# Atomic Bombings of Japan **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 24, 2009, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803 "2009-11-24T17:52:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2009, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/141 "2009-11-25T20:21:49Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > I read the Japanese did not teach Pearl Harbor as part of their history classes. They did not want to make their country look bad. We do the same with our defense of the bomb. Possibly I’m misunderstanding you, here; while it may be the case that the Japanese don’t teach Pearl Harbor, surely we teach (a) that we bombed Hiroshima, and then (b) since bombing Hiroshima _ **wasn’t** _ unnecessary and cruel enough to actually cause a surrender, we bombed Nagasaki – which finally rose to the level of “good enough”, just like Hiroshima _ **didn’t?** _ > [@](#): > > It is hard to admit what we did was unnecessary and cruel. When the hit isn’t hard enough to actually get the job done, it’s danged near _ **impossible** _ to admit that we did too much. There’s a reason we needed to drop that second bomb after they voted to continue the war: the first bomb didn’t even rise to the level of “necessary” on its own, and so _ **couldn’t** _ pass into “unnecessary” territory. ---
**Author:** ![Tristan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tristan/32/18058_2.png) [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2009, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/142 "2009-11-25T21:48:45Z")
**gonzomax** is making the usual fallacy of looking at historical events with a “modern” perspective. We know now that atomic bombs are horrible, awful weapons. And we spent 50 years living in fear of them being used again. It is a permanent scar on the psyche of all who were children during the Cold War. But at the time, in that context, using the morality of the day, it was going to happen. And we can look back and debate it today (or not debate, in the case of the OP). But it happened. We spent 4 long years fighting a foe who gave every sign of not being willing to surrender. Who had a doctrine of “Fight to the last man, and the last man kills himself!” in their war methodology. This, combined with the fact that bombing raids on Japan had already occured that caused equal damage, with higher fatalities, makes the use of the A-bomb kind of a no-brainer. Were **gonzomax** a soldier at the time, he would be just as grateful as the rest of them that he wasn’t going to have to face fanatical wave charges of defending soldiers and civilians. Hell, there was a story that came out a while back about a guy who was at Hiroshima when the balloon went up. HE was horribly burned, but avoided radiation sickness. After getting bandaged, it took him 3 days to make his way to his new job position, where he reported to his boss and apologized for being late. His new job was at Nagasaki. The mere fact that a non-fighting citizen survived a nuclear blast, then went to work immediately after the fact, should tell you all you need to know about the dedication and determination of the Japanese people. No WAY were they going to surrender without being forced to. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2009, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/143 "2009-11-25T23:02:49Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Who had that goal? The bomb was an anti civilian weapon of the highest order. We killed 100 thousand civilians in an instant. > I read the Japanese did not teach Pearl Harbor as part of their history classes. They did not want to make their country look bad. We do the same with our defense of the bomb. It is hard to admit what we did was unnecessary and cruel. Any war is sanitized by the politicians and historians of the country. The children are taught what we want them to believe. It is expected. It was a bomb like any other bomb. Whether we used it to kill 100,000 civilians quickly or kill 100,000 in conventional ordinance bombing is indistinguishable except the horror of it would have been ongoing. As to how history is portrayed your statement makes no sense. If Japanese school children are not taught about Pearl Harbor that is not comparable to how the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is portrayed. We do not hide the event. The fact that you feel it was unnecessary and cruel is a function of your opinion and does not bare up to the reality that this was a country that used school girls to build terror weapons and prisoners for live vivisections. They would have fought from island to island with the mindset that their own civilians should kill themselves rather than surrender. The death toll would have been substantial and the horrors of war would have ground on for months with no relief. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2009, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/144 "2009-11-25T23:05:16Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > We do the same with our defense of the bomb. Yeah, you’re right - American history doesn’t even _mention_ the use of atomic weapons. No, wait, the other thing… you’re completely laughably ludicrously amazingly wrong. ---
**Author:** ![hansel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6bbea6/32.png) [@hansel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hansel)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2009, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/145 "2009-11-25T23:07:05Z")
I don’t find the argument “you have to judge them by the standards of the day” to be very compelling. By that argument, slavery wasn’t an awful thing until the public tide turned against it, at which point the slow-movers _came to be_ in the wrong about it. The error that people like Gonzomax make isn’t arguing with contemporary morality, it’s arguing with contemporary hindsight. The question isn’t whether Japan would have surrendered without the bombing. The question is how reasonable/moral the decision seemed _at the time_, when U.S. forces had fought Okinawa and Iwo Jima and seen the determination of the defenders; when they were aware that the Japanese were trying to negotiate a completely unacceptable surrender; when their collectively strong experience of fighting led them to project half a million casualties for their side alone in an invasion of the home islands, and when the horrors of atomic weapons beyond a really big boom were little known and less understood. The decision to drop the atomic bombs wasn’t inarguable at the time, but you’re just being dogmatic if you can’t understand why the decision was made as it was without resorting to racism or bloody-mindedness as an explanation. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2009, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/146 "2009-11-25T23:34:32Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > What on Earth do the ‘old days’ have to do with acceptable victory conditions in the modern era? > I’ll ask the OP again, since the above posters right now are already assuming a shit load right off the bat. > > Are we assuming unconditional surrender is the only Allied option? Yes since there’s no realistic chance that President Truman wouldn’t have demanded unconditional surrender. ---
**Author:** ![Tristan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tristan/32/18058_2.png) [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2009, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/147 "2009-11-25T23:50:50Z")
> [@hansel](#): > > I don’t find the argument “you have to judge them by the standards of the day” to be very compelling. By that argument, slavery wasn’t an awful thing until the public tide turned against it, at which point the slow-movers _came to be_ in the wrong about it. You are correct, I think I phrased that badly. Though, again, the majority of people \*at the time[i/] didn’t think slavery was wrong. That was something that developed over time, and now we have that hindsight you mentioned. Which also applies here, to a much lesser extent (slavery being a larger moral issue, imo, than the decision to use a weapon of war in a war, especially in a way that will speed up or assure the end of said war). ---
**Author:** ![Electric\_Monk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/2acd7d/32.png) [@Electric\_Monk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Electric_Monk)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/148 "2009-11-26T00:01:13Z")
I’ll have to agree with Dave Barry’s opinion on the original topic: “It was Truman who made the difficult decision to drop the first atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, the rationale being that only such a devastating, horrendous display of destructive power would convince Japan that it had to surrender. Truman also made the decision to drop the second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, the rationale being that, hey, we had another bomb.” ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/149 "2009-11-26T01:03:29Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > It might be possible (and I am only speculating) that one of the reasons for a complete unconditional surrender may be the belief that failure to get one from Germany in 1918 was what laid the ground work for the Second World War. > > I have heard it stated that the Second World War (in Europe, anyway) could be considered a continuation of the First. > > With all the blood spilled on both sides in the Second, don’t leave the job half finished. Make sure we don’t have to go through all this again. > > If my speculation is correct, then it absolutely makes sense that the Japanese surrender terms (which appears to be almost a return to the status quo) were completely unacceptable. I’ve read that before, too. I also recall the same History prof I mentioned before mentioning that at the time, the two bombs were all we had. That if Japan still hadn’t surrendered after Nagasaki, it would have been a few months before we could have dropped another one. And I am not sure if it was the same prof, another one, or another source, but I was told at one time that a known intelligence agent for the Japanese was “allowed” to witness the test in the American Southwest (he thought he was being sneaky and did not know they wanted him to see it), in hopes he would report this back to Tokyo, and the news would persuade them to give it up finally. Does anyone else here recall something like this? ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/150 "2009-11-26T01:08:21Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > To use a broad brush: There is a number of people who see no difference (except in numbers) between the (Nazi) Final Solution and the (U.S.) use of the Atomic Bomb, or the (British) firebombing of Hamburg or Dresden. Yes, there are a number of people who are idiots. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/151 "2009-11-26T04:33:06Z")
Any discussion about this issue must take into account that the US or any of the scientists had no clue about fallout. At the time, it was thought that it would be one big explosion and that would be it so the idea that we intentionally did something that would KNOWINGLY lead to birth defects, high cancer rates, etc. is wrong. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/152 "2009-11-26T04:46:40Z")
> [@mlees](#): > > **gonzomax** seems to be illustrating the type of person I outlined in post #46. > > It’s easy to sit back in your slippers and smoking jacket 60+ years after the fact, and condemn the policy decisions made back then, using knowledge and a belief system that just wasn’t around much at the time. > > Might as well blame FDR (and the oil embargo) for pushing Japan into a corner. MLEEs seems like the kind of person who accepts what he is taught. Ike and Macarthur were against it when they did it. Your logic does not explain why there were military and involved people ,who were very much against it. They were not 60 years later. Therefore, that criticism is baseless. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/153 "2009-11-26T04:58:09Z")
At this point, I’m seriously considering suggesting nuking Japan again, just to annoy max. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/154 "2009-11-26T05:10:10Z")
1. Japan was done. More than 60 cities had been leveled with conventional bombs. The island was blockaded. The Soviets were done in Europe and attacked Manchuria. 2… Intercepted messages said they were talking to the USSR to get a peace treaty. We knew that but rejected it demanding "unconditional surrender’. They wanted to retain the emperor. 2. Demonstrating the bomb on a nearby unpopulated island would have been sufficient. 3. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were of little military significance. They killed old men, women and children. 4. Some think we used it to justify the 2 billion spent on developing the bomb. 5. Some think we did it for USSR benefit. To show them what we were capable of. And that we were willing to use it. 6. Ike, Macarthur and even LeMay said it was unnecessary and unproductive. 7. Marshall predicted 25,000 casualties if we had to take the islands. 8. Truman said it would have been a million after a few months because the nation was torn by its use. We have been taught what the government wanted us to learn. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/155 "2009-11-26T05:16:07Z")
**gonzomax** , could you give us a cite for your claims? Once again, I wouldn’t rely on MacArthur, considering the guy had a hardon for nuking China some six years later. So it wasn’t about being anti-nuke. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/156 "2009-11-26T05:32:05Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > At this point, I’m seriously considering suggesting nuking Japan again, just to annoy max. I think it only wise policy to do it every 50 years or so. ---
**Author:** ![cckerberos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@cckerberos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cckerberos)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/157 "2009-11-26T07:30:51Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > Some thought they could. Frankly, I don’t know of any convenient online sources. You’d have to go dig through your local library. If you have a particular offline source (book or journal) in mind I’ll take a look. I’m pretty well read in this field and have never come across anything supporting the claim. So I’m not going to invest a lot of time into looking for a cite that I’m pretty sure isn’t there. ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_Baldy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e9c0ed/32.png) [@Gary\_Baldy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_Baldy)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/158 "2009-11-26T08:01:39Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Intercepted messages said they were talking to the USSR to get a peace treaty. We knew that but rejected it demanding "unconditional surrender’. They wanted to retain the emperor. The USSR was buying time with the Japanese so it could build up their military in the Pacific to expand its territory or at least their sphere of influence in the region. Even when the Japanese did surrender, the USSR was complaining during the ratification of the Treaty of San Francisco in 1951. The Soviets were still milking the end of the war with Japan six years after it ended, although they didn’t declare war against Japan until two days after Hiroshima. Your argument about a peace treaty with the USSR just doesn’t add up. Let me try another angle for those you don’t understand the need to drop the bomb on Nagasaki. August 6, 1945 - bombing of Hiroshima Mokusatsu - no response from Japan August 8 - USSR declares war Mokusatsu - no response from Japan August 9 - bombing of Nagasaki Mokusatsu - no response from Japan, however internally the Japanese government agrees to surrender August 14 - Emperor Hirohito announces to cabinet and records Gyokuon-hōsō Kyūjō Incident begins August 15 - two assassination attempts on PM Kantaro Suzuki coup attempt on Emperor Hirohito 11:30am - the last attempt to prevent the broadcast of Gyokuon-hōsō Kyūjō Incident ends noon - Gyokuon-hōsō broadcast - Japan surrenders To make it even shorter, after two nukes and a new military front opening up, there was still an attempt by some in the military to overthrow the government to keep the war going. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/159 "2009-11-26T08:26:14Z")
> [@Gary\_Baldy](#): > > To make it even shorter, after two nukes and a new military front opening up, there was still an attempt by some in the military to overthrow the government to keep the war going. I think we need to give it up. **Gonzomax** is not paying attention to any of the realities of the times or any of the realities of war. Nukes = bad in his worldview and all the firebombs and horrors of what war is will change his mind. We have provided abundant evidence why the bombs should have been dropped. That Hiroshima was wiped off the map and did not move them to surrender is telling. That Nagasaki got wiped off the map and a significant attempt to stop a surrender after that happened is of no matter to him. These things are without doubt and are not disputed by anyone. Gonzo apparently feels nukes are bad period. Never mind how many Americans and Japanese would die otherwise to end the war (by any reasonable count more than the nukes got and would include starvation and suicide not to mention bombs and guns). Never mind that Japan started the whole thing. Never mind that the Japanese back then, as a regime, were downright evil easily on par with the Nazis and arguably worse. Never mind that the Japanese just did not surrender as a cultural matter (Bushido code I think). Never mind more people died in the firebombings of Tokyo than the nukes got (as if that was a whole lot more pleasant than a nuke and is to say “non-nuke” war was quite capable of horrors easily on par with nukes). We’re clearly the fuckers for nuking them. Y’all must be blind to not see it. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![cckerberos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@cckerberos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cckerberos)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2009, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803/160 "2009-11-26T08:48:13Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > 1. Japan was done. More than 60 cities had been leveled with conventional bombs. The island was blockaded. The Soviets were done in Europe and attacked Manchuria. This is mostly true. The USAAF had been reduced to bombing second and third rate cities because the major targets were pretty much gone. IIRC, the next planned step was going to be to (further) target their transportation infrastructure, something that would have led to (more) mass starvation. But the Soviets hadn’t attacked Manchuria yet. I believe they were planning to do so on August 15th but sped up their plans once we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima so managed to do it on August 9th instead. > [@](#): > > 2.. Intercepted messages said they were talking to the USSR to get a peace treaty. We knew that but rejected it demanding "unconditional surrender’. They wanted to retain the emperor. The Foreign Ministry was pursuing a negotiated surrender through the USSR from July of '45. But it was largely an independent effort, with no significant outside support. The Japanese ambassador in Moscow, Sato, repeatedly told Foreign Minister Togo that it was a waste of time, that there was no point in “negotiating” while the government as a whole was still convinced that surrender was unnecessary and was committed to fighting on. But even if the government _had_ committed to supporting negotiations, their position would have been entirely unrealistic. Even after the Nagasaki bombing, the military leadership continued to insist on their “absolute” requirements (no occupation, self-disarmament, Japanese trying of war criminals, retention of the imperial system). If that was their position after the two bombs and the Soviet entry into the war, it’s hard to imagine that they would have had more acceptable conditions in mind a month earlier. > [@](#): > > 1. Demonstrating the bomb on a nearby unpopulated island would have been sufficient. There’s a moral argument to made for this, but I think that’s about it. Beyond the practical concerns (what if the bomb didn’t work, how do we get observers there, etc.) it would have made it very easy for the Japanese government to censor the news and/or deny that it wasn’t a trick in some way. There’s been some good scholarship done arguing that it took both the bombs _and_ Soviet entry into the war to force Japanese capitulation. It’s difficult for me to accept that a demonstration alone would have done it. It just might have made our hands a little cleaner afterwards. > [@](#): > > 1. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were of little military significance. They killed old men, women and children. Yes and no. Hiroshima particularly had military significance as an important Army headquarters. But certainly the amount of destruction caused by the bombs meant that where they were dropped was fairly irrelevant; they were going to kill a lot of civilians. > [@](#): > > 1. Some think we used it to justify the 2 billion spent on developing the bomb. That was a factor. The massive cost in developing the bomb did argue for using it. > [@](#): > > 1. Some think we did it for USSR benefit. To show them what we were capable of. And that we were willing to use it. Yes, this is an issue of controversy. I think the mainstream consensus among scholars at this point is that the effect of the bomb on the Soviets was a “bonus,” but not enough to alone cause use. There are still some revisionists who argue that it was more or less the sole reason for using the bomb, however. > [@](#): > > 1. Ike, Macarthur and even LeMay said it was unnecessary and unproductive. I’m not really familiar with the LeMay quote, but for the quotes for the other two come years after the fact. MacArthur had personal reasons to be against the bombings (he was going to lead the invasion, after all) and later had personal reasons regarding his image in Japan to make it look like he had opposed the bombs on moral grounds. > [@](#): > > 1. Marshall predicted 25,000 casualties if we had to take the islands. We really have no idea how many casualties it was thought that an invasion would have taken. Truman asked for an estimate, but never got a real number. There are many conflicting contemporary studies. But I’m pretty sure that Marshall never suggested 25,000 casualties. That would only be a third of what it took to take Okinawa. > [@](#): > > 1. Truman said it would have been a million after a few months because the nation was torn by its use. The details here are incorrect, but the basic argument (that the “it would have taken a million casualties to invade Japan” argument originated after the war) is true. > [@](#): > > We have been taught what the government wanted us to learn. There’s some truth to this, I think. I think most Americans and most Japanese have only the most shallow understanding of the atomic bombings. And yes, in the years following the war the government and former officials of the Truman administration did what they could to influence the public to have the “correct” understanding. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/atomic-bombings-of-japan/518803.md?page=9)