One thing I think we all can agree on, regarding the A-bomb and Hiroshima/Nagasaki

[Archae]

We saw the total horror of those two (now considered small) bombs.

And we never used nuclear weapons in war again.

[RandomThoughts]

1. I agree with that. Although the event is sad.

In a temporal story I was going to write, the reason nobody been able to fix WW2 is it is time locked with nuke development.

Note that I do not believe in temporal lore.

[ZombieHorde]

2. The majority of people killed by those bombs had nothing to do with the war.

Group A declared war, and we attacked group B.

eta, Recommended.

[canetoad]

3. That's the tragedy of war ZH

From Dresden, to the Blitz, to Hiroshima and Nagasaki and everywhere else that civilians are annihilated. It's one pack of warmongers pressuring another by wreaking death and destruction on the ordinary folk.

[givemebackmycountry]

4. Gee...

That sounds familiar.

[ZombieHorde]

15. Yes, it is familiar. nt

[proteus_lives]

6. Those people were in the war.

They were contributing to the Japanese war effort.

Group A and B were the same.

[ZombieHorde]

14. Children, the impoverished, the bed ridden, pregnant women, pacifists,

doctors, infants, etc.

[proteus_lives]

16. Soldiers, workers, slave laborers, machinists, technicians,

Total war. It's not a good thing for anyone.

Perhaps the Japanese should have thought of that before they set the machine in motion.

[ZombieHorde]

19. A minority of Japanese set the Japanese war machine into motion though.

Many of those we intentionally killed by dropping those bombs had no say. Many of those people were truly innocent of the atrocities. I would guess many of the people, especially children, did not know the atrocities were taking place.

[proteus_lives]

23. And Germans had no idea about the camps.

:eyes:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

26. Well, then next time an Islamic extremist kills American civilians because of

what the U.S. government is doing in the Middle East, that will be OK with you?

Those killed at Hiroshima and Nagasaki were as much "guilty" of Japan's war atrocities as the average American is of U.S. atrocities in the Middle East.

By the way, I had relatives who were in Germany in World War II. The control over information was so tight (just radio, print media, and movies in those days, no TV or Internet, and most Germans had only an eighth-grade education) that my relatives, who lived in East Prussia, did not realize that Germany was losing the war until they heard distant artillery fire and saw the refugees streaming through their town fleeing the advancing Soviet troops. Hearing what the refugees were saying, they threw some belongings into suitcases, walked right out of their house, and never returned.

[proteus_lives]

27. That comparison doesn't work.

Since those civilians aren't involved with a total war with the Islamic extremists.

Open and total war is very different then guerrilla/police actions our nation is facing today.

Your relatives may not have been aware that Germany was losing the war but surely they were aware that Jews, political dissents, people who spoke publicly against Hitler's regime had been disappearing for a long time. I doubt your relatives believed they been sent to a summer camp.

Your relatives were right to flee from the Soviet army. I've read about what the Red Army did to East Prussia.

[ZombieHorde]

29. What is total war? nt

[proteus_lives]

30. Total War:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_war

[ZombieHorde]

28. You are partially right, not all Germans knew about the camps. nt

[PDJane]

5. DU is a nuclear weapon.

You're still using them. The original premise is faulty.

[MajorChode]

7. So by your definition...

If I hurl a chunk of granite (which is about as radioactive as DU, BTW) through my neighbor's window, I have started a nuclear war.

Got it.

This is what the vast majority of people north of a room temperature IQ would call a nuclear weapon:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon

Hope that helps.

Cheers!

[PDJane]

9. That's a ridiculous analogy.

Grantite isn't toxic all by itself, granite doesn't burn on impact, granite doesn't break into inhalable particles, and it doesn't cause cancers and birth defects or destroy the environment.

I know what most Americans think is a nuclear weapon; that doesn't negate the fact that you are still using a very destructive nuclear weapon in the form of DU. You're tossing around a very toxic heavy metal which has the addition of radioactivity. It is still a nuclear weapon, sorry to break it to you.

[MajorChode]

11. It was intended to be a ridiculous analogy

It was designed to demonstrate the ridiculous nature of your post.

If you want to continue to call DU a "nuclear weapon" and demonstrate your absurdity, don't let me stop you. Feel free to hijack someone else's thread and go on all the rants you want.

I'm just enjoying the show. :popcorn:

Cheers!

[boppers]

13. Do not throw broccoli, as it is radioactive!

WTH happened to science classes in the US?

"Grantite isn't toxic all by itself,"
Wrong, granite contains radioactive materials, and if you inhaled as little as a pound of granite, you would die.

"granite doesn't burn on impact,"
Wrong, all matter oxygenates at high velocity.

"granite doesn't break into inhalable particles,"
Wrong, all matter breaks into particles at high velocity.

"and it doesn't cause cancers and birth defects or destroy the environment."
Wrong, our environment is bathed in radiation, granite is no exception.

And the totally laughable fallacy your post has:
All atoms (save for hydrogen) have a complex nucleus. That nucleus decays. By your logic, all matter, save for hydrogen, is a nuclear weapon.

[MajorChode]

22. You forgot this one...

"You're tossing around a very toxic heavy metal which has the addition of radioactivity."

One could say the same thing about lead, which has been tossed around for at least the last 700 years.

[Ken Burch]

8. You're not expecting the rest of us to agree with the idea

That getting the chance to see the misery and horror inflicted by the bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki somehow VINDICATED dropping the bombs, are you?

That's the most morally twisted brand of pretzel logic I've ever heard.

There was no reason to drop those bombs. Japan had already made it clear that it was ready to surrender.

[MajorChode]

12. I think you're reading too much into it

You can certainly make the argument there was no reason to drop the bombs, but saying that Japan had already "made it clear that it was ready to surrender" is not historically accurate.

It has been suggested that Japan may have surrendered without the dropping of the two bombs or an invasion, but this assumes the US firebombing campaign would have continued which actually caused more death and destruction than the two nukes ever did.

[Ozymanithrax]

10. We just never needed to...but we came close n/t

[denbot]

17. Ignition in 3,2,..1 The irony is that dropping Little Boy and Fat Man saved civilian lives.

If we had invaded the Japanese mainland conventionally it would have been like Okinawa on an even more sickening scale. The Imperial Japanese Armed Forces would have NEVER surrendered otherwise. WWII Japan had 70,000,000 civilians. If Okinawa's 25% civilian casualty rate was any indication of the civilian costs of a mainland invasion 25% would equal 17,500,000 deaths.

Flame away.

[EFerrari]

18. They were already negotiating via the Russians. n/t

[denbot]

20. The Imperial Japanese Armed Forces were more concerned with securing material help from Russia.

They were trying to offer peace to Russia to stave off the impending American invasion. Soviet Russia did not have the ability to launch an effective landing assault on the Japanese mainland. If they could secure their rear with a peace offer, the Imperial Japanese forces would have used the breathing room to prepare for our invasion.

[MajorChode]

21. Furthermore the Japanese abassador...

was specifically forbidden from entertaining the subject of unconditional surrender. So certainly the Japanese were more than willing to surrender. They knew the war for them was over in 1943. They were using the 2 million mainland troops, the 5,000 Kamikaze aircraft, and the arming of civilians as leverage against unfavorable terms of surrender.

[denbot]

24. The Americans would have not accepted anything less then total surrender.

The Japanese Military would have eagerly used all their leverage before accepting defeat. They were very confident that they could inflict demoralizing casualties on invading forces, and gain leverage for surrender on their terms. After the fall of Saipan the Imperial Japanese Army began planning for a homeland invasion, one being the "Ketsu Operation". Their levels of defenses included women with bamboo spears, and school children. As unbelievable this seems to us, most women and children would have been honored to defend their home, and emperor to the death.

If it wasn't for unprecedented power of the atomic bombs, any attempts to make peace without the military's approval would have met with executions up to and including Emperor Hirohito. They would have never surrendered unconditionally, and we would have never accepted anything less then unconditional surrender.

We really had no other choice.

[MajorChode]

25. I'm not sure I can go along with having no other choice

It's just that the alternatives weren't any better.