Did we really have to drop atomic bombs on Japan?

Ralphy1

Ralphy1

Well-known Member
The thinking that if we didn't that an invasion might cost 1 million lives of our troops is the accepted justification. However, there is evidence that we thought that if the Russians invaded that Stalin would add Japan to his empire. On the 70th anniversary of Hiroshima it is sad that 140 thousand had to die for whatever reason...
 

Hindsight is always an easy thing to pull off, but I've always wondered if those acts were absolutely necessary. Japan was already mortally crippled and most of their population just wanted to stop fighting.
 
This is also true as they had no way to continue fighting anywhere but on their homeland and disease and starvation was probably inevitable...
 

Of course, being a dyed-in-the-wool conspiracy type I've heard that it was only done (or mainly done) to test out the bombs themselves - that the previous tests weren't "live" and they wanted to see the effects on an actual population.
 
Wow! That's bigger than those who think LBJ was behind the Kennedy assassination...
 
Hmm, you also probably believe that FDR knew in advance that Japan was going to attack Pearl Harbor but did nothing so the country could get into the war...
 
SifuPhil said:
Well ... yeah. Not quite that bad, but there were signs that were late / ignored ...
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My Dad, who fought in WWII, often told me that we missed so many signs that the Japanese were going to attack that we really have no one to blame, but ourselves for missing the opportunity to be prepared. I think Admiral Bill Halsey or Chester Nimitz was convinced that the Japanese would bomb Pearl Harbor, but had no luck with convincing the other officers stationed at Pearl. The bombing of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were imminent because President Truman was really pissed at what the Japanese did and the way they went about it.

I had a teacher that taught P.O.D. (Problems of Democracy) in high school back in 1965, who served on Tinian Island and served as a mechanic for the Enola Gay and the few other aircraft that were on the island. His picture can be seen as part of the crew, which is often shown. When speaking about that era his thoughts were that had we not bombed Japan the war would have lasted longer and more GI lives would have been lost. Whether that is some propaganda spread about by the gov't or not is still in question.
 
SifuPhil said:
Hindsight is always an easy thing to pull off, but I've always wondered if those acts were absolutely necessary. Japan was already mortally crippled and most of their population just wanted to stop fighting.
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The Japanese government of that time was trying to surrender since about January of that year. Even their government wanted to 'stop fighting'.

And according to the reading that I've done, once the details of what those bombs caused (the gruesome and gory details of suffering) the American public of the time began to be very uncomfortable with what had been wrought in their name, the government began to spread the idea that 'millions of lives were saved by dropping those bombs'. There are historians and experts who now say the lives saved were minimal and the deaths and suffering caused far outweighed any potential good.

http://www.fpp.co.uk/History/General/atombomb/strange_myth/article.html Hiroshima - The Strange Myth of Half a Million American Lives Saved
http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v16/v16n3p-4_Weber.html Was Hiroshima Necessary?
 
[h=1]Hiroshima marks 70 years since atomic bomb[/h]

Residents in the Japanese city of Hiroshima are commemorating the 70th anniversary of the first atomic bomb being dropped by a US aircraft.
A ceremony, attended by PM Shinzo Abe, was held at Hiroshima's memorial park before thousands of lanterns are released on the city's Motoyasu river.
The bombing - and a second one on Nagasaki three days later - is credited with bringing to an end World War Two.
But it claimed the lives of at least 140,000 people in the city.
A US B-29 bomber called the Enola Gay dropped the uranium bomb, exploding some 600m (1,800ft) above the city, at around 08:10 on 6 August 1945.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-33792789
 
After action analysis is always easy. One must consider exactly what information those making the decisions had and what was the actual behavior of others. A lot of the memos, cables, telegrams, meeting minutes etc researchers have years to analyze but those actually seeing & using them at the time did not. They had to make decisions on the information they actually had or accumulated til the time their decisions were made. In hindsight only yes one must think was it really necessary.

So Japan made "overtures" or hinted they would be open to a negotiated peace, really? Was the monthly call so to speak. Were they sincere, did Allied intelligence show they were sincere or it was it just a stalling tactic. It was known that unconditional surrender was the only way out for Japan which means no conditions, nothing to negotiate.

Also just saw this the other day although it's been a theory for a while that Japan had their own plans for atomic bomb.

http://www.vagazette.com/la-fg-japan-bomb-20150805,0,6884300.story

People over look it but Japan was the only other nation to deploy aircraft carriers en masse ie they could develope and actually use technology.
 
I was in Hawaii once and we visited Pearl Harbor and of course, took the boat ride out to the U.S.S. Arizona. Very solemn place, that's for sure. I'm sorry for the people that have had to deal with the effects of the bombing. So many lives lost and what was gained?
 
Prior to Hawaii the Japanese diplomats were working hard but were undermined by the military. Diplomacy didn't stand much chance then. Still, we must always try and try in good faith.
 
I think we covered this topic to a large extent in a past thread: the consensus by many SF members at that time was that the bombings were justified, as they remember being very frightened as children of the idea of the Japanese attacking the US and believed the threat to be very real. My own opinion was that the nuclear bombs were not justified then, nor would they be so today.

A trip to Japan's bombing sites to see the effects of the bombings might be equally solemn, and there are archival footage and photographs available.
"So many lives lost and what gained."
 
I wonder if anyone considered notifying the Japanese that we had this weapon and to demonstrate that fact we were going to drop an atomic bomb fifty miles off the coast of Japan at a specific time. This might have achieved an end to the war without killing any people.
 
Josiah said:
I wonder if anyone considered notifying the Japanese that we had this weapon and to demonstrate that fact we were going to drop an atomic bomb fifty miles off the coast of Japan at a specific time. This might have achieved an end to the war without killing any people.
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Many have speculated on a demonstration but if civilians and military already saw cities like Tokyo turned into rubble with conventional bombing I don't see a demonstration mostly witnessed by military making a dent in the mentality of the time.. They didn't even surrender after the first one.
 
WhatInThe said:
Many have speculated on a demonstration but if civilians and military already saw cities like Tokyo turned into rubble with conventional bombing I don't see a demonstration mostly witnessed by military making a dent in the mentality of the time.. They didn't even surrender after the first one.
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You may well be right. But had we done a demonstration with the first bomb and still had to use a 2nd bomb on a city, history would be a lot kinder to HST.
 
AZ Jim said:
I don't forget the times. Torture, rapes, brutal slavery. They got what they asked for.
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Jim, as John Wayne remarked to Bruce Dern, after filming the scene in which Dern's character shoots Wayne in the back, he said, "They're gonna hate you for that!" And, some may hate you for stating the truth, here.

But, you're right! imp
 
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