SRL Archive - Discussions & Debates

So tomorrow I've a paper to do for school about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I'm arguing that we should not have used the atomic bombs, and I was just kind of wondering what arguments there were. So far I'm talking about the civilians it killed, the damage it did (buildings and such (oh, I was trying to find how much it cost Japan, but I couldn't find it anywhere.. if anyone happened to know, that'd be super helpful)), and I just need one more thing. :)

Many thanks! ^^

hardly any reasons why they shouldnt have, unless you want to say that killing is just wrong no matter what.

we gave them a warning to surrender twice, and they refused. it is therefore japans fault

From: Awkwardsaw
hardly any reasons why they shouldnt have, unless you want to say that killing is just wrong no matter what.

we gave them a warning to surrender twice, and they refused. it is therefore japans fault

It was not Japan as a whole's fault, but the damned stupid emperor. There are several generals that had not wanted to have anything to do with the US, but the emperor thought otherwise.

And Japanese diplomats said they were wanting to end the war by surrender. So it was not Japan's fault. It was the emperor's. And the amazing propaganda the Japanese had.

AND the scientists who worked on developing the bomb didn't want Truman to use it in Japan.

By the time the US dropped the nuclear bombs, they had already firebombed over 100 other Japanese cities in the dead of night and burned them to the ground, killing many, many more people than those two nukes ever harmed or killed.

If the other alternative was to continue firebombing every Japanese city until they were all burned down, perhaps the nukes actually did Japan a favor.

I've never thought about that until just now, but maybe it's true.

@ Awkwardsaw
are you serious? a warning does not justify killing of so many people, mostly innocent CIVILIANS. How would u like it if they dropped a nuke on your city ?

nikos, that was brought up in a debate we had yesterday. :p

And tara, I was thinking about that a little, but I think I'd rather be killed instantly than die from suffocation/fire. I know that a lot of people died from burns from the nukes, but a lot were also instantly killed.

It was pretty much absolutely necessary. All the Japanese civilians had been taught to fight if they were ever able to, against the Americans. Because of the way the Japanese were, they would just continue to fight until everyone was dead so to take Japan, they would have had to kill everyone anyways. That kind of shows in the Japanese people that they found "recently". They'd been on one of the unused islands i guess and they were found like 40 years after WWII ended and they still thought the war was on. Using the nukes probably saved a lot of Japanese and certainly a lot of American lives. In fact, they would have kept on fighting if they'd heard that we only had two nukes and couldn't continue using them.

People may not have liked it at the time, but it was fairly needed if we didn't want to have to kill every Japanese person there to make sure they didn't turn around and attack us back when we left. For me the only real problem to using them is it may have been a bit bad for the future; what with Stalin being all paranoid and whatnot.

From: nikos
@ Awkwardsaw
are you serious? a warning does not justify killing of so many people, mostly innocent CIVILIANS. How would u like it if they dropped a nuke on your city ?

ok, you are the emporer, i am truman.

i threaten you by dropping a nuke on one of your citys, killing thousands and thousands of people.

if you do not surrender, they will die. and you just let the americans kill innocent civilians, knowing full damn well that we would not have droped the bomb if you had surrendered.

we threaten you again, not wanting to do any more killing, but still you disagree, and there you go. an other city of innocent lives destroyed, thanks to your ignorence

if you cant see from that, then you truely need help

no one had seen the power of a nuke, the Emperor couldn't have known if we were bluffing or not.

No matter how much you try to justify it, killing civilians in any war is wrong. Try to justify it as much as you want, but at the end of the day it was done to get Japan out of the war, not to help Japan and it's my opinion that anything that argues otherwise can only be justifying it as the lesser of two evils, much as Tara suggested.

Brain, we tested it before we used it in Japan. And Awkward, we were already bombing the shit out of them, and we cut off all their resources.

I did good on the paper, by the way. Wrote six pages. :p

We tested it in New Mexico. No one else had seen it before.

From: mixster
No matter how much you try to justify it, killing civilians in any war is wrong. Try to justify it as much as you want, but at the end of the day it was done to get Japan out of the war, not to help Japan and it's my opinion that anything that argues otherwise can only be justifying it as the lesser of two evils, much as Tara suggested.

As i said, the civilians were trained to fight. They literally would go start attacking Americans. So if you have a whole bunch of civilians attacking you are you going to just let them? Japan basically made everyone in the country part of the military. So that doesn't really count here.

I believe that it was the best choice of action. It brought an end to the war. It killed many people, but so would have the war continuing. What a good deal of people who bring up the fact that innocent people died don't think about is the deaths of the soldiers.

18 year old boy gets drafted, gets killed on the front lines. Is he any less innocent? What makes a man guilty? Does a lack of innocence justify death? Many lives will be lost in wars, it's best to end them as quickly as possible.

From: Dan Cardin
It was pretty much absolutely necessary. All the Japanese civilians had been taught to fight if they were ever able to, against the Americans. Because of the way the Japanese were, they would just continue to fight until everyone was dead so to take Japan, they would have had to kill everyone anyways.

You don't seriously think that this is true, do you? They certainly have a much braver and stronger spirit than Americans, but I think this is a plain exaggeration.

ok we blew up the world but we warned them! thats what your saying.

no your wrong. thats compleatly not what i am saying. did you read my post AT ALL?

From: Wizzup?
You don't seriously think that this is true, do you? They certainly have a much braver and stronger spirit than Americans, but I think this is a plain exaggeration.

lol. Many of them fought by the "code of honor" and would not give up because they'd been trained as i said (Along with many of them having been indoctrinated). then in many cases, they were impressed into service or used by the Japanese soldiers. IMO, it was pretty much like being part of Stalin's crew in the battle of Stalingrad.

So if you can find somewhere telling me why that's a large exaggeration, then please do.

Dan, Stalingrad was not a good thing. And soldiers whom take part in such actions (war, especially with dictators/fascists/communists who run their country) should not take the blame for any of what the country did.

And I brought this up in the debate; the Japanese were not specifically horrid, blood-thirsty, mindless people. They followed their emperor, as they believed he was a living deity (or son-of/reincarnation/whatever. :p doesn't change anything, really..). If he were to tell them that America was good and to greet all Americans with love and compassion, they would have. And Japan had already discussed surrender with Stalin and Truman (or it might have been during FDR's presidency.. I can't remember. x] One of the two..) and Churchill. The main reason Truman used the nuke (this is debatable, and just something that makes sense to me personally, and probably many others, but yeah.. I dunno why I typed all this out, to be honest. ^^) was because Stalin was going to enter the battle against Japan and have an alliance with us (which is silly that we cared, since they were already part of the Allies in WWII, which you should know, Dan, since you've knowledge of Stalingrad). And apparently that'd be the worst thing to ever happen to America EVA! (x]), so we just nuked Japan so those 'filthy communists' wouldn't help us.

Yay for 'power!'

(I think it'd be good to know that I personally laugh harder at people who say men are powerful because they fight and shit, because power shows the weakest weakness in people; thus the more 'powerful' one is, the lesser of an impact he has on anything. So I'm a bit biased towards not fighting. ^^ I definitely love (not sarcastic by the way, I really do appreciate counter arguments because then I actually understand what people mean, and I fucking love learning (hahahaha x] damn I'm off-topic), so thanks to everyone. ^^)))

by mentioning stalingrad, i was saying that like the japanese in some cases, stalin forced all the civilians in stalingrad to help fight for him despite them not having weapons or training.

Is it no different to the overly patriotic ideas that go around the US? Do you not think that many of the US civilians would take arms if people tried to invade? Just some food for thought.

Oh? Where'd you get that information? Because I just looked up some stuff, and, I already didn't believe that, but this is what I found.

"Sixty years after the battle of Stalingrad, which took the lives of half a million Soviet soldiers and about 150,000 German troops, historians still cannot say how many civilians died as the city was pounded to rubble during the 200 days of fighting. But it was tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. Some had stayed voluntarily to help defend their city. Others were discouraged or prevented from evacuating to escape the Nazi onslaught. More than 400,000 civilians were in Stalingrad when the battle began on July 17, 1942…"

They were not forced, but stayed voluntarily. Which makes sense. They weren't able to leave because they could have easily been spies/Germans/Axis. It's kind of like when a school has a lock down/out. Nobody can go or leave the school/classrooms. And if you were against Germany (which I'm sure many of the people in Stalingrad were, if not all (hell, they invaded them. It only makes sense to hate every German for the few that were commanded to invade.. Hmm.. Sounds like something familiar.. >_>)), then the only logical thing to do is fight. Duh. (sarcasm. Kind of comparing Stalingrad to America and the WTC and all that stuff. And how ignorant the majority of people were about that, and just wanted to kill every Middle Eastern person they saw/knew of. Damn am I sickened by people. :p Oh well.)

^^ There ya go, mixster! :D People in America don't seem to understand logic. Damn us.. :< Well.. then again.. America is quite a religious country..

its not just america, its the whole damn world thats so ignorent and idiotic

What is this nonsense about Japanese civilians fighting which makes it okay to kill them?

You're saying /all/ civilians? including women and children, disabled people, prisoners, conscientious objectors and just people who were not overly patriotic? You say that all those people deserved to die?


Perhaps dropping the first bomb could be justified a little, as a way to make Japan surrender. But there is absolutely no way you can justify dropping the second bomb just three days after, before the Japanese authorities had a chance to work out what happened. Three days is simply not enough to survey all the damage and come to a conclusion as what to do, especially with all the infrastructure destroyed.

From: mixster
Is it no different to the overly patriotic ideas that go around the US? Do you not think that many of the US civilians would take arms if people tried to invade? Just some food for thought.

i dont really understand your point. I suppose you might have more civilians that would "sign up" or something of the sort. I doubt many would simply go, as civilians, and go-a-fightin'. Then again, i think that that's more people in general nowadays.

From: i luffs yeww
Oh? Where'd you get that information? Because I just looked up some stuff, and, I already didn't believe that, but this is what I found.

"Sixty years after the battle of Stalingrad, which took the lives of half a million Soviet soldiers and about 150,000 German troops, historians still cannot say how many civilians died as the city was pounded to rubble during the 200 days of fighting. But it was tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. Some had stayed voluntarily to help defend their city. Others were discouraged or prevented from evacuating to escape the Nazi onslaught. More than 400,000 civilians were in Stalingrad when the battle began on July 17, 1942…"

They were not forced, but stayed voluntarily. Which makes sense. They weren't able to leave because they could have easily been spies/Germans/Axis. It's kind of like when a school has a lock down/out. Nobody can go or leave the school/classrooms. And if you were against Germany (which I'm sure many of the people in Stalingrad were, if not all (hell, they invaded them. It only makes sense to hate every German for the few that were commanded to invade.. Hmm.. Sounds like something familiar.. >_>)), then the only logical thing to do is fight. Duh. (sarcasm. Kind of comparing Stalingrad to America and the WTC and all that stuff. And how ignorant the majority of people were about that, and just wanted to kill every Middle Eastern person they saw/knew of. Damn am I sickened by people. :p Oh well.)

^^ There ya go, mixster! :D People in America don't seem to understand logic. Damn us.. :< Well.. then again.. America is quite a religious country..

from my AP US history class/book and my teacher.

From: Yakman
What is this nonsense about Japanese civilians fighting which makes it okay to kill them?

You're saying /all/ civilians? including women and children, disabled people, prisoners, conscientious objectors and just people who were not overly patriotic? You say that all those people deserved to die?


Perhaps dropping the first bomb could be justified a little, as a way to make Japan surrender. But there is absolutely no way you can justify dropping the second bomb just three days after, before the Japanese authorities had a chance to work out what happened. Three days is simply not enough to survey all the damage and come to a conclusion as what to do, especially with all the infrastructure destroyed.

First, the civilians in general (since they didn't really need nukes to go about killing civilians). If there were two groups of people, yours and an enemy's. Throughout the enemy's crowd, there were innocent bystanders. I suppose you would tell yourself that you would take the chance of allowing half your crowd to die because they had to selectively attack the non-bystandards, while watching out to make sure some of the "innocents" weren't actually faking such things and really fighting on the enemy side?

As for nukes, imo the nukes really ended the war much more quickly and probably saved more lives. The idea that we could instantly do that much damage and the chance that it could happen again would very likely be much more of a deterrent than taking on casualties more gradually and such. I wouldn't really know if dropping the second one was necessary, but i suppose if i were to wager a guess, its that they were trying to make a large point. Japan had been losing hugely since quite a bit earlier in the war. The taking on of casualties didn't really seem to stop them. They knew that they were losing and quite probably that they were going to lose. I think that if they knew that America didn't have any more nukes then they would have continued fighting because there wasn't really much reason not to if they were working off of their previous strategy. I don't think anyone can clearly say that the second one wasn't needed, as no one wes there in that time period, and no one here was in the war, fighting it (then again neither was Carter, but i suppose decisions made during war times are never going to be perfect.). We're looking at it in hind sight and that always makes things a lot more black and white.

Dan, learning stuff in school is all fine and dandy, but I couldn't find anything to back your argument. :/ (Not saying it's not true, but I've no evidence so it seems untrustworthy. ;) Hopefully you understand.) And, you even said, they (Japan) were losing badly. They had nothing. And they were making plans to end the war.

A point I made in my paper today was (something like this.. :p don't have it with me right now):

"The whole world saw what happened after we sent Germany into a state of atrophy, and it seems like it should have been illogical to send another country into that same level of abolition."

Or something. :p

But the point of that is because Germany later rose up and fought back against the Treaty of Versailles, and us reducing Japan to rubble and ash is something that they most definitely would want to retaliate against. :)

my history book backs it up. i would assume that they have their sources. Along with i found some vague references in the part five minutes but they weren't really all that specific (like wikipedia on battle of okinawa). They had nothing, and they were making plans to end the war on their own terms. They refused to unconditional surrender.

My point was that there is a thin line between brainwashing and some of the more extreme levels of patriotism that have emerged in the US. My main point circling around the idea that if the US was actually being invaded, I would think that (maybe not so much now, but more in the war time) a lot of people would be prepared to `fight for their country to the death'.

Also, can you blame Japan for being wary about surrendering to the US? WWI, Germany wasn't actually invaded at all, they surrender and boom, Treaty of Versailles.

From: i luffs yeww
Brain, we tested it before we used it in Japan.

Right, but in a war, if your enemy told you that they had a device that would destroy entire cities in a blink of an eye, and you would surely lose, and you better surrender, would you believe them? No.

I would because I'd be like "Fuck that shit."

Consider these.

1. Dropping the second bomb on Nagasaki only 3 days after the first bomb simply cannot be justified. The Japanese government were very confused and in disarray after the first bomb dropped, they had no radio, telephone or any other means of contacting its people in Hiroshima. Their government officials had to fly to Hiroshima to see why all their links had gone down. 3 days simply wasn't enough to figure out what happened and issue a surrender.

2. There is quite a lot of talk here about using the bombs as a demonstration of power to make Japan surrender. If that is the case why not drop them in a deserted rural area? You get the same display of awesome power with no innocent lives lost.

From: Brain
Right, but in a war, if your enemy told you that they had a device that would destroy entire cities in a blink of an eye, and you would surely lose, and you better surrender, would you believe them? No.

i would take the chance and say "ok, you win" with respect from your people

From: Yakman
contacting its people in Hiroshima.

What people? :/

These are incredibly devastating pictures that show how much damage it did.


That's the before and after.

From: Yakman
2. There is quite a lot of talk here about using the bombs as a demonstration of power to make Japan surrender. If that is the case why not drop them in a deserted rural area? You get the same display of awesome power with no innocent lives lost.

I don't even think they should have used them at all. They knew how much damage the bombs were capable of (Trinity testing), and even if they bombed an outlying island (this was one option that was suggested instead of bombing Hiroshima), that's just nuclear blackmail, which would also look very bad on any country's behalf. All in all, it was definitely not something that America country should enforce or be proud of.

When a nation goes to war with another nation, the only combat used should be between the two armies….

From: Yakman
Consider these.

1. Dropping the second bomb on Nagasaki only 3 days after the first bomb simply cannot be justified. The Japanese government were very confused and in disarray after the first bomb dropped, they had no radio, telephone or any other means of contacting its people in Hiroshima. Their government officials had to fly to Hiroshima to see why all their links had gone down. 3 days simply wasn't enough to figure out what happened and issue a surrender.

2. There is quite a lot of talk here about using the bombs as a demonstration of power to make Japan surrender. If that is the case why not drop them in a deserted rural area? You get the same display of awesome power with no innocent lives lost.

1. Like i said, no one here was there. So looking in hind sight you could say "hey they did this all wrong" but when you're actually in a war the decisions are much less clear cut.

2. Suppose they did do that and Japan was like "FU you wouldn't actually attack us with that would you? Chicken…Chicken!". Then we go and do and Japan is still looking for an ass wooping. We just wasted our first bomb for nothing when we could have ended the war. Now we don't have any more bombs. That sucks.

From: kingarabian
When a nation goes to war with another nation, the only combat used should be between the two armies….

That's just silly. Why bother waste your armies lives when you could save many many more of them. Why bother using tanks. That will just defend my own troops and then it won't be army vs army.

i luffs yeww, I know what you mean. But there still were a few survivors mostly burned and scarred by the blast and radiation, along with with all their equipment destroyed they were no position to contact their central government.

From: Dan Cardin
1. Like i said, no one here was there. So looking in hind sight you could say "hey they did this all wrong" but when you're actually in a war the decisions are much less clear cut.

What a stupid argument. You could use exactly the same sentence to justify anything you wanted in war.
Hitler killing Jews? Well decisions in war are much less clear cut…
Saddam Hussain gassing his own people? None of us were there so…
Stalin sending millions to work camps? Its so easy to look in hindsight and say its wrong…

From: Dan Cardin

2. Suppose they did do that and Japan was like "FU you wouldn't actually attack us with that would you? Chicken…Chicken!". Then we go and do and Japan is still looking for an ass wooping. We just wasted our first bomb for nothing when we could have ended the war. Now we don't have any more bombs. That sucks.

What babble is this?
cause we all know that in a war everyone is a chicken and nobody attacks each other…

100,000 dead civilians are worth more then one atomic bomb that scientists could easily build again. If you disagree then you're a disgusting person.

I also happen to know that America had loads more bombs at the time.

From: Yakman
What a stupid argument. You could use exactly the same sentence to justify anything you wanted in war.
Hitler killing Jews? Well decisions in war are much less clear cut…
Saddam Hussain gassing his own people? None of us were there so…
Stalin sending millions to work camps? Its so easy to look in hindsight and say its wrong…

Well lets put you in an stressful, intense one time decision, where the outcome is all important and see what decisions you make. Then take you out of the situation, show you everything that happened and ask you to make those decisions from safety and whatnot. I very much doubt that you'll come to the same conclusions about what to do. Hindsight bias (though i don't know if this is really the actual definition for real hindsight bias…but it still rather fits the word choice.), when you're looking back at things, firstly you're not the person that made those decisions, and when you have no idea what they knew or were thinking about, is most definitely going to bias your conclusions now. If we put you in a maze where you aren't allowed to turn back, then later on showed you a video of the whole maze and which way you went, its a lot easier to tell which way was correct and which way wasn't.

From: Yakman
What babble is this?
cause we all know that in a war everyone is a chicken and nobody attacks each other…

that was my point. If you go attack a random place that no one is in, and say "hey japanese…we just launched a nuclear bomb. yea, so surrender". I doubt whether they'll believe you or whether that will deter them. Then you only have one left.

From: Yakman
100,000 dead civilians are worth more then one atomic bomb that scientists could easily build again. If you disagree then you're a disgusting person.

I also happen to know that America had loads more bombs at the time.

loads more nukes? I'd like to know where both of those facts came from.

We didn't have LOADS more. We had a few more.

From: Dan Cardin
Well lets put you in an stressful, intense one time decision, where the outcome is all important and see what decisions you make. Then take you out of the situation, show you everything that happened and ask you to make those decisions from safety and whatnot. I very much doubt that you'll come to the same conclusions about what to do. Hindsight bias (though i don't know if this is really the actual definition for real hindsight bias…but it still rather fits the word choice.), when you're looking back at things, firstly you're not the person that made those decisions, and when you have no idea what they knew or were thinking about, is most definitely going to bias your conclusions now. If we put you in a maze where you aren't allowed to turn back, then later on showed you a video of the whole maze and which way you went, its a lot easier to tell which way was correct and which way wasn't.

You haven't really explained why I have hindsight bias, you've only defined it and loosely tried to connect it to this case.
You're also wrong to imply that these decisions are spur-of-the-moment and impulsive. They are made in government and military boardrooms by clear-thinking generals and politicians. Not panicked laymen.

One reason my points still stand is because these decision-makers knew how much death and destruction their bombs would cause.

From: Dan Cardin

that was my point. If you go attack a random place that no one is in, and say "hey japanese…we just launched a nuclear bomb. yea, so surrender". I doubt whether they'll believe you or whether that will deter them. Then you only have one left.

This is rather silly and clearly shows you haven't thought about it at all.
If Japan were to see the total destruction of some valley somewhere they could easily imagine what would happen in one of their cities.

Let me try to put it this way in language you might understand better, if you see a black-belt karate master break a block of concrete, are you going to pick a fight with him? All it takes is if you imagine it was your head instead of the concrete.

From: Dan Cardin

loads more nukes? I'd like to know where both of those facts came from.

I read about them in a book but I managed to find this internet link for you.

From: http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/Sciences/Chemistry/NuclearChemistry/NuclearWeapons/FirstChainReaction/FirstNuclWeapons/AdditionalBombs.htm

The date that a third weapon could have been used against Japan was no later than August 20. The core was prepared by August 13, and Fat Man assemblies were already on Tinian Island. It would have required less than a week to ship the core and prepare a bomb for combat.

From: http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/Sciences/Chemistry/NuclearChemistry/NuclearWeapons/FirstChainReaction/FirstNuclWeapons/AdditionalBombs.htm
The three reactors (B and D which went started up for production in December 1944, and F which started up February 1945) at Hanford had a combined design thermal output of 750 megawatts and were theoretically capable of producing 19.4 kg of plutonium a month (6.5 kg/reactor), enough for over 3 Fat Man bombs.

3 fat man bombs a month.
Now you're probably going to say that a month is too long and you need the bombs tomorrow, but consider that America was not directly under attack. They had planned the nuking of Japan months in advance and waited years for atomic weapons to be developed. A month isn't very long on this timescale.

From: Dan Cardin

That's just silly. Why bother waste your armies lives when you could save many many more of them. Why bother using tanks. That will just defend my own troops and then it won't be army vs army.

Huh? America calls itself a democracy, and a country that has just, liberty, and all of that uber stuff. Why cant it go Army vs Army?

In WWII, America went into Europe to fight. How come America couldn't go into Japan, and fight the army there? Instead dropping an atomic bomb on two major cities filled with thousands of harmless people who were killed for doing nothing.

don't bring an army to a nuke fight, is what my old grand pappy used to say.

From: Brain
don't bring an army to a nuke fight, is what my old grand pappy used to say.

Was talking in general ;).

It seems the main issue in this thread is most people can not understand the fanaticism of the Japanese. Most everything said about the methods they employed and how they fought, etc, is true. If you believe otherwise, it is just because it sounds outlandish. But it's true.

So, Robot, I'm not really sure what you mean. Who are you agreeing with? Or what ideas? Sorry, I just woke up. :p

This thread is full of people dehumanising the Japanese.

Asserting, without any evidence, that every single Japanese person is a fanatic ready to harm America.

Further asserting (without evidence or arguments) that it is justified to kill all these people by raining fire blast and radiation from the sky just because they are supposedly fanatics ready to harm America.

Asserting that a nuke on a deserted island or plain would not have convinced the Japanese to surrender.

Asserting that the bomb on Hiroshima did not convince the Japanese to surrender, even though 3 days is simply not enough to stop being confused, survey the situation and come to a conclusion. Especially all the infrastructure destroyed.



Americans, back up your points! Now you seem to just have rhetoric, assertion and weak analogies.

(Its quite funny to have Americans talking about the Japanese being fanatical, indoctrinated, warmongering nationalists. It recalls to me an expression involving a Pot and a Kettle.)

Yakman, :<.

I don't think I portrayed the Japanese as inhuman, but if I did, I didn't mean to. I think that we (Americans) were much more brutal and terrible. They were just following their leader, like the deity they viewed him as, the same way that we follow ours. But their deity's ideology was different than ours, so we view them as wrong/terrible/idiotic people. And I think I said before that they followed their leader with honor. If they would've been told to love America, they would've. They weren't blood-thirsty warriors or anything. They were normal human beings who got in with the wrong crowd.

(And that's just from what I've read, and just talking about those who actually did follow whoever was the leader. Tojo or something? Or was that WWI? :p iono. But of course there were many who disagreed with both the leader of Japan at the time, and the war in general. Just like there are people in every country that do the same thing.)

:3 But this is most definitely off topic now, and should at least be moved to the Discussions and Debates section, as this homework was finished the day after I posted it. :p

They are not fanatics willing to harm America, at least not now. For quite a while they were, during WWII.

What I was saying was, yes, we pretty much would have had to kill everyone anyway. Japanese honor stated you must either die by the enemy or yourself, never surrender.

Apart from those codes (truthfully, they might not have always been followed), Japan mounted a massive propoganda campaign to instil fear into the population, especially those living on the archipelagos. Whole villages would be given grenades to commit suicide with (and were forced to attend) because "the raping Americans would come and torture you", those who did not commit suicide were enlisted to fight.

The fuckers had Kamikaze pilots. If someone is willing to serve as the guidance system for a bomb…

EDIT:

The Japanese would not have allowed a demonstration, much less have watched one. They had their time to be confused. The city was realized to be destroyed approximately five hours after the bombing. The emperor, however, did not wish to withdraw, and no forces were withdrawn, therefore, a second bomb was dropped.

From: Yakman
(Its quite funny to have Americans talking about the Japanese being fanatical, indoctrinated, warmongering nationalists. It recalls to me an expression involving a Pot and a Kettle.)

First, you chastise people for stereotyping, and then you do the exact same thing…

R0b0t1 you've posted no evidence at all.
What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence…


bullzeye95 I was talking about saying things without evidence, my post was not about stereotyping. this is me moving the goalposts, bullzeye95 is probably right about this

If you want evidence, go look it up. I feel no need to prove it to you.

Anyway, I am R0b0t1 and I am derailing this thread.

From: kingarabian
Huh? America calls itself a democracy, and a country that has just, liberty, and all of that uber stuff. Why cant it go Army vs Army?

In WWII, America went into Europe to fight. How come America couldn't go into Japan, and fight the army there? Instead dropping an atomic bomb on two major cities filled with thousands of harmless people who were killed for doing nothing.

that makes no sense. Why bother killing your own troops when you could save them.

Asserting that a nuke on a deserted island or plain would not have convinced the Japanese to surrender.

Asserting that the bomb on Hiroshima did not convince the Japanese to surrender, even though 3 days is simply not enough to stop being confused, survey the situation and come to a conclusion. Especially all the infrastructure destroyed.

afaik, the timeline goes. ask for unconditional surrender and receive a no. Test the bomb in new mexico. ask for unconditional surrender and receive a no. bomb. japanese newspapers are reporting that the city is destroyed. ask for unconditional surrender and receive a no. bomb again.