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The REAL Reason America Used Nuclear Weapons Against Japan
Atomic Weapons Were Not Needed 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.
The U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey group, assigned by President Truman to study the air attacks on Japan, produced a report in July of 1946 that concluded (52-56):
Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey’s opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945 and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated.
General (and later president) Dwight Eisenhower – then Supreme Commander of all Allied Forces, and the officer who created most of America’s WWII military plans for Europe and Japan – said:
The Japanese were ready to surrender and it wasn’t necessary to hit them with that awful thing.
Newsweek, 11/11/63, Ike on Ike
Eisenhower also noted (pg. 380):
In [July] 1945… Secretary of War Stimson, visiting my headquarters in Germany, informed me that our government was preparing to drop an atomic bomb on Japan. I was one of those who felt that there were a number of cogent reasons to question the wisdom of such an act. …the Secretary, upon giving me the news of the successful bomb test in New Mexico, and of the plan for using it, asked for my reaction, apparently expecting a vigorous assent.
During his recitation of the relevant facts, I had been conscious of a feeling of depression and so I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of ‘face’. The Secretary was deeply perturbed by my attitude….
Admiral William Leahy – the highest ranking member of the U.S. military from 1942 until retiring in 1949, who was the first de facto Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and who was at the center of all major American military decisions in World War II – wrote (pg. 441):
It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons.
The lethal possibilities of atomic warfare in the future are frightening. My own feeling was that in being the first to use it, we had adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages. I was not taught to make war in that fashion, and wars cannot be won by destroying women and children.
General Douglas MacArthur agreed (pg. 65, 70-71):
MacArthur’s views about the decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were starkly different from what the general public supposed …. When I asked General MacArthur about the decision to drop the bomb, I was surprised to learn he had not even been consulted. What, I asked, would his advice have been? He replied that he saw no military justification for the dropping of the bomb. The war might have ended weeks earlier, he said, if the United States had agreed, as it later did anyway, to the retention of the institution of the emperor.
Moreover (pg. 512):
The Potsdam declaration in July, demand[ed] that Japan surrender unconditionally or face ‘prompt and utter destruction.’ MacArthur was appalled. He knew that the Japanese would never renounce their emperor, and that without him an orderly transition to peace would be impossible anyhow, because his people would never submit to Allied occupation unless he ordered it. Ironically, when the surrender did come, it was conditional, and the condition was a continuation of the imperial reign. Had the General’s advice been followed, the resort to atomic weapons at Hiroshima and Nagasaki might have been unnecessary.
Similarly, Assistant Secretary of War John McLoy noted (pg. 500):
I have always felt that if, in our ultimatum to the Japanese government issued from Potsdam [in July 1945], we had referred to the retention of the emperor as a constitutional monarch and had made some reference to the reasonable accessibility of raw materials to the future Japanese government, it would have been accepted. Indeed, I believe that even in the form it was delivered, there was some disposition on the part of the Japanese to give it favorable consideration. When the war was over I arrived at this conclusion after talking with a number of Japanese officials who had been closely associated with the decision of the then Japanese government, to reject the ultimatum, as it was presented. I believe we missed the opportunity of effecting a Japanese surrender, completely satisfactory to us, without the necessity of dropping the bombs.
Under Secretary of the Navy Ralph Bird said:
I think that the Japanese were ready for peace, and they already had approached the Russians and, I think, the Swiss. And that suggestion of [giving] a warning [of the atomic bomb] was a face-saving proposition for them, and one that they could have readily accepted.
***
In my opinion, the Japanese war was really won before we ever used the atom bomb. Thus, it wouldn’t have been necessary for us to disclose our nuclear position and stimulate the Russians to develop the same thing much more rapidly than they would have if we had not dropped the bomb.
War Was Really Won Before We Used A-Bomb, U.S. News and World Report, 8/15/60, pg. 73-75.
He also noted (pg. 144-145, 324):
It definitely seemed to me that the Japanese were becoming weaker and weaker. They were surrounded by the Navy. They couldn’t get any imports and they couldn’t export anything. Naturally, as time went on and the war developed in our favor it was quite logical to hope and expect that with the proper kind of a warning the Japanese would then be in a position to make peace, which would have made it unnecessary for us to drop the bomb and have had to bring Russia in.
General Curtis LeMay, the tough cigar-smoking Army Air Force “hawk,” stated publicly shortly before the nuclear bombs were dropped on Japan:
The war would have been over in two weeks. . . . The atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war at all.
The Vice Chairman of the U.S. Bombing Survey Paul Nitze wrote (pg. 36-37, 44-45):
[I] concluded that even without the atomic bomb, Japan was likely to surrender in a matter of months. My own view was that Japan would capitulate by November 1945.
***
Even without the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it seemed highly unlikely, given what we found to have been the mood of the Japanese government, that a U.S. invasion of the islands [scheduled for November 1, 1945] would have been necessary.
Deputy Director of the Office of Naval Intelligence Ellis Zacharias wrote:
Just when the Japanese were ready to capitulate, we went ahead and introduced to the world the most devastating weapon it had ever seen and, in effect, gave the go-ahead to Russia to swarm over Eastern Asia.
Washington decided that Japan had been given its chance and now it was time to use the A-bomb.
I submit that it was the wrong decision. It was wrong on strategic grounds. And it was wrong on humanitarian grounds.
Ellis Zacharias, How We Bungled the Japanese Surrender, Look, 6/6/50, pg. 19-21.
Brigadier General Carter Clarke – the military intelligence officer in charge of preparing summaries of intercepted Japanese cables for President Truman and his advisors – said (pg. 359):
When we didn’t need to do it, and we knew we didn’t need to do it, and they knew that we knew we didn’t need to do it, we used them as an experiment for two atomic bombs.
Many other high-level military officers concurred. For example:
The commander in chief of the U.S. Fleet and Chief of Naval Operations, Ernest J. King, stated that the naval blockade and prior bombing of Japan in March of 1945, had rendered the Japanese helpless and that the use of the atomic bomb was both unnecessary and immoral. Also, the opinion of Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz was reported to have said in a press conference on September 22, 1945, that “The Admiral took the opportunity of adding his voice to those insisting that Japan had been defeated before the atomic bombing and Russia’s entry into the war.” In a subsequent speech at the Washington Monument on October 5, 1945, Admiral Nimitz stated “The Japanese had, in fact, already sued for peace before the atomic age was announced to the world with the destruction of Hiroshima and before the Russian entry into the war.” It was learned also that on or about July 20, 1945, General Eisenhower had urged Truman, in a personal visit, not to use the atomic bomb. Eisenhower’s assessment was “It wasn’t necessary to hit them with that awful thing . . . to use the atomic bomb, to kill and terrorize civilians, without even attempting [negotiations], was a double crime.” Eisenhower also stated that it wasn’t necessary for Truman to “succumb” to [the tiny handful of people putting pressure on the president to drop atom bombs on Japan.]
British officers were of the same mind. For example, General Sir Hastings Ismay, Chief of Staff to the British Minister of Defence, said to Prime Minister Churchill that “when Russia came into the war against Japan, the Japanese would probably wish to get out on almost any terms short of the dethronement of the Emperor.”
On hearing that the atomic test was successful, Ismay’s private reaction was one of “revulsion.”
Why Were Bombs Dropped on Populated Cities Without Military Value?
Even military officers who favored use of nuclear weapons mainly favored using them on unpopulated areas or Japanese military targets ... not cities
For example, Special Assistant to the Secretary of the Navy Lewis Strauss proposed to Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal that a non-lethal demonstration of atomic weapons would be enough to convince the Japanese to surrender … and the Navy Secretary agreed (pg. 145, 325):
I proposed to Secretary Forrestal that the weapon should be demonstrated before it was used. Primarily it was because it was clear to a number of people, myself among them, that the war was very nearly over. The Japanese were nearly ready to capitulate… My proposal to the Secretary was that the weapon should be demonstrated over some area accessible to Japanese observers and where its effects would be dramatic. I remember suggesting that a satisfactory place for such a demonstration would be a large forest of cryptomeria trees not far from Tokyo. The cryptomeria tree is the Japanese version of our redwood… I anticipated that a bomb detonated at a suitable height above such a forest… would lay the trees out in windrows from the center of the explosion in all directions as though they were matchsticks, and, of course, set them afire in the center. It seemed to me that a demonstration of this sort would prove to the Japanese that we could destroy any of their cities at will… Secretary Forrestal agreed wholeheartedly with the recommendation…
It seemed to me that such a weapon was not necessary to bring the war to a successful conclusion, that once used it would find its way into the armaments of the world…
General George Marshall agreed:
Contemporary documents show that Marshall felt “these weapons might first be used against straight military objectives such as a large naval installation and then if no complete result was derived from the effect of that, he thought we ought to designate a number of large manufacturing areas from which the people would be warned to leave–telling the Japanese that we intend to destroy such centers….”
As the document concerning Marshall’s views suggests, the question of whether the use of the atomic bomb was justified turns … on whether the bombs had to be used against a largely civilian target rather than a strictly military target—which, in fact, was the explicit choice since although there were Japanese troops in the cities, neither Hiroshima nor Nagasaki was deemed militarily vital by U.S. planners. (This is one of the reasons neither had been heavily bombed up to this point in the war.) Moreover, targeting [at Hiroshima and Nagasaki] was aimed explicitly on non-military facilities surrounded by workers’ homes.
Historians Agree that the Bomb Wasn’t Needed
Historians agree that nuclear weapons did not need to be used to stop the war or save lives.
As historian Doug Long notes:
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission historian J. Samuel Walker has studied the history of research on the decision to use nuclear weapons on Japan. In his conclusion he writes, “The consensus among scholars is that the bomb was not needed to avoid an invasion of Japan and to end the war within a relatively short time. It is clear that alternatives to the bomb existed and that Truman and his advisors knew it.” (J. Samuel Walker, The Decision to Use the Bomb: A Historiographical Update, Diplomatic History, Winter 1990, pg. 110).
Politicians Agreed
Many high-level politicians agreed. For example, Herbert Hoover said (pg. 142):
The Japanese were prepared to negotiate all the way from February 1945…up to and before the time the atomic bombs were dropped; …if such leads had been followed up, there would have been no occasion to drop the [atomic] bombs.
Under Secretary of State Joseph Grew noted (pg. 29-32):
In the light of available evidence I myself and others felt that if such a categorical statement about the [retention of the] dynasty had been issued in May, 1945, the surrender-minded elements in the [Japanese] Government might well have been afforded by such a statement a valid reason and the necessary strength to come to an early clearcut decision.
If surrender could have been brought about in May, 1945, or even in June or July, before the entrance of Soviet Russia into the [Pacific] war and the use of the atomic bomb, the world would have been the gainer.
Why Then Were Atom Bombs Dropped on Japan?
If dropping nuclear bombs was unnecessary to end the war or to save lives, why was the decision to drop them made? Especially over the objections of so many top military and political figures?
One theory is that scientists like to play with their toys:
On September 9, 1945, Admiral William F. Halsey, commander of the Third Fleet, was publicly quoted extensively as stating that the atomic bomb was used because the scientists had a “toy and they wanted to try it out . . . .” He further stated, “The first atomic bomb was an unnecessary experiment . . . . It was a mistake to ever drop it.”
However, most of the Manhattan Project scientists who developed the atom bomb were opposed to using it on Japan.
Albert Einstein – an important catalyst for the development of the atom bomb (but not directly connected with the Manhattan Project) - said differently:
“A great majority of scientists were opposed to the sudden employment of the atom bomb.” In Einstein’s judgment, the dropping of the bomb was a political – diplomatic decision rather than a military or scientific decision.
Indeed, some of the Manhattan Project scientists wrote directly to the secretary of defense in 1945 to try to dissuade him from dropping the bomb:
We believe that these considerations make the use of nuclear bombs for an early, unannounced attack against Japan inadvisable. If the United States would be the first to release this new means of indiscriminate destruction upon mankind, she would sacrifice public support throughout the world, precipitate the race of armaments, and prejudice the possibility of reaching an international agreement on the future control of such weapons.
Political and Social Problems, Manhattan Engineer District Records, Harrison-Bundy files, folder # 76, National Archives (also contained in: Martin Sherwin, A World Destroyed, 1987 edition, pg. 323-333).
The scientists questioned the ability of destroying Japanese cities with atomic bombs to bring surrender when destroying Japanese cities with conventional bombs had not done so, and – like some of the military officers quoted above – recommended a demonstration of the atomic bomb for Japan in an unpopulated area.
The Real Explanation?
History.com notes:
In the years since the two atomic bombs were dropped on Japan, a number of historians have suggested that the weapons had a two-pronged objective …. It has been suggested that the second objective was to demonstrate the new weapon of mass destruction to the Soviet Union. By August 1945, relations between the Soviet Union and the United States had deteriorated badly. The Potsdam Conference between U.S. President Harry S. Truman, Russian leader Joseph Stalin, and Winston Churchill (before being replaced by Clement Attlee) ended just four days before the bombing of Hiroshima. The meeting was marked by recriminations and suspicion between the Americans and Soviets. Russian armies were occupying most of Eastern Europe. Truman and many of his advisers hoped that the U.S. atomic monopoly might offer diplomatic leverage with the Soviets. In this fashion, the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan can be seen as the first shot of the Cold War.
New Scientist reported in 2005:
The US decision to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 was meant to kick-start the Cold War rather than end the Second World War, according to two nuclear historians who say they have new evidence backing the controversial theory.
Causing a fission reaction in several kilograms of uranium and plutonium and killing over 200,000 people 60 years ago was done more to impress the Soviet Union than to cow Japan, they say. And the US President who took the decision, Harry Truman, was culpable, they add.
“He knew he was beginning the process of annihilation of the species,” says Peter Kuznick, director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University in Washington DC, US. “It was not just a war crime; it was a crime against humanity.”
***
[The conventional explanation of using the bombs to end the war and save lives] is disputed by Kuznick and Mark Selden, a historian from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, US.
***
New studies of the US, Japanese and Soviet diplomatic archives suggest that Truman’s main motive was to limit Soviet expansion in Asia, Kuznick claims. Japan surrendered because the Soviet Union began an invasion a few days after the Hiroshima bombing, not because of the atomic bombs themselves, he says.
According to an account by Walter Brown, assistant to then-US secretary of state James Byrnes, Truman agreed at a meeting three days before the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima that Japan was “looking for peace”. Truman was told by his army generals, Douglas Macarthur and Dwight Eisenhower, and his naval chief of staff, William Leahy, that there was no military need to use the bomb.
“Impressing Russia was more important than ending the war in Japan,” says Selden.
John Pilger points out:
The US secretary of war, Henry Stimson, told President Truman he was “fearful” that the US air force would have Japan so “bombed out” that the new weapon would not be able “to show its strength”. He later admitted that “no effort was made, and none was seriously considered, to achieve surrender merely in order not to have to use the bomb”. His foreign policy colleagues were eager “to browbeat the Russians with the bomb held rather ostentatiously on our hip”. General Leslie Groves, director of the Manhattan Project that made the bomb, testified: “There was never any illusion on my part that Russia was our enemy, and that the project was conducted on that basis.” The day after Hiroshima was obliterated, President Truman voiced his satisfaction with the “overwhelming success” of “the experiment”.
We’ll give the last word to University of Maryland professor of political economy – and former Legislative Director in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, and Special Assistant in the Department of State – Gar Alperovitz:
Though most Americans are unaware of the fact, increasing numbers of historians now recognize the United States did not need to use the atomic bomb to end the war against Japan in 1945. Moreover, this essential judgment was expressed by the vast majority of top American military leaders in all three services in the years after the war ended: Army, Navy and Army Air Force. Nor was this the judgment of “liberals,” as is sometimes thought today. In fact, leading conservatives were far more outspoken in challenging the decision as unjustified and immoral than American liberals in the years following World War II.
***
Instead [of allowing other options to end the war, such as letting the Soviets attack Japan with ground forces], the United States rushed to use two atomic bombs at almost exactly the time that an August 8 Soviet attack had originally been scheduled: Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki on August 9. The timing itself has obviously raised questions among many historians. The available evidence, though not conclusive, strongly suggests that the atomic bombs may well have been used in part because American leaders “preferred”—as Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Martin Sherwin has put it—to end the war with the bombs rather than the Soviet attack. Impressing the Soviets during the early diplomatic sparring that ultimately became the Cold War also appears likely to have been a significant factor.
***
The most illuminating perspective, however, comes from top World War II American military leaders. 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.
***
Shortly before his death General George C. Marshall quietly defended the decision, but for the most part he is on record as repeatedly saying that it was not a military decision, but rather a political one.
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Excellent summation.
I would only add, if Hitler & company hadn't been such master race obsessed douchebags and bided their time a little more, the first atomic bomb could very well have fallen on NYC or London or Moscow.
Timing, as they say, is everything.
"It was Tavistock-designed methods that got the United States into the Second World War and which, under the guidance of Dr. Kurt Lewin, established the OSS, the forerunner of the CIA. Lewin became the director of the Strategic Bombing Survey, which was a plan for the Royal Air Force to concentrate on bombing German worker housing while leaving military targets, such as munition plants, alone. The munition plants on both sides belonged to the international bankers who had no wish to see their assets destroyed. The idea behind saturation bombing of civilian worker housing was to break the morale of the German worker." http://www.theforbiddenknowledge.com/hardtruth/tavistochumanrelations.ht...
Good to see you back. +1
"to concentrate on bombing German worker housing while leaving military targets"
Horseshit ! Bombing was so inaccurate that often entire bombing raids missed their industrial target. American bomber losses were horrific up until the Mustang was fitted with a Rolls-Royce engine and could keep up with the bombers to their targets and home again.
Dropping a bomb "into a pickle barrel" was a cute, but totally inaccurate statement. Dropping a bomb within a city block was difficult especially a night and cloudy weather.
At least Bomber Harris stated his objectives, horrific though they were.
More bullshit armchair quarterbacking.
My father who is 90 was a bomber on a super fortress and later a pilot. He made all 25 missions a rare feat for WW2. I remember his stories and Kayman is spot on. Carpet bombing was indeed used because most of the time they missed!
The "Strategic Bombing Survey" was a political document that indeed supported the new MIC post-WWII. - Ned
And lets not forget Japan sending over 9,000 incendiary & exploding ballons across the Pacific in the jet stream.
I guess they had really good remote controlled bomb sights back then...lol...surely they were not inhumane enough to launch indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets ;-)
Of course, the plan was civilian terror and hopefully to catch the NW forests and/or plains on fire. In one of the weird quirks of fate & war...
"On 10 March 1945, one of the last paper balloons had descended in the vicinity of the Manhattan Project's production site at Hanford, Washington. The balloon landed on a power line that fed electricity to the building containing the reactor producing plutonium for the Nagasaki bomb, and shut the reactor down."
http://www.faqs.org/docs/air/avfusen.html
I believe one of those balloons hit a Sunday school picnic. While tragic do you find it SLIGHTLY out of proportion to firebomb and entire nation of men, women and children and then nuke them twice, when the only offensive resistance they are capable of is sending hot air balloons across the globe in the desperate hope of starting a forest fire in Oregon? You're smarter than that nmewn.
"...firebomb and [sic] entire [sic] nation of men, women and children and then nuke them twice..."
Did you go to Chico State?
Proportional or not, it was still an offensive action, not a defensive one.
You forget, they were working on bio-weapons at Unit 731 and had no qualms about using human beings for that research, so it takes no great flight of fancy to think that the Imperial Japanese government would or could attach them to those balloons.
"You're smarter than that nmewn."
Adopting the professorial, condescending stance toward someone you disagree with might work on some plebe in a classroom or drunk on a bar stool but it doesn't with me, Vlad.
You are trifling.
If it were not for your Dresden firebombing comment, I would have forgotten about the Japanese balloons because they had little impact. But the potential was there.
But it does point to Japanese intent does it not? The balloons were an indiscriminate conveyance of ordnance, completely unfocusd on any military targets.
One could have landed on an Japanese-American internment camp just as they were about to be done away with. No doubt that would have been seen by some as sort of conspiracy to cover up the scene of a crime ;-)
Their intent was to strap dynamite to balloons and sent them on air currents thousands of miles across the Pacific. And they did just that.
No, their intent was to have these things drop out of the sky on the North American continent and any of its inhabitants.
The balloons were un-controlled.
They knew they would drop anywhere and everywhere. They didn't care where they landed just as long as they didn't land in the Pacific before getting here.
The intent was indiscriminate death and terror.
Which is exactly what happened to a preganant woman and five Sunday school students out for a simple picnic in Bly, Oregon on May 5 1945.
On May 5, 1945, a pregnant woman and five children were killed when they discovered a balloon bomb that had landed in the forest of Gearhart Mountain in Southern Oregon. Pastor Archie Mitchell and his pregnant wife Elsie drove up to Gearhart Mountain with five of their Sunday school students (aged 11–14) to have a picnic, and Elsie and the children got out of the car at Bly, Oregon, while Archie drove on to find a parking spot. As Elsie and the children looked for a good picnic spot, they saw a strange balloon lying on the ground. As the group approached the balloon, a bomb attached to it exploded and Elsie and all five children were killed. Archie witnessed the explosion and immediately ran to the scene and used his hands to extinguish the fire on his wife's and the children's clothing, but he could not save them.[12][13] These are the only known deaths caused by the balloon bombs, and also the only known deaths in the continental U.S. as the result of enemy action during World War II.
Military personnel arrived on the scene within hours, and saw that the balloon still had snow underneath it, while the surrounding area did not. They concluded that the balloon bomb had drifted to the ground several weeks earlier, and had lain there undisturbed until found by the group.
Elsie Mitchell is buried in the Ocean View Cemetery in Port Angeles, Washington. A memorial, the Mitchell Monument, is located at the point of the explosion, 110 kilometers (70 mi) northeast of Klamath Falls in the Mitchell Recreation Area. It was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2001. Several Japanese civilians have visited the monument to offer their apologies for the deaths that took place here, and several cherry trees have been planted around the monument as a symbol of peace.[13]
I'm aware of the balloons and the American deaths. I score it Japan 6 and USA 250,000.
I don't score it like for like...I never have and never will. I'm sure many look at it the same way, in varying degrees.
Such is life...and death, on the big rock inhabited by all of us.
Time to change the score:
The historian Chalmers Johnson has written that:
He is seeking reasons to justify his animalistic morality.
Why try and become human when it is much easier to go along with your animal nature. Very common.
The systematic fire bombing of Tokyo produced more casualties than the Abomb drops:
http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/tokyo.htm
Hiroshima was kept off the list of cities to be conventionally bombed - not sure about Nagasaki - so that the effect of a nuke on an undamaged city could be observed.
The Russians already knew about the bomb after Alamagordo. That's why Stalin didn't react when he was informed about the new, powerful weapon that the US had.
"Hiroshima was kept off the list of cities to be conventionally bombed "
Interesting. Do you have a source for that info? I don't mean that in a challenging way.
http://www.dannen.com/decision/targets.html
THe Army Targeting report.
Nagasaki was a secondary target. THe second bomb was intended for Kokura, an alomst insignificant military target but a marshalling yard for a proposed defence of N. Kyushu. Nagasaki was added to the list VERY late after Kyoto was removed because of it's culutral significance.
EDIT:
(1) they be important targets in a large urban area of more than three miles in diameter, (2) they be capable of being damaged effectively by a blast, and (3) they are unlikely to be attacked by next August. Dr. Stearns had a list of five targets which the Air Force would be willing to reserve for our use unless unforeseen circumstances arise.
Is it just me that noticed that the target calls for an urban area THREE MILES IN DIAMETER? They were not requesting a military target, they were requesting a laboratory.
"laboratory" - Your term, as it is not in the report.
The report you link to was presented in May, 1945. Hiroshima had been bombed previously, just not seriously damaged:
From Japanese web site: http://www.gojapango.com/travel/hiroshima_bombing.htm
Hiroshima Bombing - Hiroshima during World War IIAt the time of its bombing, Hiroshima was a city of considerable military significance. It contained the headquarters of the Fifth Division and Field Marshal Hata's 2nd General Army Headquarters, which commanded the defence of all of southern Japan. The city was a communications centre, a storage point, and an assembly area for troops. It was chosen as a target because it had not suffered damage from previous bombing raids, allowing an ideal environment to measure the damage caused by the atomic bomb. The city was mobilized for "all-out" war, with thousands of conscripted women, children and Koreans working in military offices, military factories and building demolition and with women and children training to resist any invading force.
From International Socialist Review (hardly a "right wing" site):
http://www.isreview.org/issues/13/Hiroshima-Nagasaki.shtml
"... [Hiroshima] had largely escaped conventional aerial bombardment..."
Note: "largely" - not "completely".
Successful military strategy has always been about deception and never entering a conflict without knowing the outcome ahead of time. Like so many things in society today, the last ten plus years has shown that the U.S. military has indeed lost their way. I wonder what the Rand corporation is up to these days? Things that make you go hhhhmmmmmmmm.
funny you should ask. . .
http://www.handsoffmotherearth.org/2011/04/rand-corporation-report-revea...
http://www.rand.org/pubs/technical_reports/TR846.html
it's a "93 page report" pdf that I've yet to read, but I'm sure will be. . . interesting.
The current wars are designed never to end for that would defeat their real purpose... direct subsidies to private profiteering corporations.. and the subjugation and impoverishment of the general populace.
At least it was safer for US military grunts than the method of nuclear testing adopted by the British in the 50s.
The emperor of Japan asked for it so be could save face?!?
I'll buy that as sick as it sounds.
But using it to scare the crap out of the USSR is probably right on.
You know the US military is the only forward looking/planning organization
In the Federal Govt. Sad but true
Readers interested in some really real reasons that the bomb was developed in and used by Merika first will find no shortage of interesting co-incidences and con-junctions in the fascinating story of the development of modern medicine and weapons as laid out in Jennifer Lakes Blog - https://jenniferlake.wordpress.com/?s=bohr ...
an amazing assemblage of 'scientists' of the reputedly hebraic persuasion(with a heavy preponderance of "hungarian' origins, and scions of international banking heavyweights)gathered like moths round a flame at U of M (Ann Arbor)1927-30 ....later rubbing shoulders with luminaries like Louis Strauss and other 'advisors' of presidential puppets who would push through the funding and muscle for the Manhattan Project to really get going....
and those singularly unterrified of 'co-incidence' will take careful note of the appearance of rock-star status modern icon D. Lama in the same location, some considerable years later, to perform the dreaded Kalachakra ceremony...
“In 1991 in New York City a so-called Kalachakra Sand Mandala was constructed, then destroyed by the Dalai Lama, and the sand was poured into the water near the World Trade Center. Two years later in 1993 another Wheel of Time (Kalachakra) Sand Mandala was built by Tibetan Monks in the lobby of Tower One " 10 years later, life imitates - majic? ///then in DC he invokes 772 demons, er gods upon the Merikan capital...
Bronfmann BnaiBrith Kosher Mafia scientificism or ol time revival tantric demonological metaphysics...two sides of the same co[i]n?
Why did I know that someone would blame the JOOOOOOZZZzzz!
Is it Iran, a country that has not attacked any other in modern history (400 years), that should not have nuclear weapons?
Perspective is a bitch.
The families of 85 dead jews in argentina might ask you to define "attack."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jul/18/argentina-iran-jewish-centre-bombing
While tragic, 85 is statistically insignificant in comparision to dead Japanese civilians, incarcerated Japanese Americans, dead Iraqi women and children, dead native Americans, etc., etc.
My point had nothing to do with Japan. I have seen it posted here several times that Iran hasn't attacked anybody for 400 years. I don't think that is accurate.
He knows your point. You proved the fallacy of his assumption, so he had to rebutt an argument you are not making.
America won't hand over 23 CIA officials that were convicted in absentia of kidnapping in Italy either. What's the difference? Do you think Israel would turn over any Israeli government officials to another country for prosecution?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-19653566
No difference. America kills people all the time. Israel definitely wouldn't turn over any officials.
"WE" must use our knowledge of X to prevent others from obtaining knowledge of X, because people who have knowledge of X represent a clear and present danger.
Almost forgot....because God is on our side.
Feel free to apply this template to all areas of life against which the pressure of jack boots is being applied.
Why does God need anyone on His side if He's omnipotent?
Well played!
So the Iran-Iraq "war" was really just a discussion or disagreement?
It was Iraq, prompted and supported by the US, that invaded Iran. You should read up before you comment.
You should really go for the trifecta: It was US Jew bankers that were behind it!
Well terminus, YOU really should read with a bit more comprehension or learn the subtle difference between "attacking" (as in the original comment) and "invading". Iran and Iraq fought a lengthy and costly war. As for your assertion Iraq was put up to this by the dastardly US of A, go ahead and cite a credible account. There, fixed your lack of reading and reasoning skills for ya.Next lesson, the exciting world of historical revisionism and how to profit from home-canned pablum.
you confirm my point.
There is no "subtle" difference, you sought to develop the understanding in readers that Iran started the Iran/Iraq war. It did not.
It is a well known fact that Iraq was supplied with cash and arms prior to and during the Iran/Iraq war. There is plenty of evidence demonstrating this, do your own research. The US also had plenty of motive to have a proxy attack Iran. You are either deep into the kool-aide or you are a disinfo agent. either way, your understanding of that point of history is... incorrect at best.
FYI the United States of America is a part of the Anglo-American Empire. It has not been a Republic since, at least, the Mexican/American War.
Read my post again. You repeat your own errors as if to assert truth by merely repeating your feebleness. But, let's explore: my use of "subtle" was sarcasm and sailed parsecs over your head; nothing in my post implied or stated that Iran started the war with Iraq; as for the U.S. being part of the "Anglo-American Empire" you finally reveal yourself to be a lickspittle sycophant of drivel spewing leftist teachers who fill the minds of empty vessels such as yourself.
ad hominem much?
This is post modern revisionist history at work, Monday morning quarterbacking based on today's biased review of yesterday's game tapes. Allied casualty estimates for an invasion of the mainland were running at 1 million. They were not looking for "peace with honor". Their objective was to bring an immediate cessation to an existential conflict that had and was killing so many of their young men and fellow citizens. Suggest you talk to the veterans of the South Pacific theater and find out the reality of the time on the ground. Find out what happened in the Gilbert Islands, the Marshall's, and Mariana's? Specifically what happened on the cliffs of Saipan? Or the cannibalism described in Fly Boys? This look back is a little too pretty.
Read EB Sledge With the Old Breed or Hell of a Way to Die: Tarawa by Wright.
http://www.intercom.net/~whynes/lst119.html
Good luck getting through to the American haters!
@ airedalesrule~ Spot on.
@ George Washington ~ My opinion of you is dropping. What a bunch of revisionist caca you've barfed up here. So you're taking a piece from History.com, no less, and trying to pass it off as how this nation was wrong to hammer the crap out of Japan to hasten the end of WWII. Tool.
Who owns History.com? If you'd done your homework you'd have found out that History.com is owned by A&E Television Networks. A&E Television Networks is a joint venture of Hearst Corporation and Disney-ABC Television Group (The Walt Disney Company), and all three are members of the CFR, the corporatist one-worlders. can you say crony capitalists?
If you think that somehow it was immoral for the USA to smack the crap out of Japan to end WWII, I missed your listing of the opinions of anybody who was in Nanking in 1943 and was fortunate enough to survive the Japanese "visitors" of the time. Please, think twice before posting garbage like this or better yet, do your damned legwork beforehand.