Would you have used the atom bomb on Japan in WWII if you were Prez?

I do. The mass killing of innocent people. We have done it more than once

 

Easy way to win a war.

 

"If Japan didn't surrender in 1945 ...

Quote Originally Posted by Vegas giants View Post

First wait. Then wait some more. Then wait longer. No deaths would be on our hands and it was what the generals thought was the best plan. But then we have your opinion. Lol

The first opinion above isn't mine, it's Vegas giants' - that's what I was responding to. I think he was advocating starving out IJ, without invading. & No, I would have dropped nukes on IJ, no question. & incendiaries, & anything else that came to mind that seemed likely to end the war - which was the point of the exercise.

 

You said "We wouldn't kill any more Japanese by our direct action, true enough, @ that point in time."
Even if we did not drop the bombs, we would have still prosecuted the war against Japan, so...

Just to rile people up and draw attention to himself.
Several likely reasons for that.

Certainly -- it's the only rational course of action.

 

Well, yeah. Except that the Imperial Japan Army was right there with us & UK & various European powers @ the Boxer Rebellion - & the IJA covered themselves in glory & the esteem of the European & US military & diplomats. They were brave & conscientious & gained an excellent reputation. (The IJN also slaughtered the Imperial Russian formation @ the Strait of Tsushima later on - another story.)

The IJA earned a reputation for restraint & obedience to orders. It was later, as IJ felt cheated of the spoils of conquest, that the IJ military began to leak arrogance to the junior officer corps, who began plotting to overthrow the government & run the entire country gang-style, with the Emperor as a front man.

 

We wouldn't have had to starve anyone. Just wait a couple of weeks

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We wouldn't have had to starve anyone. Just wait a couple of weeks

 

Absolutely ... But any discussion of the decision has to be taken with consideration as to what the Allies knew and believed at the time. The Japanese displayed a tragic fight-to-the-death culture during the war. Although it's difficult to imagine 1 million casualties, I could definitely see a few hundred thousands killed.

Personal story: My father spent most of the war in the Aleutian Islands. (Many people do not know the Japanese were on US territorial soil in the early stages of the Pacific war.) His unit was transferred to the Philippines at some point, and began training as part of the first wave planned to invade the Home Islands. As a combat engineer blowing up things like beach obstacles and anti-tank traps, my father would have been in one of the first waves to go ashore. Had that happened, I probably wouldn't be typing this today, 70 years later ...

 

Your father could have sat in his quonset hut on adak and played poker. All we needed to do was wait

 

Could have? Maybe ...
And how many more would have died while "waiting"?? How many Japanese civilians alone would have died of starvation as a blockade was used to sufficiently shrivel the Japanese?
IMHO, the costs in waiting - starvation, suffering, stationing a sufficient force to surround the entire Japanese archipelago, etc. etc. - would have been astronomical.

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Could have? Maybe ...
And how many more would have died while "waiting"?? How many Japanese civilians alone would have died of starvation as a blockade was used to sufficiently shrivel the Japanese?
IMHO, the costs in waiting - starvation, suffering, stationing a sufficient force to surround the entire Japanese archipelago, etc. etc. - would have been astronomical.

 

Spare me the tear filled mortality argument. When the US fights, we fight to win. And we do so with the desire to suffer as few casualties as possible while also inflicting maximum casualties to the enemy.

 

Never mind the moral imperative to win a war as quickly as it can be won, to reduce unnecessary casualties.
Months of additional bombing plus an invasion nets far more casualties than ending the war with the bomb.

 

And after those few weeks the soviets invade and turn Japan into a living hell hole and causing far far far FAR greater destruction and death then even 10 Hiroshimas combined, which would mean that instead of being the prosperous nation that it is today, it would be more like Nam or North Korea. Great alternative to just ending the war then and now.

 

I hope you shed a tear for the dead of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. ...all we had to do is wait

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The greatest military leaders this world has ever known disagReed with you

 

To be fair - the Soviet navy did not have capacity for a general invasion of Japan.

 

We didn't need to do a thing except wait

 

I understand those who tell people that to be enlightened they must constantly express hatred towards and about the United States and American traditions and values, but also must respect all other countries and peoples unless supported by the USA.

As I said, you do not understand the definition of genocide. Who are claiming the dropping of atom bombs on Japan was atrocities. It was not genocide, since both did not kill even 1% of the Japanese. HOWEVER, the Japanese Emperor was convinced that genocide by atom bombs was coming, so he promptly surrendered when we dropped the second atom bomb, proving we could produce them - thus saving millions of lives and preventing Stalin from enslaving Japan and Northern China.

The Confederacy definitely would have preferred you as president over Abraham Lincoln.

 

It was genocide. A war crime. And don't attack me personally unless you served in my unit with me son

 

Its called an indefinite cease fire to both allow Japan to rearm, Russia to continue to seize China - both killing Chinese - and to allow Stalin to then invade Japan.

Your argument is exactly the same argument that Confederates use to claim Abraham Lincoln was a mass murderer. The North should not have invaded the South. Rather, they should let the Confederacy be its own slave country and eventually slavery would come to an end. Do you fly a Confederate flag to protest the murderous United States for that reason too?

 

Rearm? Please tell me you are kidding? You think Japan was going to rearm? Now that is hilarious

 

Genocide and atrocity do not mean the same thing. Look it up. It was not a war crime by the USA whatsoever. Not evacuating those military industry cities of civilians after warning was a war crime against their own people by the Japanese government and military.

 

The winners are never charged with war crimes....even if they commit them

 

Indeed.
For the use of the atomic bombs to be a war crime, you must change a definition of the term to include it.

 

You are debating people including those who condemn everything the USA does or ever did - unless by President Obama or Hilary Clinton. At the core it has nothing to do with concerns for Japanese killed. It has to do with hating the United States.
Because both Obama and Hilary killed the Democratic Party liberalism, they have no problem calling all previous Democratic presidents mass murdering racists and bigots because the #1 premise of theirs the USA and Americans are the most evil people in the most evil country to ever exist. Thus, they insist that the USA was the aggressor with Japan and Germany innocent victims forced to try to defend themselves against evil America.

You'll come across that constantly on this from many of the so-called progressive Democratic members.

 

Your "greatest military leaders" wanted to drop atom bombs on Tokyo, China and Russia - and your wanna-be genocidal maniac wanting to start 2 nuclear wars (China and Russia) were thrown out of military command for it by our elected civilian leaders.

 

You simply can't stay on topic. To suggest they were not military geniuses is laughable. But we do have your opinion. Lol