a policy and could be presented to the country as doing so, the military, which had fostered and lived on the idea of complete obedience to the Emperor, could not effectively rebel.

" A preliminary step in this direction had been taken at the Imperial Conference on 26 June. At this meeting, the Emperor, taking an active part despite his custom to the contrary, stated that he desired the development of a plan to end the war as well as one to defend the home islands. This was followed by a renewal of earlier efforts to get the Soviet Union to intercede with the United States, which were effectively answered by the Potsdam Declaration on 26 July and the Russian declaration of war on 9 August."

https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/USSBS/AtomicEffects/AtomicEffects-2.html

[Hulk]

132. Nice read...shear speculation

While hundreds of Americans were being killed every day climbing over rocks and through steamy jungles. We should have just continued fire bombing them until God knows when?

Bull shit. The atomic bomb put a close on the torturous agony that bastard regime laid down on the world, and I thank God we made that decision and pulled the plug on that military monster that was struggling to die, just as Nazi Germany fought to the last soldier.

[Kablooie]

61. There was also the attitude in some of the Japanese military that...

it would be better for all Japanese to be eliminated than to suffer the shame of surrender.

I don't know how prevalent this view was but the thing that overcame it was the Emperor going on the radio for the first time ever and saying that Japan must surrender. The Emperor's decision overruled the extremist, suicidal views.

Whether the bombs were necessary or not I can't say but the Japanese were not on the verge of surrendering as far as I know.

[RufusTFirefly]

3. Expect lots of angry responses from sleepwalkers...

... who don't appreciate being disturbed.

For those who think Japan attacked us unprovoked and deserved everything it got, riddle me this: What was a U.S. Naval base doing in the middle of the Pacific, more than 4,000 miles from our coastline?

I figure they were just vacationing.

By the way, make no mistake: this is in no way an apology for Japan's bloodthirsty empire. I have too many close Chinese friends to overlook or excuse Japanese atrocities, atrocities that they have never fessed up to.

But jingoism and denial are reprehensible characteristics, regardless of the country that's exhibiting them. I condemn all empires.

[MADem]

32. I guess you've never heard of the whole "forward deployed" concept, have you?

Protecting the sea lanes of communication?

You don't have to spend a day or more steaming if you're already there.

Further, PH was a well established military facility on a US territory--did that escape you, too? "Our" coastline included--and still includes--the "coastline of the Hawaiian islands.

Are you saying US citizens in territories have less "right" to protection than those on our mainland?

smh.

Read a few books.

[Hulk]

48. You need to study some history.

Seriously? "What was a US Naval base doing in the middle of the Pacific"? Get some history in under your belt.

I'm just flabbergasted at these sorts of comments. At the very least, watch some Ken Burns documentaries on the time period and World War II.

[Feeling the Bern]

54. My wife is a Chinese national from Zhenjiang

You have to hear what she has to say about Japan, especially since her great grandmother was gang raped and left for dead in a muddy ditch in 1938 by six Japanese soldiers who pulled her off the street as she was walking home.

[Bonobo]

96. We know. You brag about your credentials in every single post of yours. nt

[Dont call me Shirley]

114. Damn, that was cold!

[dbackjon]

55. No - but telling disgusting LIES doed

You are the misinformed

[dbackjon]

99. You mean the one on AMERICAN SOIL?

Sounds like you are the sleepwalker - through history, geography and civics.

[SusanCalvin]

126. Whaaaaaaaa?

I don't want to be an empire, but, seriously, whaaaaaaaa?

[melman]

4. globalresearch

no thanks.

[hedda_foil]

18. To us, what is your objection to this Canadian research site?

I've found it stimulating and thought pro poking for at least the past 15 years but suddenly, it's being badmouthed all over the internet. Now what could possibly be the cause of thay sudden burst of negativity? Is that bad Professor Chossudovsky saying nasty things about a particular candidate? Mind you, I have no idea of whether he has or not, but the behavior in reference to his website bear the hallmark of a certain Mr Brock.

It boggles the mind that so many of Hillary's supporters are so dismissive of information that conflicts in the slightest with their preconceived ideas. At the very idea that they are not absolutely right about everything that counts, they stick their fingers in their ears and loudly shout la la la la la ... I can't hear you.

The cognitive dissonance, it burns!

[melman]

34. First of all

I am not a Hillary supporter. And what does she have to do with this thread?

globalresearch is a lot like infowars. Anyone that doesn't see a problem with it is not going to see the problem. No use explaining what should be obvious.

[Major Nikon]

49. You mean other than it's a crank magnet?

Anti-vax, AIDS denialism, 9/11 "truth", climate change denialism, Bilderberg Group, Fluoridation conspiracy theories, on and on it goes.

Here's a prime example:

BREAKING: ‘US used Nukes on Iraq, Afghanistan’: Atomic bomb dropped on Tora Bora: Expert

http://www.globalresearch.ca/breaking-us-used-nukes-on-iraq-afghanistan-atomic-bomb-dropped-on-tora-bora-expert/27972

[Odin2005]

82. It's a conspiracy nut site.

And I'm a Bernie supporter, BTW.

[hedda_foil]

98. What gave you that idea?

[Odin2005]

113. Because they publish conspiracy shit.

[melman]

119. Here

took me seconds to find this stuff.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-brussels-attacks-another-false-flag/5515856

http://www.globalresearch.ca/nine-reasons-to-question-the-paris-terror-attacks/5514021

http://www.globalresearch.ca/san-bernardino-incident-has-the-earmarks-of-a-false-flag-testimony-of-eyewitnesses/5495126

[hedda_foil]

122. Ok. That's got me convinced. Thank you for the links.

[EX500rider]

108. ”Headline: North Korea, a Land of Human Achievement, Love and Joy"...

“”Headline: North Korea, a Land of Human Achievement, Love and Joy"
—Everything you need to know about Globalresearch

Globalresearch is an anti-"Western" website that can't distinguish between serious analysis and discreditable junk -- and so publishes both. It's basically the moonbat equivalent to Infowars or WND.
While some of GlobalResearch's articles discuss legitimate humanitarian concerns, its view of science, economics, and geopolitics is conspiracist -- if something goes wrong, the Jews West didit! The site has long been a crank magnet: If you disagree with "Western" sources on 9/11, or HAARP, or vaccines, or H1N1, or climate change, or anything published by the "mainstream" media, then GlobalResearch is guaranteed to have a page you will love.
The website (under the domain names globalresearch.ca(link), .org(link), and .com(link)) is run by the Montreal-based non-profit The Centre for Research on Globalisation (CRG) founded by Michel Chossudovsky, a tenured professor at the University of Ottawa.[4] Weep for the future.
Whenever someone makes a remarkable claim and cites GlobalResearch, they are almost certainly wrong.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Globalresearch

[Trust Buster]

5. Google "the rape of Nanking" to see what we were dealing with. The Japanese would have

continued slaughtering POW's and civilians on the massive scale as they were slaughtering until the bombing. They would not have surrendered. The reason they gave for killing POW's is that the were inculcated to die for the Emperor and held those that surrendered in utter contempt. The history is there to read. Ignorance is not an excuse.

[roamer65]

7. Not to mention also their vivisection experiments of Chinese civilians and POW's.

The Japanese were utterly brutal.

[Trust Buster]

9. Yes, in the Pacific islands the Japanese would capture foreign missionaries. In one instance

they bound Australian women to trees, cut off their breasts, cut off their arms and legs and then, as the remaining life was slipping away, they used their remaining torsos for bayonet practice. They transferred thousands of POW's to work in Japan's mines. Those that didn't freeze to death or die of starvation would be executed if they could no longer work.

[virginia mountainman]

6. non-combatant population??

You clearly do not understand the subject at hand..

As a lifelong student of military history, I can confidently state that the Japanese population was well into preparing for a fight to the death..

IMH an invasion of Japan, would have resulted in almost the complete annihilation of population of Japan. The WWII era Japanese where considered to have been the most tenacious defenders in the history of warfare. And this is not even considering Allied losses.

People of today, like to compare the world wars to other "modern" wars. What they fail to take into account the utter and total contempt the "some" of the sides had for each other. And the will to see it too the end.

We saved the Japanese people from annihilation with the Atomic Bomb..

[Trust Buster]

10. I agree. Ask the 100's of thousands of Chinese and Filipino's about "non-combatant populations".

Oh we can't, their dead. In Nanking alone the Japanese slaughtered 200,000 civilians. Google "the rape of Nanking".

[Feeling the Bern]

42. 300,000 men, women and children in Nanjing. 20,000 women raped in Nanjing

My Rape of Nanking screenplay for my production company is in pre-production and I am an associate producer.

I already am getting death threats and a Japanese film company offered to buy it from me for 125K just to bury it.

[Trust Buster]

51. If you haven't already read it, the most comprehensive history of Japanese atrocities during

WWII was written by Lord Russell of Liverpool. He reported on the war crimes trials held in 1946-1948. He compiled the historical record in his book "The Knights of Bushido" ( available on Amazon in Kindle version ). The war crimes tribunal recorded the Nanking deaths at 200,000.

[Feeling the Bern]

56. Iris Chang's book is more up to date. 300,000 is the accepted amount.

[Trust Buster]

59. If you are writing a screenplay, I urge you to read "The Knights of Bushido". Go on Amazon

and at least review it.

[Feeling the Bern]

62. Read it. Movie is already in preproduction. But most of my research was done in China since I live

there and worked as a historian at the Rape of Nanking Memorial Hall in Nanjing for 2.5 years.

www.hierarchypictures.com

Go to "treasury" and look up "300,000."

[Bonobo]

97. Sounds like very balanced research. nt

[Marengo]

117. I'm assuming you saw City of Life & Death? Wondering what you thought of it.

I lived in Wuhan for a couple of years and have experienced first hand the traumatic effect the Japanese occupation still projects on the Chinese national psychology. The older generation of the Chinese family I married into had direct contact with Japanese troops and regarded them as little more than sadistic animals. Yeah, central government does keep the the hate fire burning fiercely, but horrific, almost medieval shit really happened on an immense scale.

[Feeling the Bern]

125. Typical Chinese movie with typical flaws

They did little to make me feel any sympathy for the characters. Historically accurate, but not a good movie. Similar to Flowers of War, where the characters spent the entire movie insulting each other and trying to be superior to one another.

[Trust Buster]

11. I agree. You actually read the history unlike some others.

[Hydra]

8. More than once I heard that the idea was to make an example

We would be the world nuclear power. End of story. Do not fuck with us.

The irony is that the idea may have worked for awhile if not for the spies at Los Alamos. All of those people died horrifically for nothing.

[Trust Buster]

12. Read the history of the Japanese slaughter of POW's and civilians.

[Hydra]

13. Ya, they tortured people and killed civs

We do too. Pretty much all the time.

I thought the point was that we were supposed to be better than that...but I guess when you put it that way, why don't we start using ABC weapons wherever we feel like it? After all, those civs have to be worse than ours.

[Trust Buster]

22. Once again you show your ignorance of history. It was not just about what they had done, it was

about what they would have done if the war had not ended abruptly. Thousands of allied prisoners and civilians were transferred to Japan and China during the war and used as slave labor. The Japanese slaughtered POW's and civilians in the Pacific islands before retreating because of invading allied forces. Had the war not ended abruptly, ten of thousands of POW's and civilians in slave labor camps across Japan and China would have been executed before the allied forces arrived. You are just not well read on the actual history.

[rhett o rick]

15. They were horrible, no one is arguing that. But why choose civilian targets?

Your rationalizations for killing civilians is very sad. Rationalization is the key to your happiness.

[Trust Buster]

25. What about the tens of thousands of allied POW's and civilians in slave labor camps across Japan

and China ? Should they just have been sacrificed in your opinion ?

[rhett o rick]

27. If you have something to say, do so. I don't play the answer your pointed questions game.

I am disappointed by your attempts to rationalize this horrible disaster.

[Trust Buster]

29. I did say so. What do you think would have happened to the tens of thousands of POW's and

civilians held in slave labor camps across Japan and China if the war was not brought to an abrupt end ? A very simple question I ask.

[ronnie624]

67. What do *you* think would have happened to them? n/t

[Trust Buster]

93. They would have either starved to death, died of disease or executed before Allied forces could

liberate them. That's what happened to them when Allied forces began to retake the islands. Japanese slaughtered them before retreating.

[MADem]

116. Again--they were MILITARY targets, and the civilians in the area WERE warned in advance. nt

[still_one]

16. Have you ever heard of the battle of Iwo Jima and Okinawa? Do you know how many people were killed

in those battles?

In Iow Jima the most of the Japanese soldiers refused to surrender

Okinawa was the bloodiest battle of the Pacific War. At least 200000 people were killed in that battle. The Okinawa campaign led
directly to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as a means of avoiding the planned ground invasion of the Japanese
mainland.

Here is one example of what it was like at Iwo Jima for 2nd Lieut. Benjamin Roselle, part of a ground team directing naval gunfire:

"Within a minute a mortar shell exploded among the group ... his left foot and ankle hung from his leg, held on by a ribbon of flesh ... Within minutes a second round landed near him and fragments tore into his other leg. For nearly an hour he wondered where the next shell would land. He was soon to find out as a shell burst almost on top of him, wounding him for the third time in the shoulder. Almost at once another explosion bounced him several feet into the air and hot shards ripped into both thighs ... as he lifted his arm to look at this watch a mortar shell exploded only feet away and blasted the watch from his wrist and tore a large jagged hole in his forearm: "I was beginning to know what it must be like to be crucified," he was later to say."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Iwo_Jima

From Victor Davis Hanson in his book Ripples of Battle:

"...because the Japanese on Okinawa... were so fierce in their defense (even when cut off, and without supplies), and because casualties were so appalling, many American strategists looked for an alternative means to subdue mainland Japan, other than a direct invasion. This means presented itself, with the advent of atomic bombs, which worked admirably in convincing the Japanese to sue for peace [unconditionally], without American casualties."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Okinawa

An invasion of the Japanese mainland would have resulted in tremendous American casualties.

It is also sometimes forgotten exactly what was being dealt with. In Nanjing, China alone, over 300000 civilians were killed, and over 20000 mass rapes were committed by Japanese troops against the residents of Nanjing

Malaya, Singapore, Hong Kong, Philippines, and so many other places in China and throughout Asia atrocities were done at the hands of the Japanese military.

Manila massacre of 1945, Sook Ching massacre in 1942, Kalagong massacre, and so many other massacres that now have faded into the past. In China alone, more than 2.7 MILLION Chinese civilians were killed based on Japans scorched earth strategy, sanctioned by
the emperor himself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_war_crimes

As horrible as it was, it ended the f*king war, and prevented a direct invasion of the Japanese mainland.

[rhett o rick]

17. I notice that the conservatives here all can rationalize why we dropped nuclear bombs on

civilian targets. Rationalization is the key to your happiness.

[yeoman6987]

20. After they bombed Pearl Harbor, they killed our civilians too

[rhett o rick]

21. So what exactly is your point? I hope it isn't, "we did it because they did it."

[still_one]

73. The point is our involvment in that war was initiated by that unprovoked attack.

War is an ugly business. The Imperial Japanese Army were extremely ruthless, in their invasion and massacres of millions of civilians. When a country is involved in war, its objective is to limit their casualties, and do what is necessary to win that war.

Operation Downfall was the codename for the Allied plan for the invasion of the Japanese homeland. After the tremendous loses of U.S. troops in the battles of imo jima and okinawa, other alternatives were examined to end the war, and limit additional loses.

Operation Downfall was abandoned when Japan surrendered following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Soviet declaration of war.

Before the bombs were dropped there were two views among the leadership in Japan. One camp maintained that Japan must inflict tremendous damage on the Americans, in order to win better terms than President Roosevelt's unconditional surrender demands at the Yalta Conference in 1945.

The other camp believed that ending the war as soon as possible was the best way to achieve peace, and retain the emperor status.

There is no way to know which camp would have been dominant

[Orrex]

102. Obviously we should have built a bomb that only targeted military resources

It would have been difficult and costly, but it would be worth it in order to keep from offending armchair second-guessers 70 years hence.

[Hydra]

23. They're just reflexively defending the system

They're scared that if the confidence level in it falls much more, that it will go away and there will be nothing but chaos.

The haven't realized the body is already cold.

[rhett o rick]

24. Their rationalization is the key to their happiness.

[dbackjon]

58. Telling lies then is key to yours

Pathetic

[still_one]

64. I wonder if they would have felt the same way if they were one of the soldiers that would have been

in the landing craft, if we had to invade the Japanese homeland, which would have happened, if Japan hadn't surrendered

[dbackjon]

100. They probably think that the Japanese would have given them flowers as liberators

[Feeling the Bern]

43. Estimates were that the losses for invading the home islands would be 10-1 with one million American

GIs killed.

Japan would have fought behind every blade of grass. Iwo Jima and Okinawa proved that.

Also the Japanese knew where we would be landing and had a massive stockpile of weapons waiting for us.

[rhett o rick]

19. We knew that we had to convince the Emperior to surrender and not the military that

was in to the last man. We knew that bombing military targets wouldn't effect the Emperior but if we killing civilians that would get his attention.

Also, we wanted to end the war quickly to keep the Russians out.

[Trust Buster]

26. No, we wanted to end the war quickly to save the tens of thousands of allied POW's and allied

civilians that were being held in slave labor camps across Japan and China. They would have all died without an abrupt intervention. Read your history.

[rhett o rick]

28. Does that make you feel better to think that? Rationalize away if you need to keep from facing

reality. Read YOUR history.

[Trust Buster]

30. Rationalization ? Saving the lives of tens of thousands of allied POW's and civilians imprisoned

in slave labor camps across Japan and China is not rationalization. That was the stark reality. How arrogant of you.

[MADem]

37. I had family members at sea steaming towards Japan, and

part of the task force surrounding Japan towards the end of the war. Everyone had already written their farewell letters and prepared their last wills. Many of them wouldn't have come home had there been a protracted battle for Japan.

It was really not a question of how many would die, at the end of the day, but how those deaths would be distributed. "Better thee than me" was certainly the prevailing attitude.

And, of course, there were other factors at play. Proof of concept had been demonstrated at Trinity; USA wanted to let other actors know that they'd worked out the kinks and were able to produce operational models of this brand new weapon, that they hoped would be the Ultimate Deterrence. Alas, the best laid plans...! The people who developed Fat Man and Little Boy certainly were prosecuting an agenda beyond the war, but the bottom line is that we had those tools in the toolbox and we had a "test bed" that needed to be neutralized. The population was warned, in fact, many of the victims were not Japanese citizens at all, but captured Korean slaves.

I find the finger-pointing and retrospective "blame" about those two weapons deployments just absurd. Revisionist history, guilting, blaming. We didn't ask for that fight, but we stepped up and did the rotten, shitty job. And when it was all done, we could have been total assholes to a decimated population, but we weren't. You got it, Toyota--Japan is a much better nation today than it was in that era, an ally to us, and our post-war conduct had much to do with that.

[Trust Buster]

39. I had an uncle I never met who died on Okinawa. Those that like to hold a political "feel good"

position today and who exhibit a complete ignorance with regards to the facts on the ground at the time simply disgust me.

[MADem]

111. The idea that Truman was at all cavalier about the consequences of his decision is what

is particularly galling.

It really came down to this--one way, or another, a lot of people were going to die. Would it be us, slowly and in a vicious slog across a nation conditioned to regard us as especially vicious and heartless connoisseurs of baby flesh, or would it be them, quickly and with a leafletted warning ahead of time?

Your uncle, may he RIP, was truly up against it. Had he lived he could have given some of these theorists a lesson in brutal reality.

[zappaman]

66. Rick, I hope you don't consider yourself a student of history!

[bhikkhu]

31. Top US military leaders "morally offended" by the unnecessary destruction?

I know most people aren't taught much of that part of history, but we destroyed more than 60 cites in Japan prior to the nuclear bombs, most of them with large deployments of incendiary bombs. A revisiting of the justification for Nagasaki and Hiroshima is fine, but any US military leaders raising moral objections had to be either severely memory-impaired or completed out of the loop.

http://apjjf.org/-Mark-Selden/2414/article.html

[left-of-center2012]

33. Japanese were peace loving folk and we slaughtered them?

Bad, bad USA?

[Rex]

35. There will never be a definitive answer to this one.

Some people will always say it was this, while others will say it was that etc..

[aikoaiko]

36. War is hell. There are no civilised wars.

Some say we've killed over 1 million civilians in Iraq over the 10 years of active fighting with our more modern warfare techniques.

I can't say its better than what we did with the atomic bombs.

[Warren DeMontague]

38. I suspect it had no small element of sending a message to Stalin, as well.

But WWII was a long series of absolutely horrible things. You cannot look at those 2 events in a vacuum separate from the years of horror which preceded them.

It's not my place to try to justify OR condemn the bombings, but I do believe Harry S. Truman was a good and honorable man. I do not think it was an easy or lightly made decision.

[panader0]

92. I read through the replies looking for the mention of Russia and Stalin.

The threat of the USSR was definitely a factor in the decision. Truman knew that after the war, the new
concern would be the USSR.

[Auggie]

101. I've had the same thought. A message to Stalin, and to the world as well.

[Feeling the Bern]

40. Carpet bombing of Shanghai in 1933, Mukden Train incident of 1931 where they illegally seized

Manchuria
Targeting civilians in bombing raids over Shanghai and Nanjing in 1937
Burning Suzhou to the ground and killing all but 500 people
Forcing Chinese women into prostitution
Using Korean men as slave labor
Forcing Korean women into prostitution
The Rape of Nanking
Sook Jing Massacre
Parit Sulong
Banka Island
Bataan Death March
Manila Massacre
Singaporean Massacre
Marco Polo Bridge incident of 1937
Lacing candies with opium to addict Chinese children
Human experimentation in Harbin with Unit 731
Littering the ground with disease pathogens to cause a famine in Jiangxi and Zhejiang
Gang raping Chinese women
Forcing men to rape their daughters, sons to rape their mothers, brothers to rape their sisters for entertainment
Cannibalism of Chinese people in Guangdong province
Attacking Pearl Harbor without cause or justification

Sorry, Japan earned the bomb for the war they started. Then they honor their butchers at the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo and deny their history.

Nice revisionism. But we need to blame America first. . .after all, the Japanese only brutalized Chinese people, Filipinos, Indonesians and others that deserved it. Japan has innocent hands.

[Waldorf]

47. I have no problem with the nuking that happened. It ended the war. When I hear this morally offended

stuff, it appears nobody had a problem with the firebombing of Tokyo that occurred 5 months prior to Hiroshima that killed between 80,000-130,000 civilians during a 48 hour period that incinerated 16 square miles.

[dbackjon]

52. Full of disproven falsehoods

[redixdoragon]

70. Look at the legacy it left us

What are you all saying the bombing was? Revenge for Nanking? Were we saving them by atomic fire? We may have instead doomed the entire species.

"But they'd be developed anyway"

But they woudln't yet have been dropped. Not to menteion dropped by us. We forever have that history. We have used nuclear weapons on a civilian population. Men, women, children, died. You can't justify that, only excuse it, just like we can't justify the bombing of berlin that rubbled the city, or the fire bombings that killed thousands more japanese. Only excuse it.

These are weapons of terror. They sit poised in silos and they frighten us, because they could exterminate all life on the face of this earth. We don't do anything against anyone who has one, because our extermination would follow.

We are left with a legacy of death, and a haunting sword of damocles over our head, held by a thread. And now its financial legacy comes at us.
http://billmoyers.com/story/the-trillion-dollar-question-the-media-have-neglected-to-ask-presidential-candidates

Something that in one act could eliminate so many thousands and now milions of people per one and upon billions for all can't ever be justified by the rapes, murders, and slaughters that happened before. Not for Russia, not for China, not for Indiia or Pakistan. Not for Japan, and not for the U.S.

[redixdoragon]

72. I'll let someone's face and words also speak for me.

[Feeling the Bern]

76. And I'll let these images sink in and speak for me about the war Japan started

https://www.google.com/search?q=rape+of+nanking&safe=off&biw=1366&bih=642&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwjVx_W134PNAhXHP48KHXVBBZUQ_AUIBigB

https://www.google.com/search?q=rape+of+nanking&safe=off&biw=1366&bih=642&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwjVx_W134PNAhXHP48KHXVBBZUQ_AUIBigB#safe=off&tbm=isch&q=manila+massacre

https://www.google.com/search?q=rape+of+nanking&safe=off&biw=1366&bih=642&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwjVx_W134PNAhXHP48KHXVBBZUQ_AUIBigB#safe=off&tbm=isch&q=singaporean+massacre

https://www.google.com/search?q=rape+of+nanking&safe=off&biw=1366&bih=642&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwjVx_W134PNAhXHP48KHXVBBZUQ_AUIBigB#safe=off&tbm=isch&q=unit+731+victims

Don't let your revisionism block your judgement. They started the war. They earned everything the war gave them.

[redixdoragon]

78. What will we deserve?

[Feeling the Bern]

80. Hopefully, war crimes trials and executions/prison terms for the guilty parties.

But that is good deflection from the Japanese. "See, we did it too, so that excuses Japan's brutality against China and most of East and Southeast Asia."

I keep forgetting. . .America is always wrong to some people.

[Democat]

79. You believe that no bombs would have been dropped after WWII?

If they weren't used in WWII? Why do you assume that?

[zappaman]

81. FFS

[GOLGO 13]

83. The bombing saved American lives.

That's all I care about. I'll let you worry about everyone else.

[Omaha Steve]

94. The real reason was an unprovoked attack on US soil

It was in all the papers.

[MisterP]

118. the attack on Clark Field?

[MillennialDem]

103. Two reasons

intimidate the Soviets and keep them from taking too much Japanese land

live tests of the weapons. Why do you think we had camera and scientific crews? Japan didn't even send up a single fighter.

[tularetom]

104. My parents may have been two of the lives saved by the bombing

My father was with the 1st Marine Division, I believe he was still in the Ryukyu Islands at the time of Hiroshima and my mother was a Navy nurse in San Diego.

[Javaman]

105. this comes up every year....

read up on Operation Downfall.

we were going to use them even if Japan didn't surrender.

there were going to be 3 invasion points. Each was going to have its own atomic bomb dropped ahead of each landing.

this alone makes the whole controversy, to me, moot.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall

Nuclear weapons[edit]
On Marshall's orders, Major General John E. Hull looked into the tactical use of nuclear weapons for the invasion of the Japanese home islands, even after the dropping of two strategic atomic bombs on Japan (Marshall did not think that the Japanese would capitulate immediately). Colonel Lyle E. Seeman reported that at least seven Fat Man-type plutonium implosion bombs would be available by X-Day, which could be dropped on defending forces. Seeman advised that American troops not enter an area hit by a bomb for "at least 48 hours"; the risk of nuclear fallout was not well understood, and such a short amount of time after detonation would have resulted in substantial radiation exposure for the American troops.[66]

Ken Nichols, the District Engineer of the Manhattan Engineer District, wrote that at the beginning of August 1945, "[p]lanning for the invasion of the main Japanese home islands had reached its final stages, and if the landings actually took place, we might supply about fifteen atomic bombs to support the troops."[67] An air burst 1,800–2,000 ft (550–610 m) above the ground had been chosen for the (Hiroshima) bomb to achieve maximum blast effects, and to minimize residual radiation on the ground as it was hoped that American troops would soon occupy the city.[68]

[hertopos]

106. I am originally from Japan and here is my input.

When I was in college in Ohio, my Chemist professor was running an independent seminar about atomic bomb.
When he was young, he participated Manhattan project. He told us that was how he decided to start his seminar.

The problem of Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing is two-fold.
First of all, nobody knew how atrocious the effect of atomic bombing would be. In fact, quite a few participants of Manhattan projects later suffered and some died from radiation poisoning. Unlike usual bombing, in addition to 80k dies instantly from Hiroshima bombing, additional 60k-100k died from the radiation poisoning over years. There are also 2nd generation sufferers
as well.

In fact, if you look at the worst bombing strictly from the number of death, Tokyo bombing on March 9th 1945, killed around 130k.

The second issue is about Nagasaki bombing. Are you aware of the fact that the bomb used for Nagasaki was different from
the one for Hiroshima. This is actually what my Chemistry professor told me. He believe that Nagasaki bombing was more of
the experiment than anything. Unfortunately, this is quite problematic even for people who supports the justification of Hiroshima.

Nagasaki bombing , I believe, was unnecessary.

By the way, I greatly appreciate President Obama's visit and his historic speech. I also want all American to understand that vast majority of Japanese never wanted any 'apology or likes' from Americans regarding atomic bomb.

Majority of Japanese who either experienced the last war or directly know someone who did, were very ashamed of Japanese expansion war.

I you know anything about Japanese history and culture, we invaded out only twice in relatively long history. Civil wars in Japan had been relatively bloodless compared to the rest of the world.

Finally, even the majority of generation who does not know the last war support our Peace constitution.

Hertopos

[Feeling the Bern]

131. Yasukuni Shrine. Nuff said.

[Xolodno]

109. This thread is amazing.

Way too many taking absolute positions...when the answer is in the middle.

Was Japan about to surrender? Maybe. We do know there was a fight brewing in the Japanese Military brass about fighting to the end vs. surrender. And going by memory, but their was going to be an attempt by the hardliners to kidnap the emperor and force the war on. But a bombing run and subsequent black out on Tokyo prevented that.

If they were successful, I doubt even the A-bomb dropped on every population center would have dissuaded the hardliners.

And there was an offer of conditional surrender on the table, but elements in the allied military wanted unconditional. In the end, it was still a conditional surrender.

Did the bomb end the war? Probably not by itself exclusively. But a combination of other conditions such as the blockade, the Soviet invasion, etc. The blockade was making resources to wage war scarce and seeing how the Soviets took "control" of eastern Europe meant that Soviet control on Japanese soil would likely be a permanent one (and has been proven correct).

One atomic bomb with the threat of more on the way was probably sufficient. There really wasn't a need for one on Nagasaki. After the drop, an ultimatum should have been given to surrender within a week or face another bomb. Two days is hardly enough time when they were still assessing the damage of the first one and aiding the populace. They military was already actively trying to quell rumors of the devastation. If we gave it some time, it would have a larger effect.

And yes the Japanese troops fought to the end on those islands.....due to the propaganda they were being fed on how the allies treated their POW's. Something no one is mentioning.

I also think its disgusting that people justifying the bomb due to the atrocities the Japanese army were committing. That doesn't make it "ok", it just shows just how immoral your thinking is.

Was the atomic bomb used to make a statement to the Soviets? Yes. But that statement backfired and only drove Stalin to ramp up their research. And thus a few short years later, detonated their own.

We can probably state dropping one was justified, but two, that's a bit harder to sell.

[TheFarseer]

123. Very interesting

I did not know many/most of our military leaders were against it.

[Adrahil]

129. Just to be clear, the military leaders did not have a problem.... WARNING, GRAPHIC

civilian population centers using conventional bombs. AS a child, my mother lived in Berlin from 1938-1945. She experienced that first hand.

And here's Dresden after the bombings there.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eXfgIzDC2KE/UWXhxUDTxTI/AAAAAAAAELA/m7mI6DvN6-w/s1600/A+pile+of+bodies+awaits+cremation+after+the+firebombing+of+Dresden,+February+1945.jpg

WWII was a nasty, bloody business.

[FourScore]

133. I just finished a book about the race to build the atomic bomb.The US definitely wanted to show the

world our new weapon. At the time that we dropped it on Japan, we thought we were the only ones with the knowledge and ability...Little did we know there were two phycisists who were spies for the Soviets inside Los Alamos.

It's a fascinating story.

[MisterP]

134. the ever-mounting number of "lives saved" was in fact a way for the S.A.C. to pad its budget

it's the "too cheap to meter" of the military atom