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

Yes I've heard the excuses before against the difficulty of an invasion, but today it would be considered a War Crime under the Forth Geneva convention to do the same thing we did then. It's estimated that between 90,000 - 146,000 Japanese died in Hiroshima and the another 39,000 to 80,000 in Nagasaki; indiscriminately. But the Japanese had no Atomic bomb or ICBMs. All they had was a Navy and an Air Force to threaten the US homeland, that had to cross 6,000 miles of ocean to reach us. The fighting could have all be handled in International Waters without posing a threat to a single innocent civilian. And if we focused on just taking out the Japanese Navy they would have been screwed. We never had any need to invade. The real imminent threat in WWII was Italy and Germany. Fortunately Russia handled that.

 

Correct. The officer who planned the defense of Okinawa escaped the battle. His strategy used to inflict horrific casualties on the US invasion forces in Okinawa would have been amped up to include arming the civilian population to meet the invasion force. The bombs saved American lives and countless millions of Japanese lives.

 

So would the scores of incendiary raids that destroyed scores of Japanese cities.
Funny how everyone ignores the far greater loss of life and destruction of property in these conventional raids than the 2 bomb drops, combined.

 

The international laws of war have led to ever more savage warfare. They are obsolete. Japan had been developing weapons designed to exterminate entire populations from the start of their war with China. They were working actively to create nuclear weapons when the war ended.

“ Several historians have claimed Japan was days away from testing an atomic weapon in Nagoya when Hiroshima was obliterated by one American bomb on 6 August 1945.” Independent, UK, Japan was 'days away from test' of A-bomb, By David McNeill in Tokyo, 05 August 2002 .

 

The firebombing of Tokyo was very devastating. Link: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...omb-strike-killed-Nagasaki-single-attack.html . But, it didn't force the Japanese to surrender. Only after we had dropped two atomic bombs on Japan did it finally surrender. 'Nuff said....

 

Did you overlook the part where I said we never had any need to invade?

 

You did. How are you a competent judge?

Further: How does any of this this negate what I said?

 

Which is of course what the military experts also said

 

If I were Prez and it was time to nuke the enemy, I'd invite my wife in the room and we'd push the button together. It'd be romantic and badass.

 

The family that nukes together stays together.

 

Have a nice glass of whiskey, makeout with the wife for a bit, pop a cigar, then push the button together. It's the perfect date to reignite a marriage

 

The attack on Pear Harbor failed because starting a war with the US (& UK & France & Netherlands & Australia & Commonwealth) was an enormous strategic error - the kind of thing you never recover from. Tactically, in achieving the immediate goal of delaying the US response out of Hawaii, it succeeded. On every other count, it was a miserable failure, it silenced the America First faction, all the conservative GOP critics, all the Fortress America partisans, & enraged the US public.

This failure had nothing to do with the atomic program, which Pres. FDR had barely approved in Oct. 1941. We barely designed, built & tested the plutonium bomb in time to deploy it. The German atomic program stalled, they miscalculated the amount of U needed for a bomb core, & their efforts were spread over several programs, & they had a lot of financial & prestige infighting. The Soviets had to wait for the Manhattan Project to come to fruition - they had the physicists & etc., but not the material & resources to divert from conventional weapons, to devote to atomics.

US/Japan trade has run @ a US deficit for @ least a generation, I believe. Would Japan invade Korea & China? Japan didn't have the manpower nor firepower to prevail over China in the 1930s nor 1940s - & their demographics have gotten far worse than they were then. N. Korea alone - & certainly China - would likely lob any strategic weapons they have @ a Japanese invasion force or @ Japan itself, if the JSDF could be convinced to execute such orders.

As to the US nuclear arsenal, I believe we've vowed never to use nukes first. That doesn't preclude our use of nukes altogether, of course. The intent, I believe, was to remind the World that we've already used nuclear weapons twice.

 

Tell that to the relatives of the over 800 men killed on the USS Indianapolis after it had delivered the first atomic bomb.

Clearly you don't give a damn about our Ally China, whose civilians were being slaughtered by the millions.

Had the USA not entered the war against Germany in 1941 drawing off huge amounts of the German military and but for the USA supplying Russia, Germany would have rolled over Russia nearly as easily as it had France. Your last sentence confirms that your message overall is rooted in core contempt of the USA and the American military, doesn't it?

 

Once again, that is false. Every military "expert" actually involved was for it. In your grotesquely false messages you including "experts" you say much not be questioned who wanted to drop atomic bombs on China over Korea and on Russia over the Berlin blockade, plus the most pro-firebombing cities general of them all. There is no integrity in your message that you continue to repeat on this thread.

 

Flat out lie. Lets start with the navy leaders

In his memoirs Admiral William D. Leahy, the President's Chief of Staff--and the top official who presided over meetings of both the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Combined U.S.-U.K. Chiefs of Staff--minced few words:
(*)
[T]he 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. . . .
(*)
n being the first to use it, we . . . 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. (See p. 3, Introduction)
Privately, on June 18, 1945--almost a month before the Emperor's July intervention to seek an end to the war and seven weeks before the atomic bomb was used--Leahy recorded in his diary:
(*)
It is my opinion at the present time that a surrender of Japan can be arranged with terms that can be accepted by Japan and that will make fully satisfactory provisions for America's defense against future trans-Pacific aggression. (See p. 324, Chapter 26)
(*)
Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet stated in a public address given at the Washington Monument on October 5, 1945:
(*)
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. (See p. 329, Chapter 26) . . . [Nimitz also stated: "The atomic bomb played no decisive part, from a purely military standpoint, in the defeat of Japan. . . ."]
In a private 1946 letter to Walter Michels of the Association of Philadelphia Scientists, Nimitz observed that "the decision to employ the atomic bomb on Japanese cities was made on a level higher than that of the Joint Chiefs of Staff." (See pp. 330-331, Chapter 26)
(*)
Admiral William F. Halsey, Jr., Commander U.S. Third Fleet, stated publicly in 1946:
(*)
The first atomic bomb was an unnecessary experiment. . . . It was a mistake to ever drop it. . . . [the scientists] had this toy and they wanted to try it out, so they dropped it. . . . It killed a lot of Japs, but the Japs had put out a lot of peace feelers through Russia long before. (See p. 331, Chapter 26)
(*)
Time-Life editor Henry R. Luce later recalled that during a May-June 1945 tour of the Pacific theater:
(*)
. . . I spent a morning at Cavite in the Philippines with Admiral Frank Wagner in front of huge maps. Admiral Wagner was in charge of air search-and-patrol of all the East Asian seas and coasts. He showed me that in all those millions of square miles there was literally not a single target worth the powder to blow it up; there were only junks and mostly small ones at that.
(*)
Similarly, I dined one night with Admiral [Arthur] Radford [later Joint Chiefs Chairman, 1953-57] on the carrier Yorktown leading a task force from Ulithi to bomb Kyushu, the main southern island of Japan. Radford had invited me to be alone with him in a tiny room far up the superstructure of the Yorktown, where not a sound could be heard. Even so, it was in a whisper that he turned to me and said: "Luce, don't you think the war is over?" My reply, of course, was that he should know better than I. For his part, all he could say was that the few little revetments and rural bridges that he might find to bomb in Kyushu wouldn't begin to pay for the fuel he was burning on his task force. (See pp. 331-332, Chapter 26)
(*)
The Under-Secretary of the Navy, Ralph Bard, formally dissented from the Interim Committee's recommendation to use the bomb against a city without warning. In a June 27, 1945 memorandum Bard declared:
(*)
Ever since I have been in touch with this program I have had a feeling that before the bomb is actually used against Japan that Japan should have some preliminary warning for say two or three days in advance of use. The position of the United States as a great humanitarian nation and the fair play attitude of our people generally is responsible in the main for this feeling.
(*)
During recent weeks I have also had the feeling very definitely that the Japanese government may be searching for some opportunity which they could use as a medium of surrender. Following the three-power conference emissaries from this country could contact representatives from Japan somewhere on the China Coast and make representations with regard to Russia's position and at the same time give them some information regarding the proposed use of atomic power, together with whatever assurances the President might care to make with regard to the Emperor of Japan and the treatment of the Japanese nation following unconditional surrender. It seems quite possible to me that this presents the opportunity which the Japanese are looking for.
(*)
I don't see that we have anything in particular to lose in following such a program. The stakes are so tremendous that it is my opinion very real consideration should be given to some plan of this kind. I do not believe under present circumstances existing that there is anyone in the country whose evaluation of the chances of the success of such a program is worth a great deal. The only way to find out is to try it out. (See pp. 225-226, Chapter 1
(*)
Rear Admiral L. Lewis Strauss, special assistant to the Secretary of the Navy from 1944 to 1945 (and later chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission), replaced Bard on the Interim Committee after he left government on July 1. Subsequently, Strauss repeatedly stated his belief that the use of the atomic bomb "was not necessary to bring the war to a successful conclusion. . . ." (See p. 332, Chapter 26) Strauss recalled:
(*)
I proposed to Secretary Forrestal at that time that the weapon should be demonstrated. . . . 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 the Japanese observers, and where its effects would be dramatic. I remember suggesting that a good place--satisfactory place for such a demonstration would be a large forest of cryptomaria [sic] trees not far from Tokyo. The cryptomaria tree is the Japanese version of our redwood. . . . I anticipated that a bomb detonated at a suitable height above such a forest . . . would [have] laid the trees out in windrows from the center of the explosion in all directions as though they had been 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, their fortifications at will. . . . (See p. 333, Chapter 26)
(*)
In a private letter to Navy historian Robert G. Albion concerning a clearer assurance that the Emperor would not be displaced, Strauss observed:
(*)
This was omitted from the Potsdam declaration and as you are undoubtedly aware was the only reason why it was not immediately accepted by the Japanese who were beaten and knew it before the first atomic bomb was dropped. (See p. 393, Chapter 31)
(*)
In his "third person" autobiography (co-authored with Walter Muir Whitehill) the commander in chief of the U.S. Fleet and chief of Naval Operations, Ernest J. King, stated:
(*)
The President in giving his approval for these [atomic] attacks appeared to believe that many thousands of American troops would be killed in invading Japan, and in this he was entirely correct; but King felt, as he had pointed out many times, that the dilemma was an unnecessary one, for had we been willing to wait, the effective naval blockade would, in the course of time, have starved the Japanese into submission through lack of oil, rice, medicines, and other essential materials. (See p. 327, Chapter 26)
(*)
Private interview notes taken by Walter Whitehill summarize King's feelings quite simply as: "I didn't like the atom bomb or any part of it." (See p. 329, Chapter 26; See also pp. 327-329)
(*)
As Japan faltered in July an effort was made by several top Navy officials--almost certainly including Secretary Forrestal himself--to end the war without using the atomic bomb. Forrestal made a special trip to Potsdam to discuss the issue and was involved in the Atlantic Charter broadcast. Many other top Admirals criticized the bombing both privately and publicly. (Forrestal, see pp. 390-392, Chapter 31; p. 398, Chapter 31) (Strauss, see p. 333, Chapter 26; pp. 393-394, Chapter 31) (Bard, see pp. 225-227, Chapter 18; pp. 390-391, Chapter 31)

- - - Updated - - -

Now lets see what airforce leaders had to say

Air Force Leaders

(Partial listing:
See Chapter 27 for an extended discussion)
(*)
The commanding general of the U.S. Army Air Forces, Henry H. "Hap" Arnold, gave a strong indication of his views in a public statement only eleven days after Hiroshima was attacked. Asked on August 17 by a New York Times reporter whether the atomic bomb caused Japan to surrender, Arnold said:
(*)
The Japanese position was hopeless even before the first atomic bomb fell, because the Japanese had lost control of their own air. (See p. 334, Chapter 27)
In his 1949 memoirs Arnold observed that "it always appeared to us that, atomic bomb or no atomic bomb, the Japanese were already on the verge of collapse." (See p. 334, Chapter 27)
(*)
Arnold's deputy, Lieutenant General Ira C. Eaker, summed up his understanding this way in an internal military history interview:
(*)
Arnold's view was that it [the dropping of the atomic bomb] was unnecessary. He said that he knew the Japanese wanted peace. There were political implications in the decision and Arnold did not feel it was the military's job to question it. (See p. 335, Chapter 27)
Eaker reported that Arnold told him:
(*)
When the question comes up of whether we use the atomic bomb or not, my view is that the Air Force will not oppose the use of the bomb, and they will deliver it effectively if the Commander in Chief decides to use it. But it is not necessary to use it in order to conquer the Japanese without the necessity of a land invasion. (See p. 335, Chapter 27)
[Eaker also recalled: "That was the representation I made when I accompanied General Marshall up to the White House" for a discussion with Truman on June 18, 1945.]
(*)
On September 20, 1945 the famous "hawk" who commanded the Twenty-First Bomber Command, Major General Curtis E. LeMay (as reported in The New York Herald Tribune) publicly:
(*)
said flatly at one press conference that the atomic bomb "had nothing to do with the end of the war." He said the war would have been over in two weeks without the use of the atomic bomb or the Russian entry into the war. (See p. 336, Chapter 27)
The text of the press conference provides these details:
(*)
LeMay: The war would have been over in two weeks without the Russians entering and without the atomic bomb.
The Press: You mean that, sir? Without the Russians and the atomic bomb?
. . .
LeMay: The atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war at all.
(See p. 336, Chapter 27)
On other occasions in internal histories and elsewhere LeMay gave even shorter estimates of how long the war might have lasted (e.g., "a few days"). (See pp. 336-341, Chapter 27)
(*)
Personally dictated notes found in the recently opened papers of former Ambassador to the Soviet Union Averell Harriman describe a private 1965 dinner with General Carl "Tooey" Spaatz, who in July 1945 commanded the U.S. Army Strategic Air Force (USASTAF) and was subsequently chief of staff of U.S. Air Forces. Also with them at dinner was Spaatz's one-time deputy commanding general at USASTAF, Frederick L. Anderson. Harriman privately noted:
(*)
Both men . . . felt Japan would surrender without use of the bomb, and neither knew why the second bomb was used. (See p. 337, Chapter 27)
Harriman's notes also recall his own understanding:
(*)
I know this attitude is correctly described, because I had it from the Air Force when I was in Washington in April '45. (See p. 337, Chapter 27)
(*)
In an official 1962 interview Spaatz stated that he had directly challenged the Nagasaki bombing:
(*)
I thought that if we were going to drop the atomic bomb, drop it on the outskirts--say in Tokyo Bay--so that the effects would not be as devastating to the city and the people. I made this suggestion over the phone between the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings and I was told to go ahead with our targets. (See p. 345, Chapter 27)
(*)
Spaatz insisted on receiving written orders before going forward with the atomic bombings in 1945. Subsequently, Lieutenant General Thomas Handy, Marshall's deputy chief of staff, recalled:
(*)
Well, Tooey Spaatz came in . . . he said, "They tell me I am supposed to go out there and blow off the whole south end of the Japanese Islands. I've heard a lot about this thing, but my God, I haven't had a piece of paper yet and I think I need a piece of paper." "Well," I said, "I agree with you, Tooey. I think you do," and I said, "I guess I'm the fall guy to give it to you." (pp. 344-345, Chapter 27)
In 1962 Spaatz himself recalled that he gave "notification that I would not drop an atomic bomb on verbal orders--they had to be written--and this was accomplished." (p. 345, Chapter 27)
Spaatz also stated that
(*)
The dropping of the atomic bomb was done by a military man under military orders. We're supposed to carry out orders and not question them. (See p. 345, Chapter 27)
In a 1965 Air Force oral history interview Spaatz stressed: "That was purely a political decision, wasn't a military decision. The military man carries out the order of his political bosses." (See p. 345, Chapter 27)
(*)
Air Force General Claire Chennault, the founder of the American Volunteer Group (the famed "Flying Tigers")--and Army Air Forces commander in China--was even more blunt: A few days after Hiroshima was bombed The New York Times reported Chennault's view that:
(*)
Russia's entry into the Japanese war was the decisive factor in speeding its end and would have been so even if no atomic bombs had been dropped. . . . (See pp. 335-336, Chapter 27)

 

How about the army?

Army Leaders

(Partial listing:
See Chapter 28 for an extended discussion)
(*)
On the 40th Anniversary of the bombing former President Richard M. Nixon reported that:
(*)
[General Douglas] MacArthur once spoke to me very eloquently about it, pacing the floor of his apartment in the Waldorf. He thought it a tragedy that the Bomb was ever exploded. MacArthur believed that the same restrictions ought to apply to atomic weapons as to conventional weapons, that the military objective should always be limited damage to noncombatants. . . . MacArthur, you see, was a soldier. He believed in using force only against military targets, and that is why the nuclear thing turned him off. . . . (See p. 352, Chapter 2
(*)
The day after Hiroshima was bombed MacArthur's pilot, Weldon E. Rhoades, noted in his diary:
(*)
General MacArthur definitely is appalled and depressed by this Frankenstein monster [the bomb]. I had a long talk with him today, necessitated by the impending trip to Okinawa. . . . (See p. 350, Chapter 2
(*)
Former President Herbert Hoover met with MacArthur alone for several hours on a tour of the Pacific in early May 1946. His diary states:
(*)
I told MacArthur of my memorandum of mid-May 1945 to Truman, that peace could be had with Japan by which our major objectives would be accomplished. MacArthur said that was correct and that we would have avoided all of the losses, the Atomic bomb, and the entry of Russia into Manchuria. (See pp. 350-351, Chapter 2
(*)
Saturday Review of Literature editor Norman Cousins also later reported that MacArthur told him he saw no military justification for using the atomic bomb, and that "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." (See p. 351, Chapter 2
(*)
In an article reprinted in 1947 by Reader's Digest, Brigadier General Bonner Fellers (in charge of psychological warfare on MacArthur's wartime staff and subsequently MacArthur's military secretary in Tokyo) stated:
(*)
Obviously . . . the atomic bomb neither induced the Emperor's decision to surrender nor had any effect on the ultimate outcome of the war." (See p. 352, Chapter 2
(*)
Colonel Charles "Tick" Bonesteel, 1945 chief of the War Department Operations Division Policy Section, subsequently recalled in a military history interview: "[T]he poor damn Japanese were putting feelers out by the ton so to speak, through Russia. . . ." (See p. 359, Chapter 2
(*)
Brigadier Gen. Carter W. Clarke, the officer in charge of preparing MAGIC intercepted cable summaries in 1945, stated in a 1959 interview:
(*)
we brought them [the Japanese] down to an abject surrender through the accelerated sinking of their merchant marine and hunger alone, and 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. (See p. 359, Chapter 2
(*)

 

HIGHEST RANKING ARMY OFFICE, General Marshall

General George C. Marshall was the U.S. Army Chief of Staff during WWII, the highest ranking U.S. Army officer. He had known of the atomic bomb project at least as far back as Oct. 1941, when he was appointed to the small group which would oversee the project, the Top Policy Group. After WWII, Marshall was a staunch defender of the atomic bombings (Larry I. Bland, editor,(*)George C. Marshall: Interviews and Reminiscences for Forrest C. Pogue).

http://www.doug-long.com/marshall.htm

Claiming the Japanese were going to surrender is as accurate as claiming Donald Trump would never run for President.

In fact, the Japanese has outright REFUSED our offer of surrender. This was our offer:

The elimination "for all time of the authority and influence of those who have deceived and misled the people of Japan into embarking on world conquest"
the(*)occupation of "points in Japanese territory to be designated(*)by the(*)Allies"
that the "Japanese sovereignty shall be limited to the islands of(*)Honshu,(*)Hokkaido,(*)Kyushu,(*)Shikoku, and such minor islands as we determine," as had been announced in the(*)Cairo Declaration(*)in 1943.[3]
that "the Japanese(*)military forces, after being completely disarmed, shall be permitted to return to their homes with the opportunity to lead peaceful and productive lives."
that "we do not intend that the Japanese shall be enslaved as a race or destroyed as a nation, but stern justice shall be meted out to all(*)war criminals, including those who have visited cruelties upon our prisoners."
On the other hand, the declaration offered that:
"The Japanese Government shall remove all obstacles to the revival and strengthening of democratic tendencies among the Japanese people.(*)Freedom of speech,(*)of religion, and(*)of thought, as well as respect for the(*)fundamental(*)human rights(*)shall be established."
"Japan shall be permitted to maintain such industries as will sustain her economy and permit the exaction of just reparations in kind, but not those which would enable her to rearm for war. To this end, access to, as distinguished from control of, raw materials shall be permitted. Eventual Japanese participation in world trade relations shall be permitted."
"The occupying forces of the Allies shall be withdrawn from Japan as soon as these objectives have been accomplished and there has been established, in accordance with the freely expressed will of the Japanese people, a peacefully inclined and responsible government."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potsdam_Declaration

“After Japanese leaders flatly rejected the Potsdam Declaration, President Truman authorized use of the atomic bomb anytime after August 3, 1945.(*)“

https://www.trumanlibrary.org/teacher/abomb.htm


The U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff estimated that an invasion of Japan’s home islands would result in approximately 1.2 million total American casualties, with 267,000 killed.(*) A study performed by physicist (and future Nobel Laureate) William Shockley for the staff of Secretary of War Henry Stimson(*)estimated(*)that the invasion of Japan would cost 1.7-4 million American casualties, including 400,000-800,000 fatalities, and five to ten million Japanese deaths.
These fatality estimates were in addition to the members of the military who had already perished during four long years of war; American deaths were already about 292,000.(*) In other words,(*)the invasion of Japan could have resulted in the death of twice as many Americans as had already been killed in the European and Pacific theaters of WWII up to that time!

https://www.forbes.com/sites/henrym...a-military-and-moral-imperative/#24f80ffd5269

The Japanese Emperor gave exactly ONE reason he surrendered - the atom bomb. The atom bombs ended the war that was still mass killing people - mostly in China, but also Americans, Allies and POWs.

Even without invasion, the Japanese were still killing Americans, still killing Allies, still torturing and murdering our prisoners, and still slaughtering the Chinese by the tens of thousands - none of which you have voiced any concerns about whatsoever. By your messages you would have no objection to 100,000,000 Chinese killed, all our POWs murdered, and continued sinking of US and Allies ships. There is endless reminders of the German holocaust - but it is a far 2nd place to the level of deaths and atrocities that were ongoing by the Japanese against the Chinese, as had been by the Japanese against civilians everywhere they occupied. All you care about is condemnations of the USA on this topic and virtually any other topic. Hating the USA - the PC correct view of progressivism.

Yes, there were Generals/Admirals who did not want the war to end because there always are - because with it ended their glory, their power and their jobs. So they say "we didn't need the atom bomb because we had ME! and I will win the war - soon." Nothing new about that. Americans were constantly told we were winning in Vietnam and North Vietnam was going to surrender. We are continually told ISIS will soon be defeated by generals - who want to be generals in wars forever. They all claiming THEY are winning the war and the enemy is going to surrender - soon. Month after month, year after year.

McArthur wanted to drop nuclear bombs on China. LeMay wanted to drop nuclear bombs on China and Russia. Both fired and later recanted AFTER fired for being maniacs saying actually they were against the atom bomb, both having advocated and ordered massive bombing and firebomb of cities - killing hundreds of thousands.

 

Actually, the plan was to use 12 nuclear weapons.

And, yes, I would have used all 12 to force an unconditional surrender upon the Japanese, if necessary.

If the goal of any conflict is to minimize US casualties, then use of nuclear weapons was just and proper.

According to the memo, three to four nuclear weapons would be ready by the end of September, with another three weapons ready by the end of October. That would make a total of 10 nuclear weapons used before the invasion of Kyushu Island began November 1.

 

Sure I'll have that conversation with the families of the 800 men killed on the Indianapolis if you're will to have an equal conversation with the families of a quarter million Japanese we killed indiscriminately. This is how I'd start my conversation, "I am deeply sadden by you lose today. It is unimaginable to even pretend to understand the pain of that lose by any parent or loved one left behind to deal with such an absence. To deal with the nagging question of what they could have become. Some cannot even deal with the thought of it at all, some won't. But if you'd like help rationalizing the comparison between what was done to your loved ones by the Japanese Government and what our government did in reply you first have to understand that your sons and daughters were a military target not a civilian one. I'm sure that doesn't make coping with you lose any easier but it should help put into proper perspective your anger vs your compassion.

 

Summary of what you wrote: "You must accept that while we were at war because Japan attacked us, you must accept that those working in the Japanese war industry had more of a right to life than your evil American relatives."

My statement would be much simpler:

"Your relatives were warned prior to the bombing to get out of that war industry city, but decided to remain anyway, unlike the men aboard the Indianapolis given no warning whatsoever or give the right to choose between living and dying."

 

They were warned, how, and told to go where, and by what means, and by what time, and method? Can you imagine the process of evacuating a place like New Your City, Chicago, or Washington DC based on some leaflet that fell like confetti from the sky that you just happened to pick up and read? Can you imagine how easily it would be to invade the uninvadible if you could simply evacuate the population in advance by some simplistic method? ISIS is constantly warning the US population to curb the actions of of Government or accept the consequence, so if we fail to take those "warnings" hastily also wouls ISIS be absolved of any accountability? If would we did qualifies as reasonable then why do we find it unreasonable for anyone else to do the same?

 

That message is so ignorant of the facts it is absurd. We had been firebombing Japanese cities massively for many months and Japan and the USA had been at war for 4 years. Such levels of absurdity in messages comes out of a desperate desire to trash the USA and Americans.

Neither you nor Ronstar have explained your unconditional love of the Japanese over all other people and your rabid hatred of the Chinese in your messages. 20,000,000 Chinese were killed and were still being slaughtered - which obviously by your messages you are just fine with. Why?

 

The Chinese are not our allies today, and you're probably correct that the reason for that is because we didn't do more to push back the Japanese in WWII and in the end Japan became our ally. I'm not pro-Japan or anti-China. I'm just stating some simple facts that Japan is an Island. You still have not addressed any of the questions that I asked about where they should go, when they should be out, and why they should comply. So why don't you explain to me why you are so particularly so anti-Japanese? If you tell me your Korean (particularly now North Korean) then I'll buy that for a dollar, but you're waving a US flag. And please don't try to tell me that you were in Pear Harbor that day.

 

There are some that hate America so vehemently that the facts and truth don't matter.

 

I did not answer because your example of ISIS threats has NO comparison to Japan's situation in WW2.

IF the USA had NO air defense and if American cities were being massively bombed and firebombed by an enemy we were at war with - 2 HUGE IFs - then Americans should vacate any city they are warned is imminently going to be totally obliterated upon such notice. Where they should go would be where our government advises to go. They should comply so they are not killed in the bombing.

In fact, it is not rare for their to be a bomb threat against a school or other location and it is our practice to ALWAYS vacate that location entirely.