Reading back through my post, I realized that while I answered this obliquely, you might not have caught it (my writing style is pretty convoluted, admittedly). When would I consider it justifiable to deliberatly kill large numbers of civilians? Probably never, or in VERY unusual or desparate circumstances. But then, like you, I’m a product of our society TODAY. I was born in the 60’s, and THIS is my time. So my perceptions and bias’s are based on that. Justify government atrocities? I dont JUSTIFY them…I simply understand what lead to them. And some atrocities are NOT even understandable, let along justify-able. This however isn’t one of those cases IMO.
Of COURSE it makes a difference that the leadership of the time thought it was best. How could it be different? Were they supposed to be psykic?? Be able to peer into the future to know what the right thing to do was? Were they supposed to be omnicent and know everything the enemy was doing and thinking?? THEY were the ones making the decisions.
The fact that they were WRONG, doesnt’ make them ‘morally bankrupt’ if what they were trying to do was what THEY felt was the best thing they could do to win the war and protect their way of life and people. Unless you are telling me that you are infallable.
I don’t condemn the Axis for stategic bombing anymore than I condemn the Allies…it was the thinking of the time, and would have taken an exceptional individual to see whats outside the box…and those kinds of people are very rare no matter what time you live in. I could wish that one of those brilliant thinkers was currently president while I’m wishing for things…
CyberPundit: There is a link on British occupation of Iraq and the use of airpower and poison gas against Iraqis here. While the Western Allies (or what became them during the war) did condemn the bombing of cities by fascist and Nazi forces in the 30’s, they were being hypocritical in condemning them for actions that they themselves took. Prior to the war, the British fully expected to be bombed by Germany in any future war. One of the reasons for the British cave in to Hitler’s demands on Czechoslovakia was the lack of large numbers of modern fighter aircraft in the RAF, as well as an overestimation of the size and capabilities of the Luftwaffe. The Battle of Britain came as no surprise to them, though its inability to deliver a crippling blow to civilian morale did come as somewhat as a surprise to the proponents of airpower. Guilo Douhet, William Mitchell and others had been arguing since the 1920’s that future wars would be won through airpower alone. Britain had been building a force of heavy bombers prior to the war, and the US had as well. While Britain initially had qualms about conducting area bombing of German cities, primarily of of fear of retaliation, both they and Germany turned to it. Planning for strategic bombing by Britain goes back to World War I, when in response to German Zeppelin and Gotha raids on Britain’s cities
Source is The Oxford companion to World War II. With the technology of WWI, the ability to actually hit precise targets was even less than that of WWII. The concept of unconditional surrender wasn’t innovative in WWII; it was the same policy that the USA pursued against the CSA in the US Civil War, itself a major stepping stone in total war. Did the US have the right to demand this from Japan? The US had every bit as much (or as little) a right to demand this from Japan as Japan had the right to invade China, committing brutal atrocities against the Chinese people, and then demand that the US allow it to continue pursuing this goal unfettered.
Mr. Svinlesha:
This isn’t a false dilemma, it’s upon you to prove that the alternatives to invasion of the atomic bomb were preferable to either of them. Even if Japan were to accept the inevitable and surrender within 2 weeks, 4 months, or longer than that, the cause of the collapse would be due to mass firebombing of its cities and starvation through blockade. The invasion wasn’t just planned, barring a sudden collapse from Japan it was on, and while some advisors were against it or had reservations, it wasn’t most of them. The following is taken from chapter one of V [Marine] Amphibious Corps Planning for Operation Olympic and the Role of Intelligence in Support of Planning.
Xtisme,
Like I said the bombing of civilians was against the democratic norms of the day and the bombing by the fascist powers in the 30’s had been widely condemned including by Roosevelt himself. It was not the “thinking of the time”.
You also keep talking about how the how the leaders ordered the bombings because it was the only way to win the war. Especially for the bombings of 1945 this is not plausible. It was clear to any informed observer that the Allies were going to win. Only the timing and terms of surrender were in doubt.
And don’t forget that part of the debate is about the goal of “unconditional surrender”. This was an innovation at the time and several officials on both sides of the pond were highly critical of it.
Dissonance,
Thanks for the information about British attacks in Iraq but again they don’t refute the notion that there were widely accepted norms about the bombing of civlians among the democracies. The US government today also violates human rights norms sometimes but that doesn’t mean those norms don’t exist. All this is relevant to Xtisme’s claim that bombing civilians was the “thinking of the day”. It wasn’t at least for the democracies.
As for unconditional surrender obviously the Civil War is different in the sense that defeated South was to be integrated back in the US and had to accept the ultimate authority of the federal government. This didn’t apply to a foreign country.
As for Japanese atrocities in China, again they don’t justify American atrocities against Japanese civlians. Two wrongs… etc. etc.
War Crimes?
The Nuremburg trials were not about the bombing of cities, they were about the land-based murder of civilians, and about starting the war in the first place.
What is the point of asking if the bombings were War Crimes ?. We aren’t going to put anybody in jail. The US isn’t going to apologize or pay reparations even if you convince everybody that the bombing was a war crime.
It is interesting to note that when the US began development of the atomic bomb, it was intended to be used against Germany, not Japan. I’ve read that the overall effort of the US towards defeating Germany was about 9 or 10 times the size of the effort towards defeating Japan. It seems unbelievable but it’s what I’ve read (some time ago).
The actions of the Japanese against Chinese civilians did indeed effect the way that the Japanese were perceived and that, in turn, effected the decision to bomb Japanese cities. In wartime, rules are not followed by one side only, with the other side restraining itself. Not for long. The psychological dissonance is too great. That would be unfair to your own soldiers. Deliberately causing the death of one’s own soldiers (with “unnecessary” battles) as the result of a tighter adherence to the rules tends to demoralize the troops and generate anger at home.
In judging the decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan, it is unreasonable to expect that the US planners would values Japanese lives on a par with US lives, given that the Japanese had devalued themselves in US eyes by their atrocities against the Chinese.
It is also unreasonable to expect perfect or near-perfect efficiency in waging war. If later on, somebody can prove that the war could have been won with 10% fewer enemy deaths by spending 20% more time, soldiers and money, that’s just the nature of war and of human behavior, not a war crime. Even if it’s 20% fewer deaths by spending 10% more.
The main problems with the US use of the atom bomb in the Second World War are:
[list=1]
[li]Nuclear weapons were introduced into the world.[/li][li]An arms race of missiles and warheads generated a dynamic of its own that threatened to be another cause for war.[/li][li]The weapons came too late to save the millions of dead in the European theater.[/li][/list=1]
On the other side, the total number of US and Japanese dead may be actually smaller than without the atomic bomb, and Japan was not divided into North and South.
The countervailing arguments, that more US lives were lost while waiting for the bomb, rather than compromising with Japan on the status of the Emporor, might be technically true. But these deaths would be seen as an extension of battles already ongoing, that is, once you start to fight, one is committed to finish.
The US goals in the war against Japan were essentially Unconditional Surrender. This goal came to be an almost holy duty as a result of the analysis of the armistice ending World War I having cause World War II. The US believed that had the winners demanded a full surrender and demiliterization of Germany after the first war, the second could not have occurred. And the US was determined not to make the same mistake again. The lives lost in extending “Ordinary combat” are already justified by the adoption of the goal of Unconditional Surrender.
If I could make a phone call back in time to 1945 to instruct President Truman what to do about the decision to use the bomb, I might well advise him to refrain. But i would be frightened to make that decision, as the outcome in term of todays world is so unknowable. Actually, of course, if i could make a phone call back in time to a US President, I would call back to 1930 and have Hoover assassinate Hitler. That might be enough.
It was. In ‘colonial’ action, Britain bombed Iraqis in the 1920s against an enemy that couldn’t respond in kind. In World War II (and prior to it), they expected to do so against Germany in retaliation for likely German bombing of British civilians. They were drawing on their experiences in WWI, where Germany bombed England with Zeppelins and bombers, and Britain responded in kind.
Japan had to accept the ultimate authority of the US government and accept occupation and the rewriting of its constitution. That was the policy of the Allies at the time for both Germany and Japan. You may feel that this was unfair, but it did apply. Personally, considering the nature of the German and Japanese governments, I don’t have very serious qualms about it. Having their governments go and be held accountable for their actions, even if the post war war-crimes trials were to a degree victor’s justice was a reasonable act to me.
I didn’t intend it as justification, I intended it as a reply to the ‘right’ that the US had to demand unconditional surrender. If you are going to hold the US to high standards, the Japanese government should be held to them as well. Its government chose to start a war in China, and later with the Allies in order to be able to continue its war in China. The entire war is filled to the brim with atrocities. Japan conducted area bombing of Chinese cities, committed orgies of slaughter, and its policy for dealing with Chinese guerilla action behind their lines was the Three Alls: Kill all, burn all, loot all.
Regarding General Albert Wedemeyer’s claims of deep divisions between the Nazi’s and the Wehrmacht’s generals, it was wishful thinking on his part. They followed Hitler into Poland, France, the Low Countries, the Balkans and the USSR before unconditional surrender was announced as a goal. There was some dissent, and a couple of assassination attempts, but they were very, very much in the minority.
Sure. But if what I read about Truman is accurate, I wouldn’t expect to have the least bit of influence. Be like throwing popcorn balls at a tank. But if I had the chance, I’d sure feel obliged to give it a shot.
To those of you who’ve been condemning the US and the UK for inflicting civilian casualties during WWII, there are a couple of things I’d like to point out to you. My mother’s first memories are of hiding under the kitchen table during the London Blitz. She and my grandmother moved to the English countryside to reduce their risk of being killed in one of the bombing raids on London. Pearl Harbor, too had civilian casualties.
I am not a history buff, but what with majoring in Japanese and minoring in German, I wound up learning a lot of WWII history. I also spent a year studying in Japan. People were already starving in Japan when the atomic bombs were dropped. Also, what Andrepapa (welcome to the SDMB, by the way) said about the Japanese attitudes jibes with what I’ve learned first hand from them. The emperor was not in control of things at the time; the military was. What’s more, the army and the navy were fighting each other for material, etc. Surrender was simply not an option, especially not to an inferior country like they believed America was.
I’ve stood a Hiroshima and at Pearl Harbor. I have read some horrors and drawn back, knowing the reality was worse. I know how the English would have fought if Hitler had tried to invade England, and I have no doubt that the Japanese would have fought even more fiercely. In war, especially, sometimes there are no good choices, only varying degrees of bad. In my opinion, dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the least bad choices available.
What if Hirohito had been Assassinated?
When Emporor Hirohito was planning to surrender at the very end of WWII, some military officerrs attempted to assassinate him so they could keep on fighting. This shows some division of opinion within the ruling circles.
What would have happened had the assassination been successful? Would the war have continued, even though two cities had been nuked?
Would Japan’s leaders actually have been able to surrender without being assassinated for it, had the atomic bombs not been used? Possibly not.
Radon, they weren’t attempting an assassination, they were attempting a coup. Link, and from Soldiers of the Sun
It does raise the issue of tenacity for their cause amongst the military. Even after hearing the surrender broadcast, the commander of the Japanese army in Manchuria and most of his officers wanted to continue the fight and held out for two more days awaiting written verification before surrendering.
Xtisme: I believe that the terms discussed by the privy council once the Emperor had suggested that Japan seek “an early exit from the war” in June '45 included:
Self-evacuation of occupied territories (I am not sure if this included Manchuria or Taiwan, it almost certainly did not include Korea)
Self disarmament
No occupation (which might or might not make verification of disarmament difficult or impossible)
No change to the Imperial system, although there would be a change in government (i.e. cabinet)
Self trial of war criminals
These terms are unlikely to be acceptable to the US, especially as they in many ways resemble the terms of Versailles, which did approximately nothing (from the view of 1945) to affect German Expansionism. I am not at all certain that the US was aware of these terms.
However, the Japanese ambassador to Sweden (IIRC) did make some preliminary feelers seeking mediation, on his own recognizance. For this he was severely rebuked by Tokyo. As the US managed to read that particular diplomatic message, there certainly appeared to be a strong anti-peace government in Tokyo.
On point that should be noted is that while we don’t have the day to day knowledge that commanders did in 1945, we in many ways have more knowledge. We have more perfect knowledge of the facts on the ground, so to speak. For example, we know that the Russians completely overran the Japanese with their attacks in 1945, something that the Japanese government did not know by the time of the surrender - communications so bad and the defeats so one-sided that the only word received by the Japanese government were initial optimistic reports about attacks by small units of Soviets. In addition, we have access to a far wider range of Magic and Ultra decrypts than any commander had - they would receive only a summary while modern historians can read them in context. It should also be noted that we have access to far more decrypts than any commander had because decypting continued on old messages well after the fact. Any history written prior to the 1970’s is going to be completely missing these fairly critical pieces of information. And additional material has continued to be declassified through the late '90’s (no doubt some remains still classified).
Dissonance,
Your quotes seem to from WW1 and the 20’s(wrt Iraq). Do you have any quote from just before WW2 which show that massive bombings of civilian areas were considered acceptable in the UK and US? Especially on a country like Japan which wasn’t
capable of retaliating in kind at the US? In any event the widespread condemnation of German, Italian and Japanese atrocities would indicate that democratic leaders did appreciate that civilians shouldn’t be targetted even if they weren’t 100% consistent.
“Japan had to accept the ultimate authority of the US government and accept occupation and the rewriting of its constitution. That was the policy of the Allies at the time for both Germany and Japan.”
What we are discussing is precisely whether this policy was justified. If Lord Hankey ,from my quote, was correct unconditional surrender was extremely rare in recorded history.
And anyway the issue isn’t about fairness to the Japanese government but to Japanese civilians. The question is whether the US had the right to use massive attacks on civilians as a means to obtain unconditional surrender. If the idea of a just war means anything at all the answer is clearly no.
I don’t want to get into a debate about the specifics of Wedermeyer’s claims; I just wanted to show that there was a fair degree of dissent about the policy of unconditional surrender even at the time. It’s not just hindsight.
I doubt that any method would end the war more quickly than the atomic bombs - Japanese records indicate that the apparent tempo of the bombing gave the surrender an urgency it might otherwise not possess. The Japanese plan for the latter half of the war was to bleed the Americans/Allies - there position might get weaker, but they felt there ability to withstand bloodshed was greater than that of the United States. If sufficient casualties could be inflicted and the end delayed sufficiently than war-weariness and public opinion might force the United States to accept something less than unconditional surrender, allowing Japan to turn a defeat into a moral victory of sorts (we took the worst they could give and came out standing)
At any rate, here are what I see to be the options the Allies had:
0: Arrange demonstration of atomic bomb. Pros: shows we care; has some chance of persuading Japanese government to surrender. Cons: Demo could fail; Uses up one of a very few weapons - as it was the Japanese initially doubted we had more than one; Japanese continue to strengthen positions while demo takes place; world opinion might dissuade US from using bomb after demo; if Japanese refuse to surrender after seeing the demo we are left with the same dilemma - do we drop on cities or not; Soviet Union can make good use of time to overrun Manchuria, portions of China, Korea, possibly invade Japan in more vulnerable northern islands (this might not have a huge effect on anything other than it would pretty much guarantee the Soviets a hand in the occupation);
1a. Continue blockade, continue unrestricted submarine warfare, continue bombing of cities, raids on transportation facilities. Pros: no atomic bombs, possible early surrender ; minimal allied casualties (except POW’s) Cons Continuing large scale Japanese civilian and military casualties; possible surrender does not occur at all - Japan merely adjusts to rubble bouncing, people dying and the young and the elderly starving; Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Burma, parts of the Phillipines and most of China remain under the tender rule of the Japanese; Soviets have far more time and ability to overrun eastern Asia, and again partially invade the northernmost home island.; Possible loss of confidence in US (bombing the enemies civilians with no probability of positive effect is likely to be unpopular eventually) - demands for demobilization and negotiated peace - leave Asia split between totalitarian Japan and Soviet Union.
1b. Continue blockade, no active submarine warfare, no bombing, some harbor mining using B-29’s Pros: no atomic bombs, barely conceivable surrender; minimal allied casualties (except POW’s) Cons possible surrender does not occur at all - Japan merely the young and the elderly starving; Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Indochina, parts of the Phillipines and most of China remain under Japanese control; Soviets have far more time and ability to overrun eastern Asia, and again partially invade the northernmost home island.; Possible loss of confidence in US - demands for demobilization and negotiated peace - leave Asia split between totalitarian Japan and Soviet Union
1c Continue blockade, continue unrestricted submarine warfare, continue bombing of cities, raids on transportation facilities, “reversing Japanese aggressions elsewhere” . Pros: no atomic bombs, minimal allied casualties (except POW’s); we may not “lose China” (or we may be drawn into the civil war); possible independence for all territories liberated by US; possible surrender of Japanese after Soviet invasion of Manchuria/several months of blockade and bombing/continued US success in the field Cons This is Japan’s dream scenario, a long drawn out bloodbath mostly far away from Japan; possible surrender does not occur at all - Japan merely adjusts to rubble bouncing, people dying and the young and the elderly starving; Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Indochina, parts of the Phillipines and most of China remain under the rule of the Japanese until they are driven out by the Americans, with the possibility of dozen’s of Manilas; Soviets have far more time and ability to overrun eastern Asia, and again partially invade the northernmost home island.; Possible loss of will in US, especially as recently demobilized troops are called up to reverse Japan’s aggressions elsewhere.
1d Continue blockade, no bombing of Japanese cities, coastal trawlers and merchants allowed to move unmolested , efforts concentrated on “reversing Japanese aggressions elsewhere” . Pros: no atomic bombs; minimal Japanese civilian casualties; we may not “lose China” (or we may be drawn into the civil war); possible independence for all territories liberated by US; possible surrender of Japanese after Soviet invasion of Manchuria/several months of blockade and bombing/continued US success in the field Cons I was wrong before - this is Japan’s dream scenario, a long drawn out bloodbath mostly far away from Japan while the homelands are given a breather; Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Indochina, parts of the Phillipines and most of China remain under the tender rule of the Japanese until they are driven out by the Americans, with the possibility of dozen’s of Manilas; Soviets have far more time and ability to overrun eastern Asia, and partially invade the northernmost home island.; Possible loss of will in US, especially as recently demobilized troops are called up to reverse Japan’s aggressions elsewhere
2a Invasion of the home islands: continue unrestricted submarine warfare, continue bombing of cities, raids on transportation facilities Pros: no atomic bombs, possible cakewalk meaning minimal casualties all around ; possible surrender of Japanese after Soviet invasion of Manchuria/several months of blockade and bombing Cons Probable bloodbath for American soldiers, Japanese military, Japanese civilians; earliest probable end to war - late ’45 early ’46 - thats a lot of bombing; Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Indochina, parts of the Phillipines and most of China remain under the tender rule of the Japanese; Soviets have far more time and ability to overrun eastern Asia, and partially invade the northernmost home island.;
2b Invasion of the home islands:: continue unrestricted submarine warfare, continue bombing of cities, raids on transportation facilities; tactical use of atomic bombs Pros: no atomic bombs used against civilians, possible cakewalk meaning minimal casualties all around ; possible surrender of Japanese after Soviet invasion of Manchuria/several months of blockade and bombing Cons Probable high casualties for American soldiers, much higher for Japanese military, and militia/civilians; more total atomic bombs used unless Japanese surrender quickly; earliest probable end to war - late ’45 early ’46; Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Indochina, parts of the Phillipines and most of China remain under Japan; Soviets have far more time and ability to overrun eastern Asia, and partially invade the northernmost home island.; destigmatization of tactical use of atomic bombs;
3 Drop the atomic bombs as per history: Pros Provides a figleaf that potentially allows the Japanese to surrender - (I say figleaf because from a practical point of view the difference between an atomic raid and a thousand plane mixed explosive/incendiary raid is trivial to the Japanese. From a ideological point of view it is a symbol of an incredible, unfightable imbalance of power such that the only conceivable honorable course for the Imperial government is to surrender to save the people of Japan, even against the will of those in the military who would fight for their version of the Emperor’s honor come what may) Cons May not work (leaving the allies no better or worse off materially); Introduces new weapons orders of magnitude more powerful than those previously available, with far less discriminatory ability; Cost in world opinion; uses up scarce weapons that might more profitably and/or humanely used tactically in the invasion (as was the plan for either weapons 3+ or 4+ (I don’t remember and it’s late))
I am sure I have left options and pros and cons out, both because it is late/I am tired, and because of cultural and ideological blind spots.
If you are still reading I would like to reiterate that I feel that discussions on the morality of WWII bombing practices belongs in a thread of its own. The decision point presented to us is August 45, not mid 1930’s.
Has no read Truman by David McCullough? To understand why Truman felt it necessary to drop the bomb, you have to understand who Truman was.
When WWI broke out (for the US, Europe having been fighting it for a number of years before), Truman volunteered to join the Army. Physically, Truman never should have been allowed to enlist, and the only reason he was able to enlist was that he talked the examining physician into covering up Truman’s medical conditions (such as being legally blind in one eye). At that time, officers could be selected by the men they were serving with (in other words, if everyone in the platoon liked private Smith and wanted him to being their commander, he was promoted in rank) and Truman was selected by the men in his group to be their officer. When Truman’s unit saw combat for the first time, the men under his command broke and ran from fright. Truman dragged them back to their posts, cursing and screaming at them, the men never ran from a fight again.
Truman knew first hand the horrors of war. He also knew that Americans were growing tired of the war. Food was rationed (What was it called “Meatless Thursdays”?), new consumer goods were extremely difficult to come by (cars hadn’t been made for civilian use since December 1941), many people hadn’t had a pay raise since before the war, and everyone knew someone who’d been killed in the war.
When Truman was made President after the death of FDR, he had no knowledge of the Manhattan Project. He was told only that the US was working on a weapon of incredible destructive power. When Truman was finally told the details of the Manhattan Project, he saw it as an opportunity to end the war quickly. To his dying day, Truman had no doubts about his decision.
Remember, the horrors of war are only suffered by the living, the dead have no such troubles.
Before Germany surrendered, the US considered dumping radioactive materials over German cities if the US wasn’t able to get a working bomb ready in a satisfactory time period. (However, Germany surrendered, and the test in Nevada proved that the US had a viable atomic bomb design.)
MacArthur was a bit of a nutbag, I should point out. (Truman sarcastically referred to him as “God’s right hand man.”) When Chinese forces overran US forces in Korea, MacArthur was positively hysterical. He wanted to line the 38th Parallel with enough radioactive material to kill anyone that tried to cross it. He started jabbering wildly about nuking China, and Truman promptly fired him.
Quotations from those opposed to use of the bomb are cited by those who think that the bomb shouldn’t have been used because Japan was already defeated.
Of course, there were those who felt that use of the bomb ended the war more quickly and saved lives both US and Japanese. Somehow they never get quoted. Maybe because Gen Marshall, Secy of War Stimson and Secy of the Navy Forrestal weren’t such publicity hounds and kept their thoughts to themselves because they were comfortable with the decision and saw no need to defend it.
One of the group who thought the war was ended by the bomb was Dr. Karl Compton, President of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in this post-war article.
It is incredible to me that people feel justified in criticising the decision based on data that the decision makers couldn’t possibly have had and quotations from outsiders who didn’t really know the factors on which the decision was based.
I won’t be able to address all the points brought up so far, but will start from the top and try to clarify my position as I go along.
xtisme:
A very good point, which has already been addressed, but I would like to add a couple of comments.
The US and Britain demanded of Japan an unconditional surrender to end the war. As Cyberpundit has pointed out, such a demand was pretty unprecedented in the history of warfare, and many felt that it also prolonged the war, for the reasons given.
Truman was approached on numerous occasions by various members of the government/ military establishment and asked to clarify what he meant with the word, “unconditional.” Many felt that if he would simply give some sort of guarantee for the Emperor’s life he would further weaken the hand the of the “hawks” in the Japanese cabinet. Alperovitz writes, “* In fact, President Truman was urged to modify the surrender terms on numerous occasions during the summer of 1945-- and by numerous people,*” and lists the following examples:
[QUOTE] [ul][li]by Acting Secretary of State Grew on May 28, 1945; [/li][li]by former President Herbert Hoover in a May 30, 1945 memorandum; [/li][li]by Grew again on June 13, 1945; [/li][li]by Counsel to the President Samuel I. Rosenman on June 17, 1945; [/li][li]by Grew once more on June 18, 1945; [/li][li]by Assistant Secretary of War McCloy on June 18, 1945; [/li][li]by Admiral Leahy on June 18, 1945; [/li][li]by the State Department in a formal recommendation of June 30, 1945; [/li][li]by Under Secretary of the Navy Ralph Bard on July 1, 1945 (it appears from certain evidence); [/li][li]by Secretary of War Stimson (with the support of Secretary of the Navy Forrestal and Grew) on July 2, 1945; [/li][li]by Stimson again on July 16, 1945; [/li][li]by Churchill on July 18, 1945; [/li][li]by the Joint Chiefs of Staff on July 18, 1945; [/li][li]by Stimson on July 24, 1945.[/ul][/li][/QUOTE]
Truman opted to ignore these appeals, for reasons not readily apparent to me. Dissonance:
Maybe not. They weren’t intended as such. Rather, I’m simply trying to point out that the traditional defense one often hears about the dropping of the A-bomb – i.e., that the US “had no choice,” because the Japanese would “never have surrendered otherwise” – is not as watertight as many would like to believe. Other options were within the realm of possibility, and Truman knew that to be the case. He may have made the morally correct decision anyway, but it strikes me as disingenuous to argue that he did so because he had absolutely no other choice. David Simmons:
First off, thanks for helping to fight the Nazis and all of that stuff. Everyone here owes you a debt of gratitude. My son sleeps more securely at night thanks to the sacrifices of people like yourself.
Next, in response to this:
Agreed. It has not been my intent to somehow “prove” that dropping the bomb was “wrong.” It is my intent, on the other hand, to demonstrate that we cannot say with 100% certainty that dropping the bomb was “right,” and that asking critical questions of the historical record is not the equivalent of “whining revisionism.”
You’ve misread the quote in question. The estimate is not Fies’ own, it is a statement take from the US Strategic Bombing Survey. Feis does argue that the Survey’s conclusions were “well-grounded”, however.
Now, a lot of people in this thread are arguing that Fies is wrong, and that the SBS had its own “axe to grind.” Maybe so, but can’t that argument also be applied to those who supported the decision to drop the bomb? Maybe everyone involved had an axe to grind, and we are now left to sort out who got his axe ground, afterwards.
And is it just my imagination, or is everyone who objects to my list of quotes studiously avoiding Eisenhower’s statements?
The decision may also have been the right one, as far as that goes. As long as you aren’t accusing me of unpatriotic whining just because I dare to ask the question, and don’t accept the simple answer to it, we’re on the same sheet of music. Andrepapa:
Welcome to the SDMB!
Dissonance (again):
Regarding my claim that the “invasion or drop the Bomb” argument is a “false dilemma:”
Clearly, I can’t “prove” that alternatives to “invasion of the atomic bomb” (“invasion of the atomic bomb”?) are “preferable.” What I do need to demonstrate, on the other hand, is that alternatives existed, and that Truman knew of them.
One point of contention involves the question of consensus. Note how the question is addressed in your cite:
“After successful landings on Luzon in January 1945, military planners began to seriously analyze the task of invading the Japanese home islands. The Army Chief of Staff, General George C. Marshall, and most Army leaders believed that an invasion was necessary to bring about Japan’s unconditional surrender.”
This might very well have been true, but skirts the issue of whether or not “unconditional surrender” was a reasonable or necessary demand. As far as that goes, there was appears to have been a considerable lack of consensus within the military and the administration as well.
Alperovitz provides a lot of evidence that “most” Army leaders did not believe an invasion was necessary to bring about Japan’s surrender. He argues that a conceivable alternative to the bombing of Hiroshima might have looked like this:
Russia declares war on Japan.
Japan’s situation was already hopeless, and both sides were well aware of it. It was felt that an open declaration of war on the part of the Russians would have an overwhelmingly negative effect on Japanese morale. This contention is supported by intercepts of top-level communications between Japanese officials.
Clarification of the term “unconditional.”
If the Russian entry into the war was followed by an assurance on the part of the US that the Emperor would not be executed, the blow on Japanese fighting morale coupled with the removal of this final stumbling block might lead to a Japanese surrender.
Naturally, a demonstration of the A-bomb’s capacity, on a strictly military target, might also be interpolated into this strategy as a means of applying even more pressure on the Japanese government.
The above strikes me as a reasonable alternative to simply dropping the bomb on Hiroshima while demanding unconditional surrender. It seems clear as well that Truman was aware of this alternative. For supporting evidence and arguments, please refer to the H-net discussion linked from my post on page 1 of this thread.
Truman didn’t orginate and might not have known what the originators, Roosevelt and Churchill, meant. This cite from the Truman Library archives is from the minutes of a June 1945 meeting at which the subject was broached. Leahy is Fleet Adm. William Leahy who had been Roosevelt’s Chief of Staff and continued that with Truman.
*"ADMIRAL LEAHY said that he could not agree with those who said to him that unless we obtain the unconditional surrender of the Japanese that we will have lost the war. He feared no menace from Japan in the foreseeable future, even if we were unsuccessful in forcing unconditional surrender. What he did fear was that our insistence on unconditional surrender would result only in making the Japanese desperate and thereby increase our casualty lists. He did not think that this was at all necessary.
THE PRESIDENT stated that it was with that thought in mind that he had left the door open for Congress to take appropriate action with reference to unconditional surrender. However, he did not feel that he could take any action at this time to change public opinion on the matter."*
So, it seems that Truman thought Congressional action was needed in order to define exactly what “unconditional” meant and to change the terms if that was considered desirable. Possibly this was because the original was part of an agreement with Britain arrived at when we formally got into the war following 7 December 1941. I don’t know and maybe we can’t know at this late date.
David Simmons:
I’ve searched my posts and don’t find the phrase “whining revisionism” anywhere. I don’t think I even hinted at it and if I did it was unintentional. In fact, I’m what some people regard as an “unpatriotic whiner” with respect to what I think is foolish adventurism of GW’s preemptive war in Iraq.
Yeah, sort of. I didn’t notice at first that it was from the bombing survey. However, as an illustration of just how hard it is to decide now about the decision, there is this, again from the Truman Library concerning the Strategic Bombing Survey in Japan.
*"At the end of World War II the Truman administration arranged for surveys of the damage done to both Germany and Japan by the bombers of the U.S. Army Air Forces - by the autonomous air arm of the U.S. Army that in 1947 achieved independence as the U.S. Air Force.
Supporters of the latter [conventional dominated the bombing survey for Japan. They were champions of conventional bombing, even though USAAF planes carried the atomic bombs. They sought to show that the atomic bombs were less important than people thought, and intimated that conventional air power had brought Japan to its knees. They stressed the failure of the atomic bombs to affect civilian morale, as if this failure were important; within the Japanese government the civilians were powerless, the military in control. They beheld a decision for peace taken earlier than August 1945, when in fact the decision of the Supreme War Guidance Council on June 26 was ambiguous. All they could say for the atomic bombings was that the latter ‘considerably speeded up’ the move toward peace."*
So even the makeup and conclusions of the Survey team are still controversial and your following comment about the “axe to grind” is appropriate.
Well, here again, Eisehower was an outsider as far as the decision to drop the bomb is concerned. His comments are thus those of a military expert but one who was “out of the loop” and thus are based on generalities. As far as I know, only the very stratosphereic levels of the War and Navy Department’s plus the President and maybe the Secretary of State were privy to all of the factors that went into the decision.
And again, I don’t remember anything that could be taken as an accusation of “unpatriotic whining.” If you think there is one point it out, otherwise it resembles a straw man.
It is my belief that the “moral argument” against the bomb is invalid. I don’t think there is a choice in war between a “moral” and an “immoral” choice. The only ones are the “lesser of two evils.”
Wartime decision makers are constantly deciding whether to kill the enemy or their own people and whether this method of killing is preferred to that method of killing.
For example, suppose you have been assigned a target to bomb. And suppose further that the best approach route to this target to ensure its destruction endangers a civilian area next door. Now the prime concern is to hit and destroy the target. If you don’t do that you have exposed your people to danger for nothing. And, of course, the target needs to be destroyed or it wouldn’t be a target so if you fail the first time others will have to try again tomorrow thus exposing more of your people to danger. What mission planner would endanger those of his own side, friends and companions, in order to avoid endangering enemy civilians who are total strangers and supporting the enemy besides?
I think you have to conduct a war in the manner that you think will bring it to a close the quickest in order to prevent unneeded killing on both sides. And that manner of conducting the war will always be uncertain and subject to second guessing based on subsequent information and ideas of “right and wrong.”
Cyberpundit
Early efforts at strategic bombing by Germany and Britain in WWI laid the foundations for what was to be expected in a future war, whether it was against conventions or not. Both sides targeted cities, Britain doing so in retaliation for initial German attacks. It was expected to occur in future war. From here
That said, I’m afraid I am going to have to agree with MMI that further discussion of the morality of Allied (and Axis) bombing in WWII is deserving of its own thread.
Mr. Svinlesha
The ‘of’ is a typo, it should read ‘or,’ I caught this after submitting but assumed the ‘either’ following it would make the meaning clear, apologies if it wasn’t. What I am questioning is not whether alternatives existed; I am questioning whether they would have been better. I have never argued that Truman dropped the bomb because he had no choice. While some in positions of authority questioned the use of the atomic bomb, there was no serious question amongst any in power that I am aware of to cease the strategic bombing of Japan even if the use of the atomic bomb and/or invasion were to be held off. The USAAF was planning on delivering 850,000 tons of incendiary bombs on Japanese cites from July 1945 through February 1946. I have also never heard any argument made that the US considered ending the naval blockade of Japan, which was producing starvation amongst the Japanese people. While Alperovitz may argue that ‘most’ Army leaders didn’t consider an invasion *necessary * for Japan’s surrender, this is a statement of fact with regards to time. The bombing and blockade would eventually produce Japanese surrender, but estimates were that this would not occur until mid or late 1946. Considering that conventional bombing had already killed more Japanese than both of the atomic bombs did the loss of life in another year of strategic bombing at a greater tempo than what had already occurred would have been vast indeed. Regardless, the decision to invade had already been made and the massive preparations required for an endeavor of this magnitude were well under way. Just Operation Olympic alone would have been a larger invasion than any that had preceded it, either in Europe or the Pacific.
With regards to the blow to Japanese morale from a Russian declaration of war and the clarification of the terms of unconditional surrender to include an assurance that Hihohito would not be executed, I’d point out two things. General Otozo Yamada, the commander of the Kwantung army in Manchuria, continued to fight for two days until he had written verification of the Emperor’s surrender broadcast, which he had heard. The other is that
Bolding is mine, from Soldiers of the Sun by Meirion and Susie Harries. Non-execution of the Emperor wasn’t the only thing keeping the Japanese military insisting on a continuation of the war. These terms were too reminiscent of Versailles to have any chance of their acceptance by the Allies.
Like David Simmons, I am myself one of those “unpatriotic whiners” who opposes GW’s adventurism. I also don’t enjoy seeing the perfectly valid phrase ‘historical revisionist’ turned into a dismissive slur.
