August 6th, 65 years ago.

[Archae]

It's coming up on 65 years since the destruction of Hiroshima.

I don't know what our leaders were thinking.
Before and after.

But I did have an uncle who was going from the European theater to the Japanese one.
He told me what it was like for him.
He had flown as top-turret gunner on many missions, bombing Germany.
But going to the Japanese theater scared the patooties out of him.
Japanese suicide planes were not only targeting ships.
They targeted planes as well.
How could they effectively fight against THAT?
Even if they did survive, Japanese camps for Allied prisoners were barbaric.
The lucky ones were slave laborers.

So one day, the radio has a special bulletin.
An atomic bomb was dropped on a Japanese city.

Within the next couple weeks, the Emperor himself intervened, and shamed the "Make war until we all die" Japanese factions into saying "That's enough."

So my uncle was able to come home, and was back in Wisconsin by November.

How many others felt the same way as my uncle?
How many still do?

[Ishoutandscream2]

1. My Grandfather in law

He was 18 and a marine. He was being sent to the so called Pacific theater. Who knows what could have happened. I'm just glad he made it, and lived until 2004.

[liberal N proud]

2. My father contends to this day that we would not be here if it were not for the bomb

He contends that he would have been in the first invasion of Japan had they not dropped the bombs.

If he would have survived is another set of what if you would have to play. He was among the first troops in Japan following the bombs, but never has really talked about what the experience was like.

[roguevalley]

23. my dad too. my dad and his brother were in the pacific fleet and

had to contend with kamikaze planes. My uncle was wounded in one attack. No one really knew how bad the bomb was. they just knew they didn't have to invade japan. On some of the islands, people were jumping off cliffs because they heard americans were cannibals. they fought to the last man in too many islands. They figured from the plans they made to invade japan if it came to that that about a million people would be dead and there would be such destruction as to not be believed. One of those moments in history when it could have gone either way.

[virgogal]

3. I remember the actual day. There was joy in my neighborhood in the

hope that the war would be over.

That's the way it was.

[Recursion]

4. What our leaders were thinking

Was probably something along the lines of "An invasion of Japan will kill 3 million people".

Also, "The firebomb campaigns we've been using are more deadly than this nuclear bomb, so now we can destroy the city without killing as many people".

[amandabeech]

25. The bomb was also brand new.

The mushroom cloud and the radiation burns were absolutely terrifying in part because no one had ever seen them before outside a few folks in the desert.

REally, I think that there was a certain amount of shock and awe involved, and it worked that time.

[Ozymanithrax]

5. My father fought through the Pacific theater.

My stepfather fought through the European theater, under Patton.

All my uncles, except those that died in World War II, fought; some in Africa, Italy, the Pacifc.

Not one of them I knew every complained that the war was cut short by the use of the Atomic Bomb.

[av8rdave]

6. I wrestle with the bomb in my head often

I remember Curtis LeMay's attitude about the bomb - that it's just another weapon (met him once, btw...was not impressed).

Then I start asking myself....was he right, in which case the use of ANY bomb is evil, or was he wrong and nukes represented a new level of evil?

It's hard to argue with the posters here about the consequences of NOT having used the bomb to end the war in the Pacific. Still, it presents quite the moral dilemma.

[Hawkowl]

33. Fire bombing

Fire bombing Tokyo and Dresden killed far more people than the atom bombing of Hiroshima. Both types of bombs are evil. However, it isn't the single nuclear bomb that is so scary, it is the concept of nuclear war and the resultant extinction of civilization that is beyond evil.

[av8rdave]

38. Well put.

[unkachuck]

7. hmmmm....

"Japanese suicide planes were not only targeting ships.
They targeted planes as well.
How could they effectively fight against THAT?"

....so instead of using an atomic weapon against the Japanese military, we slaughtered civilian women, children and old people in a most horrific way....makes sense....

[Archae]

11. Hiroshima was a part of the war.

There was a military base in the city, and war industries were scattered throughout Hiroshima.

How many civilians were slaughtered to destroy war industries in Tokyo? Berlin?

[nomorenomore08]

19. But an invasion of Japan would likely have killed many times more civilians.

And what third option could possibly have ended the war?

As horrific as Hiroshima and Nagasaki were, it's hard not to see the bombings, in hindsight, as the lesser of two evils. As much as it turns my stomach to say so. :(

[unkachuck]

62. "...an invasion of Japan would likely have killed many times more civilians."

....but a demonstration of the atomic bombs' awesome potential wouldn't have....

[roguevalley]

24. carpet bombing the country as they did in Germany could have

been an option and would have been a thousand times worse than europe due to wooden construction of houses and the density of their buildings. the lesser of two very evil evils. The idea is to prevent war but when it starts bad things happen. its easy to sit back later and judge. very easy.

[Hawkowl]

35. Japan WAS "carpet bombed"

The reason Hiroshima was chosen was there weren't any larger Japanese cities left standing. Tokyo had already been razed by incendiaries and several times in 1945 lost over 100,000 people PER NIGHT.

It is probable that several million people died in bombing Japan EXCLUDING nuclear weapons. These people are no less dead than those killed by atom bombs.

[Recursion]

37. Thats the point. The Bomb killed half as many people as napalming Tokyo

But still destroyed the city. Same objective met; fewer civilian casualties.

[proteus_lives]

29. Hiroshima was part of the war.

And it was total war.

[nadinbrzezinski]

30. Three points

1.- Hiroshima was the factory for MITSUBISHI... which MADE military planes. Guess what was in the target zone?

2.- Nobody knew what it would do in such a place.

3.- Operation Olympic is calculated to have led to 3+ million allied casualties and over 1+ of Japanese Casualties, quite a few, most in fact, civilian.

But I am positive you knew that.

Hell, the only reason why we haven't had a TOTAL WAR like WW II is Hiroshima\Nagasaki. It is called Mutually Assured Destruction. But the memories are getting so fuzzy, that I expect to see a total war in my lifetime.

[Romulox]

54. Did the Japanese refrain from attacking civilian targets, or was that a "white man's burden"?

:hi:

[unkachuck]

63. then 911 was justified....n/t

[Romulox]

65. I have no idea what "justified" means.

911 happened. What do your "justifications" change or not change? Who do they bring back to life?

If nobody, then perhaps this issue doesn't turn on after-the-fact "justifications", after all. :wtf:

[SheilaT]

8. I was born after the war.

So I have no personal memories, and my father was stationed stateside.

Some years back I discovered that the college I was attending had bound issues of Life Magazine, starting with issue 1, which came out in November, 1936. I started reading them sequentially, and made it up through the first quarter of 1945 before I moved to another part of the country and haven't been able to resume reading them. Because Life was published weekly, and because I read them in order, it's as if I was around then, and I feel as if I recall the event leading up to WWII, and most of the war itself.

I can tell you that as of the end of March 1945, the war in Germany is almost over, just a matter of time. But we'll be fighting in Japan for at least another year, and we're going to have to invade them and they'll fight practically to the last man, woman and child. The loss of life on both sides will be beyond imagining. We'll lose most of a generation of our own men, and will need to destroy Japan, and kill probably half of its people before it's over.

But it didn't happen that way, did it? As terrible as the bomb was, and as inclined as I am to agree that the second one, the one on Nagasaki didn't need to be dropped, I think the first one did have to happen.

[pengillian101]

15. Life Magazine is archived online.

http://books.google.com/books?id=R1cEAAAAMBAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s#all_issues_anchor

:-)

[SheilaT]

52. It's not the same.

You can't just click on the issue on-line and start reading, page by page. You have to search for a specific article or topic.

The advertisements were at least as interesting and informative, and in some ways even more so than the actual content.

For example, the extent to which we went to a war economy isn't really conveyed by the articles. It's the advertisements, in which you're assured that after the war you'll be able to buy new furniture, or a television set to see your favorite entertainers such as Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, or how to make your sheets (yes, your sheets!) last indefinitely.

I could go on and on, and sometimes I do.

[RamboLiberal]

59. I just checked the site and you can read issue by issue

Click Read this magazine. Ads and all are there.

Still probably more fun to have the actual magazine to page through.

[SheilaT]

64. Aha! I navigated it wrong and didn't

quite figure it out the first time. Thanks for getting me to go back.

I may go back and try to find out how the war ended ;)

But it's still not the same as actually handling the real thing, and turning those wonderful, big pages.

[Angry Dragon]

9. As i read through the posts I was thinking

which country is going to step forward to advocate for less war to save this blob in the universe that we call Earth.

We are destroying our only home. Even animals know not to shit where they sleep.

[proteus_lives]

10. It was the best card in a bad hand.

The atomic bombing were the right decision to make.

Both my grandfathers would been involved with the invasion if they hadn't.

[reformist2]

14. Why did there have to be an invasion?

Serious question. I never asked it in high school.

[proteus_lives]

28. The Allies were confronted with several unsavory options.

1. Atomic bombs, which they used and they ended the war.

2. Blockade and bombing. A full-on naval blockade would have starved the civilian population of Japan before the army. Millions dead. The bombing run of 1944-45 had killed hundreds of thousands already and Japan refused to throw in the towel. Plus air-wars have never been as effective as the military hoped they would be.

3. Let the Soviets invade. The Soviets were powering through Northern China and Stalin would not have cared about the horrific casualties. The Western allies didn't want to see a Soviet-controlled Japan. They were already seeing the effects of USSR-domination in Eastern Europe.

4. Invasion. Google Operation: Olympic and Operation: Downfall for more information. In short, it was predicted that Allied forces would suffer over 1 million KIA/WIA/MIA in the invasion. Predicted Japanese casualties rates were much, much higher. The invasion would have been a blood-bath. The U.S. predicted this after seeing the suicidal defense by the Japanese on the islands of Saipan, Tarawa, Okinawa and Iwo Jima.

In short, the atomic bombing were awful but the others options were much worse.

[maryf]

12. Watch the video in this link,

scroll down the page to the video of a map how many nuclear explosions on the planet, crazy...wait a second for it to start, gets nuts...

The ends did not justify the means...the ends haven't stopped...

[lunatica]

13. It used to bother me until I watched The Pacific by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks

It's a ten hour series based on true stories of the marines who went to fight in the islands in the Pacific. The characters were based on the stories of four marines who were there. The actual marines, now in their 80s talked during the program. One who became a national hero for running back and forth past the enemy to bring ammunition to some of his men who were pinned down by enemy fire was forced to return to help the war effort. He went back and got killed saving other marines who were storming a beach. He kept running back to scream at them and pull them and push them to the relative safety of the vegetation. It was very intense because you feel like you're right in the middle of it.

For the first time I understand how Truman must have thought it was the only way to end the war. The Japanese never gave an inch no matter that it cost them their lives. The fighting was unrelenting. The storming of the beaches was like walking into a wall of firepower. Dead marines lay piled on top of each other on the beaches as far as you could see on either side and the rear marines had to run and crawl and scramble over the dead bodies to get into the vegetation. They went without food many times because the Japanese managed to keep supply ships from delivering food. The marines had to go on long exhausting patrols to root the Japanese out of the caves they had built on the islands. The marines really suffered during those years, both physically and psychologically. They had to do it again and again on those tiny insignificant islands. The number of deaths was horrendous.

The real marines who were there said the series was very realistic and true to the facts of that war. They talked about islands infested with rats and hot and miserable weather and not having enough food or water or dry clothes for months on end. During rainy season they had to slog through sticky mud. Many of them were reduced to acting like animals. Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks don't glorify a thing in that series. They also don't demonize anyone either.

I'm not so sure about being so critical of the US using the atom bombs anymore. I don't like it but I understand the reasons it was done.

[roguevalley]

26. there are videos of people jumping off cliffs because they thought

americans were cannibals. their leadership including the emperor, ESPECIALLY the emperor were bastards to do this to their people.

[MicaelS]

16. My opinion has always been

That if the bomb has been available 6-12 months sooner, or the war lasted 6-12 months longer, then Berlin would have been the first target. Those who now condemn the use of the bombs on Japan would not have said a thing about their use on Germany. Their attitude would have been that the dirty Fascists got what they deserved.

The Nazis were executing more people toward the end of the war in the concentration camps because they had perfected the mechanical means of the Holocaust. How many Jews, Poles, Gypsies, homosexuals and others might have been saved if the war in Europe had ended 6-12 months sooner?

Those scientists who worked on the bomb (many of the Jewish refugees from Hitler) did not seem to develop scruples until it was clear that Germany would no longer be the target. They knew for a fact that Berlin, and its civilians would certainly be the main target. They certainly didn’t have any concerns about German civilians being killed.

And for those who cry moral outrage I see no difference between the fire-bombing of Dresden, Tokyo and other Japanese cities and the atomic bombings. Dead is dead.

The Japanese were just as bad as the Nazis. But too many people weep tears for the “victims" of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as if the Japanese did nothing to start the war in Asia. The Chinese suffered between 20-35 million casualties during the Japanese invasion of China (1937-1945). The Japanese forced Korean women into sexual slavery as “comfort women” in field brothels where the women were forced to sexually service, as many as 70 Japanese soldiers a day. In other words these women were raped 70 times a day for years on end. Everywhere the Japanese conquered, they acted like barbarians toward Allied POWs and civilians. The Japanese beat, starved, tortured and executed men and women. They used living human beings as living test subjects in their infamous biological warfare Unit 731.

I might not be here today if the bomb had not been used. My father was a crew chief on B-17s in the states (due to he was a only son). If Operation Downfall had occurred he might have been sent to the Pacific, and died there. So I have a personal interest in the issue.

I think if Truman had not used the bomb out of moral scruples, and Operation Downfall had gone ahead, then America would have suffered terrible casualties. The truth about the bomb would have come out. And I think Truman would have been impeached.

People these days find it easy to take some moral high-ground when they are not involved in a war to the knife for the future of civilization.

[csziggy]

17. My Dad was on a submarine in the Pacific for the last year of the war

He does not talk about it, but he gets upset with the people who second guess the decision to drop the bomb. He knows from first hand experience how hard the Japanese were willing to fight.

Mom was a Navy nurse stationed at a hospital in Hawaii. She treated many of the men injured fighting for the Pacific islands - at least the ones that survived long enough to get to Hawaii. She knows how hard the battles were for those tiny pieces of land. She's never voiced an objection to the use of the atomic bomb.

And from what I have learned, the second bomb was necessary - the factions in Japan who thought they could keep fighting did not believe that a second atomic weapon was possible. When the bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, it shook them up - they could no longer be sure how many more atomic bombs the US could have.

[roguevalley]

27. same with my uncles and cousins. my uncle made it as far as

bougainville before getting blasted and hauled out. he was a first marine on guadalcanal during the first landing and then abandonment by the fleet. people who actually were in the fight have a lot to say with their silence about the situation they faced.

[Scurrilous]

67. My uncle was on the USS Trigger.

It was sunk 4 months before the end of the war.

[slackmaster]

18. 'tis the Season!

:nuke: :nuke: :nuke: :nuke: :nuke: :nuke: :nuke: :nuke: :nuke: :nuke:

[Recovered Repug]

20. My father was scheduled to be part of the invasion of Japan.

Aug 6, 1945, was his 24th birthday. He never accepted another birthday present in his life. He always said "That SOB Truman gave me the best birthday present I could ever get". Not really sure what he had against Truman, though.

[spiritual_gunfighter]

21. My grandfather was a pilot in the Pacific Theater

They were getting ready for a full scale blitzkrieg of Tokyo, but then Hiroshima and Nagisaki happened and they surrendered. I often wonder if I would even be living today had we not dropped the bomb. It is a strange thing to think about.

[verges]

22. My Dad was a young 1st Lt. and

would have been one of the first boots on the beach had the invasion happened. And probably one of the first body bags. He was relieved.

[nadinbrzezinski]

31. This is not well known

but your dad would have been joined by a division of Mexican Marines at zero hour, with three more to come. We were so low on troops that Mexico was ready to send more troops, while Brazil (Which saved our bacon in the Southern Atlantic and had troops in Italy) was moving troops too.

This is how few troops we had...

Yes, I knew a young (at the time) medic, for the Mexican Squadron who was already fighting in the Pacific... he had orders, as well as a few other people he knew.

[MicaelS]

34. I never knew that....

I read one of the few books about Operation Downfall, but don't remember that in there. I believe you, though.

Code-Name Downfall: The Secret Plan to Invade Japan-And Why Truman Dropped the Bomb

EDIT: another bit of trivia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall

Nearly 500,000 Purple Heart medals were manufactured in anticipation of the casualties resulting from the invasion of Japan. To the present date, all the American military casualties of the sixty years following the end of World War II—including the Korean and Vietnam Wars—have not exceeded that number. In 2003, there were still 120,000 of these Purple Heart medals in stock. There are so many in surplus that combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan are able to keep Purple Hearts on-hand for immediate award to wounded soldiers on the field

[nadinbrzezinski]

46. Most people know of US particpation in the war

we are lucky when people realize the Russians and English were also part of operations.

The minor powers that were part of the war... well there is a reason why it was a world war, and unlike the world series, it was global. The Mexican squadron was the 201, and it flew escort missions for American bombers in the Pacific, as well as straight patrol missions.

The Brazilians had their own battle of the Atlantic, that kept the lanes free for the landings on Africa.

Ah the history of the war involved far more powers than most people realize.

[pengillian101]

36. Thanks for sharing that memory .

:)

[Dreamer Tatum]

32. The Japanese didn't ratify the Geneva Convention before WWII

And through their barbarity in Nanking, Bataan, and their maniacal defense of every square centimeter of land DESPITE being completely vanquished, we were prudent to drop the bombs.

You sow a reputation for ferocity, you reap what you sow.

[Odin2005]

39. "I am become Death, the shatter of worlds"

[defendandprotect]

57. Men studied physics for 300 years and what they came up with . . .

was an atomic bomb!

And who will mourn for the US should something so dreadful ever be done to us - ?





:)

[jimlup]

40. There is strong historical evidence that the A-bomb was not the primary reason for Japan's surrender

Nor did it save "a million American lives", as the common but false meme would have people believe.

Japan's war council didn't even know what had happened to Hiroshima when they surrendered. They had reports, so the knew something catastrophic had happened. But what put them over the edge was the Soviet declaration of war.

Historical documents (Harold Stimson's diary) show that Truman could have sought peace on exactly the conditions that were achieved well before the bombs were actually dropped.

In my opinion the dropping of the A-bombs on Japan was a blatant war crime. Though not even true, the normal justification is that of a war crime. Trading civilian lives (Hiroshima) for American soldiers is not a sufficient justification for this massive war crime.

[Dreamer Tatum]

41. Go read up on Japan's military history before you start tossing "war crime" around

Japanese leadership sealed the fate of those civilians.

And you have NO IDEA how many lives were saved by not invading Japan, so you can't say what is false. All we had at the time was the experience of the irrational tenacity of the Japanese soldier to judge the response to an invasion.

[jimlup]

49. I have actually, rather extensively

Hiroshima was a blatant WAR CRIME committed by my government and I'm not tossing it around. I claim it is a blatant FACT. It is hard to imagine how killing 130,000 people in a flash of an atom bomb could be justified even if the historical propaganda is true, which it isn't. You might want to do a little reading yourself. Of course you'll have to seek sources beyond the obvious "let's agree with the propaganda of the moment" folks.

[Dreamer Tatum]

50. I see. Proof by way of Capitalization.

Can you at least be consistent and call anything Japan did a "war crime" as well?

I'm guessing not.

[jimlup]

51. You guess wrong...

I certainly agree that Japan committed rather serious war crimes during WWII. Bombing Pear Harbor was certainly one of them. There are many more.

If you are interesting in having a serious discussion then I would be willing to share more information. If you are interested in ridiculing me for my views then I would rather end this discussion now.

[Dreamer Tatum]

53. You will NEVER convince me that Hiroshima/Nagasaki were war crimes.

So no point talking about it.

[jimlup]

55. That you are so completely closed to even considering the possiblity sorta makes my case...

Just sayin'

[VMI Dem]

42. I salute our leaders for doing it.

[tjwash]

43. Nice avatar

[VMI Dem]

44. Thanks.

Its what the bombings lead to.

[Archae]

45. With A-bombs, correct.

The world was so horrified by what those two bombs did, nuclear weapons have never been used since then. Ever.

[closeupready]

48. It stands for peace, not pacifism.

n/t

[closeupready]

47. I'm with your uncle. It's not like Pearl Harbor had banners, "Japan, come bomb me!"

n/t

[defendandprotect]

56. Japan was ready to surrender . . .

it looks like America was involved in a power play -- what's new?

Most military advisers -- Like IKE - and many more were against it --

And, in fact, despite the bombs, there were other interests at play trying

to take troops into Vietnam, even after Japan surrendered.

Yeah -- power games -- and still going on.

. . . "until we all die" -- !!

[proteus_lives]

60. Well, you got that wrong. No surprises here.

:rofl:

[defendandprotect]

68. Yep -- I'm sure Ike and the gang had no idea what they were dealing with -- !!

IKE was against dropping the atomic weapons --

[Old Troop]

58. My father swore that he only survived the war because of the bomb.

He had been fighting in the Pacific since mid-1942 as a member of an Army amphibian unit. When the bomb dropped he was fighting in the Philippines with the certainty that his organization would participate in the invasion of Japan sometime in October 1945. He never really talked about the war except when I was commissioned as a 2LT. Then he told one story -- a new lieutenant that had been a martinet during the train up for the invasion of Luzon shot himself in the leg as the landing craft headed to the beaches. The soldiers on the craft allowed him to bleed out. When my parents died, I found a large packet of his letters home when I was cleaning out their house. It showed me a personality 180 degrees from the kind and gentle man that I knew. He also exulted about how the bomb was his ticket home.

[mohinoaklawnillinois]

61. My father was in the Pacific in the Phillipines in August with

Dugout Doug and he knew where he was going next. He always said that dropping the bombs on Japan, saved his life. As I've gotten older and seen how the Japanese were fanatics in defending Iwo Jima and Okinawa, I can only imagine what the loss of life on both sides would have been if the Allies had invaded the home islands of Japan.

I know that LeMay's bombing campaign had made most of Japan a wasteland as well but I still think that Truman was justified in his use of the bombs. He wanted the war to be over along with millions of people around the world.

[Romulox]

66. I think it is a very unhealthy trend for we in the West to play into Japan's WWII victim revisionism

Japan was the aggressor in WWII. The real victims were the millions of civilians on the Asian continent killed by the Japanese Imperial Army. Somehow the modern Japanese (or more accurately, their fetishists here in the West) tend to forget about that last part around this time of the year.

[Old Troop]

69. Very good point. A significant number of Korean slaves and allied

POW slave laborers were killed/injured by the blast. They had been forced to work in the "nonexistent" war industries operating in Hiroshima.

[WolverineDG]

70. +1000

My college algebra prof was one of those civilians, held by the Japanese in Manila from 1941 until the end. He had health problems for the rest of his life because of the starvation he endured. And he was one of the ones who survived.

And yet, on DU, I'm supposed to feel more sorry for the Japanese civilians who died in the bomb blasts.

Nope.

dg