The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki - Justified?

[Chukada1]

What good does apologizing for something their grandparents did 65+ years ago do?

It settles an issue. Something that holds Japan back. Better to apologize now and make real contributions to those still alive that went through the war, than wait until their dead. Japan needs to apologize as a nation by recognizing what happened when military took over their country and the results of welcoming this military take-over.

The Emperor got to keep his throne. Many war criminals received amnesty because of Cold War politics and racism. You cannot change the past, but you can recognize it for what it is, instead of downplaying events and playing victim.

If not for those killed outside of Japan, by the Japanese military. Then at least do it for the social consciousness of the Japanese people. Because they would not be just apologizing to Chinese, Koreans, Americans, ect. They would be apologizing to all those young men and women who were thrown into the meat grinder in the name of protecting some old decaying war criminals and their wild dogs. They would be at the very least, recognizing the horrors that the Japanese inflicted on themselves.

[Kitsunegari]

It settles an issue. Something that holds Japan back. Better to apologize now and make real contributions to those still alive that went through the war, than wait until their dead. Japan needs to apologize as a nation by recognizing what happened when military took over their country and the results of welcoming this military take-over.

The Emperor got to keep his throne. Many war criminals received amnesty because of Cold War politics and racism. You cannot change the past, but you can recognize it for what it is, instead of downplaying events and playing victim.

If not for those killed outside of Japan, by the Japanese military. Then at least do it for the social consciousness of the Japanese people. Because they would not be just apologizing to Chinese, Koreans, Americans, ect. They would be apologizing to all those young men and women who were thrown into the meat grinder in the name of protecting some old decaying war criminals and their wild dogs. They would be at the very least, recognizing the horrors that the Japanese inflicted on themselves.

How do you "apologize as a nation"? I think people blow the revisionist issue out of proportion due to the fact Japan is different from Germany and doesn't suppress dissident opinions.

[Chukada1]

How do you "apologize as a nation"? I think people blow the revisionist issue out of proportion due to the fact Japan is different from Germany and doesn't suppress dissident opinions.

Compensate victims.
Remove war criminals from Sacred Shrine.
Declare Emperor Hirohito and the royal family responsible.

It is only difficult when one says its too difficult.

[Kitsunegari]

Compensate victims.

Hasn't this already been done? I'm not sure exactly how much and it is hard to tell which reports are accurate.

Remove war criminals from Sacred Shrine.

I was under the impression that this is not a subsidiary of the Japanese government.

Declare Emperor Hirohito and the royal family responsible.

That doesn't really do justice to the reality of events.

[sephodwyrm]

Hasn't this already been done?

Yeah. Get a move on.
Israelis should stop taking money from Germany as well. Hasn't the Germans being paying them enough already?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/...5AN12E20091125

Whiners, just...stop. Do it like the Red Army. Build up, beat them back and invade their capital. Ruin half of the country and give 1/5 of it to the Poles. It does more justice.

PLUS: Soviets do not ask for compensation.

[Ludicus]

Nothing justifies the slaughter of people not physically involved.

Exactly, nothing justifies the instant vaporization of two entire cities.

Savage brutality...

In 23 December,1948 seven top Japanese leaders were executed for their war crimes, and "In addition to the central Tokyo trial, various tribunals sitting outside Japan judged some 5,000 Japanese guilty of war crimes, of whom more than 900 were executed".Justice was done, at least partially. When justice is done, a righteous person is delighted.

...leads to reprisals

But the Japanese war crimes should not be an excuse for a barbaric and completely disproportionate atomic retaliation. The atomic bombs were used to put an immediate end to the war, but we can't dismiss revenge as at least a partial motivation.
----
Take note, in 1950, the President of the US stated,
"The wears of the future would be one in which man could extinguish millions at one blow, demolish the great cities of the world, wipe out the cultural achievements of the past.....such war is not a possible policy for rational man" (Public Papers, 1953)
I agree, Mr. President,according to your own words, the atomic vaporization of the Japanese cities is the byproduct of an irrational decision.

Curiously, in the same year,1950,when asked if the atomic bomb would be used in North Korea/China against civilian or military targets Truman responded,
"Its a matter that military people will decide, there has been always active consideration of its use" and he said he was not an military authority that passes on this things; he added that the military commander in the field will have charge of the use of the weapons was he always has.
Mr President,is the atomic bombing of Korea and China against civilian populations a "matter that military people will decide" or is it an irrational policy? and who ordered the atomic bomb to be dropped on Japan?
And imediatly after he added, "its a terrible weapon and should not be used on innocent men,women and children..this happens when its used"
Are you talking seriously, Mr President? or is the bomb "merely another powerful weapon in the arsenal of righteousness"?
It's time to decide once and for all, Mr President, because a double standard implies two different treatments of the same thing.

[Kitsunegari]

Yeah. Get a move on.
Israelis should stop taking money from Germany as well. Hasn't the Germans being paying them enough already?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/...5AN12E20091125

Yes and it would be better for both sides to move on from this parasitic relationship.

Whiners, just...stop. Do it like the Red Army. Build up, beat them back and invade their capital. Ruin half of the country and give 1/5 of it to the Poles. It does more justice.

Or just stop trying to settle scores completely and work on improving your lot and making the future better.

If the past sits in judgment on the present, the future will be lost.

[Chukada1]

Hasn't this already been done? I'm not sure exactly how much and it is hard to tell which reports are accurate.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4855640.stm

Japan has generally refused to pay damages to Chinese claimants, despite repeated accusations that it has not properly atoned for its wartime brutality.

I was under the impression that this is not a subsidiary of the Japanese government.

Then the government can ban politicians to pay respects to the shrine until those names are removed. Is the Japanese government powerless to do anything?

That doesn't really do justice to the reality of events.

Why not? Why is the head of state and the royal family, a family that had many members in the government and military offices, not responsible for the actions of their military? I don't remember them being locked up during the military takeover. They sat on the throne while Japan was butchering millions of people, and forcing their own youth to commit suicide.

Exactly, nothing justifies the instant vaporization of two entire cities.

Nothing justifies the vaporization of two cities by the Japanese government. The Japanese leadership are the ones responsible for the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They are the ones that we should be questioning.

In 23 December,1948 seven top Japanese leaders were executed for their war crimes, and "In addition to the central Tokyo trial, various tribunals sitting outside Japan judged some 5,000 Japanese guilty of war crimes, of whom more than 900 were executed".Justice was done, at least partially. When justice is done, a righteous person is delighted.

Do not talk about philosophy with me. This isn't about philosophy. It took a Chinese judge to argue for the death penalty. The most serious punishment for the most serious crime. What happened to the "doctors" in charge of Unit 731? Many of them became leading business leaders in pharmaceutics after the war, because of their connections they gained during the slaughter of a million people. Partial justice is not justice in the same way that .05% of an apology is not a full apology. Lastly, those men who were tried, many of them were protecting the Emperor and royal family, they died because the men responsible for the entire thing, threw them at the people as human shields. The royal family was not touched, that is a miscarriage of justice.

But the Japanese war crimes should not be an excuse for a barbaric and completely disproportionate atomic retaliation. The atomic bombs were used to put an immediate end to the war, but we can't dismiss revenge as at least a partial motivation.

Unless you rightfully place the blame at the feet of the Emperor and his royal family, as well as the leadership of the Japanese government, who were bestowed the duty to protect the Japanese people. In their cowering they allowed monsters to escalate the depreciation of humanity to a point where human life became worth less than the bullets being fired by the Americans, and in some cases, joined in on that downward spiral to savagery.

In short: You have a man that was given infinite wealth and power, in return to be the heart of the Japanese people. A man who either agreed with the slaughter of so many Japanese people he was supposed to represent, or was too cowardly to do his duty and speak out against criminals who betrayed the people. Who got to live with all that wealth and power after the war, even though he committed the most serious crime imaginable. He sat by and enjoyed that gluttony, while Japan was being ripped apart from the inside. The Emperor and royal family should have been tried for treason.

The atomic bombs should not be excused by Japan's war crimes, nor should Japanese war crimes be exonerated and forgotten because a few technologically advanced bombs were dropped. More importantly, we should not forget who was actually responsible, and forget the criminals who allowed their countrymen to be slaughtered, just to protect themselves from the justice that was the Allied Coalition.

----
Take note, in 1950, the President of the US stated,
"The wears of the future would be one in which man could extinguish millions at one blow, demolish the great cities of the world, wipe out the cultural achievements of the past.....such war is not a possible policy for rational man" (Public Papers, 1953)
I agree, Mr. President,according to your own words, the atomic vaporization of the Japanese cities is the byproduct of an irrational decision.

Curiously, in the same year,1950,when asked if the atomic bomb would be used in North Korea/China against civilian or military targets Truman responded,
"Its a matter that military people will decide, there has been always active consideration of its use" and he said he was not an military authority that passes on this things; he added that the military commander in the field will have charge of the use of the weapons was he always has.
Mr President,is the atomic bombing of Korea and China against civilian populations a "matter that military people will decide" or is it an irrational policy? and who ordered the atomic bomb to be dropped on Japan?
And imediatly after he added, "its a terrible weapon and should not be used on innocent men,women and children..this happens when its used"
Are you talking seriously, Mr President? or is the bomb "merely another powerful weapon in the arsenal of righteousness"?
It's time to decide once and for all, Mr President, because a double standard implies two different treatments of the same thing.

You are comparing China and Korea to the country that invaded and slaughtered millions of people in those respective countries? That takes a certain level of disconnect. Asians captured by the Japanese had a 27.5% survival rate, Chinese considerably less so, with eight long years of war, hundreds of thousands killed and captured, only 56 Chinese soldiers were returned when Japan surrendered. Did China and Korea kill more than 99% of all American POWs? Did China test biological weapons on American populations, resulting in the death of at least another million people? Lastly, should the atomic bombs be dropped on Grenada during the American invasion? Because it would be hypocritical not to drop them, because all wars are fought for reasons that are all equal.

At least try. There is a big difference between Japan invading Korea, China, Philippines, Indonesia, Indochina, Malaysia, and butchering all those populations in the name of conquest, to China warning the United States that war will be the result of units reaching the Yalu River, then acting upon that warning when the Americans call their bluff, at a time where the United States and Taiwan seemed to be forming bridgeheads for an invasion force. The Korean War was a defensive war, although wrongly fought. The wars Japan caused, can hardly be called defensive. The populations affected, can hardly be comparable.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In summery, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was not justified and the Japanese government and royal family should be punished for vaporizing those two cities. Not enough people understand those events.

A person shouldn't argue without learning, especially when they are fully oblivious to historical facts. You might sound sympathetic to the Japanese civilians killed during the war, but you are not. If you were, you would understand that the greatest threat to their existence was not the United States war machine, it was the leaders of Japan themselves, who dictated millions of lives should be wasted in a nonsensical war of fetishism, just to satisfy the fantasies of old, selfish, and affluent men.

Asking if the Atomic bombs were justified, is like asking, should we kill one man in order to save one hundred, and oh yeah, we don't have a choice because if we don't act, a million men will die instead. They were not justified, but they were necessary. You can argue if Nagasaki was needed, but the bombs themselves. They were justice, they were just aimed at the wrong target.

[Ludicus]

Nothing justifies the vaporization of two cities by the Japanese government... we don't have a choice because if we don't act, a million men will die instead

A completely new interpretation of the WW2 history.

The atomic bombs should not be excused by Japan's war crimes

I believe you are contradicting yourself with that statement.

They were not justified , but they were necessary

There are cases which are "justified (or not) by necessity" (already discussed, previous posts)

The royal family was not touched,..in their cowering they allowed monsters to escalate the depreciation of humanity...

The Royal family was left untouched by the USA.

bombs ..They were justice, they were just aimed at the wrong target.

There is no justice, when thousands of innocents civilians are a wrong target, especially when the "right target" (according to your reasoning,the royal family) was left untouched by the USA.

You are comparing China and Korea to the country that invaded and slaughtered millions of people in those respective countries?

Truman, not me. Truman clearly stated that even in Korea/China he was also prepared to use atomic bombs against innocent civilian populations.
"when asked if the atomic bomb would be used in North Korea/China against civilian or military targets Truman responded, "Its a matter that military people will decide"

The wars Japan caused, can hardly be called defensive

Completely true. But make no mistake, there are no "just wars". USA wars outside the USA can hardly be called defensive: Spanish-American war,Dewey in the Philippines, Commodore Perry in Japan, Vietnam, Kuwait, Iraq. United States has always benign intentions when it intervenes in other countries. John T. Flynn,
"The enemy aggressor is always pursuing a course of larceny, murder, rapine and barbarism. We are always moving forward with high mission, a destiny imposed by the Deity to regenerate our victims, while incidentally capturing their markets; to civilise savage and senile and paranoid peoples, while blundering accidentally into their oil wells"

A person shouldn't argue without learning, especially when they are fully oblivious to historical facts

That´s precisely my point of view.

[Chukada1]

A completely new interpretation of the WW2 history.

Why? Who was responsible for so many dead Germans? Was it the French? The Soviets? The British? The Americans? Or was it the Nazi Party.

You are contradicting yourself.

Japanese atrocities doesn't excuse the atomic bombs, because the atomic bombs are the fault of the Japanese government and royal family.

The Royal family was left untouched by the USA.

This is the miscarriage of justice.

There is no justice, when thousands of innocents civilians are a wrong target, especially when the "right target" (according to your reasoning,the royal family) was left untouched by the USA.

Like I said, the bombs were justice, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not. They were however disproportionate to Japanese war crimes. Japanese war crimes were much worse.

Truman, not me. Truman clearly stated that even in Korea/China he was also prepared to use atomic bombs against innocent civilian populations.
"when asked if the atomic bomb would be used in North Korea/China against civilian or military targets Truman responded, "Its a matter that military people will decide"

Which became a political nightmare. Anyways, nobody cares what some American had to say about the matter, today. This isn't a "Is Truman justified in being Truman" Thread. Truman did not make the Japanese kill almost every single Chinese POW, Truman did not make Japan butcher civilians.

Completely true. But make no mistake, there are no "just wars". USA wars outside the USA can hardly be called defensive: Spanish-American war,Dewey in the Philippines, Commodore Perry in Japan, Vietnam, Kuwait, Iraq. United States has always benign intentions when it intervenes in other countries. John T. Flynn,
"The enemy aggressor is always pursuing a course of larceny, murder, rapine and barbarism. We are always moving forward with high mission, a destiny imposed by the Deity to regenerate our victims, while incidentally capturing their markets; to civilise savage and senile and paranoid peoples, while blundering accidentally into their oil wells"

The main point is that the royal family being the head of state, was responsible for the suffering of all those Japanese civilians, they conscripted them and used them as cannon fodder for their war of conquests, not the Americans, or they allowed old men to do this, without resisting. Which is failing your post if you are supposed to be the Emperor.

[Ludicus]

Why? Who was responsible for so many dead Germans?...Or was it the Nazi Party.

By the way, why is the American Nazi Party allowed to function in the USA?
---
Richard Crossman, Assistant Chief of the Psychological Warfare Division of SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force). A brilliant classical scholar at Oxford University,

"The usual explanation -- or excuse -- is that strategic bombing was only adopted by the Western powers as a method of retaliation in a total war started by totalitarians. This is at best a half-truth. The Nazis and the Communists dabbled in terror raids on civilian targets. But they were old-fashioned and imperialist enough to hold that the aim of war is not to destroy the enemy, but to defeat his armies in the field, to occupy his country, and exploit its resources. That is why both Stalin and Hitler preferred to use their air power, not as a separate weapon of unlimited war, but as a tactical adjunct to conventional land and sea operations. In fact, the only nations which applied the theory of unlimited war really systematically were the two great Western democracies.

Yet, at first sight, terror bombing seems to me, as an Englishman, a form of warfare repugnant to our national temperament, and utterly unsuited to an island people, itself hopelessly vulnerable to indiscriminate air attack. And I suspect that most Americans also feel that it does not conform with the traditions of the American way of life"

---

because the atomic bombs are the fault of the Japanese government and royal family

It seems to me that they never asked to be bombed.

They were however disproportionate to Japanese war crimes. Japanese war crimes were much worse

Mark Selden, Coordinator of the open access journal The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, a Senior Research Associate in the East Asia Program at Cornell University, and Bartle Professor of History and Sociology at Binghamton University, a specialist on the modern and contemporary geopolitics,

A Forgotten Holocaust: US Bombing Strategy, the Destruction of Japanese Cities and the American Way of War from World War II to Iraq, small excerpt,

"The systematic bombing of Japanese noncombatants in the course of the destruction of Japanese cities must be added to a list of the horrific legacies of the war that includes Nazi genocide and a host of Japanese war crimes against Asian peoples. Only by engaging the issues, and above all the impact of this approach to the massive killing of noncombatants that has been central to all subsequent US wars, can Americans begin to approach the Nuremberg ideal that holds victors as well as vanquished to the same standards with respect to crimes against humanity, or the standard of the 1949 Geneva Accord which requires the protection of civilians in time of war. This is the principle of universality enshrined at Nuremberg and violated in practice by the US and others beginning with the 1946 trials, which declared US immunity from prosecution for war crimes.

In his opening address to the tribunal, Chief Prosecutor for the United States, Justice Robert Jackson, Chief of Counsel for the United States, spoke eloquently, and memorably, on the principle of universality. “If certain acts of violation of treaties are crimes,” he said, “they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us....We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well.”

...That poisoned chalice was put to American lips in the 1945 trials and all the more so in subsequent wars. Sahr Conway-Lanz rightly points to the deep divisions among Americans seeking to strike an appropriate balance between combat and atrocity, and between war and genocide. But with absolute American preponderance of technological power and the threat of enemies from Communists to terrorists magnified by government and the media, in practice, there were few restraints on the annihilation of noncombatants in the succession of US wars that have exacted such a heavy toll in lives"

nobody cares what some American had to say about the matter, today

Truman was not "some American". Truman was the President of the USA.

---

What happened to the "doctors" in charge of Unit 731? Many of them became leading business leaders in pharmaceutics after the war

We should also keep in mind the US and British Cold War-era radioactive experiments in civilians who were never told that they had received radioactive doses of plutonium.

[visser300]

By the way, why is the American Nazi Party allowed to function in the USA?
---
Richard Crossman, Assistant Chief of the Psychological Warfare Division of SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force). A brilliant classical scholar at Oxford University,

"The usual explanation -- or excuse -- is that strategic bombing was only adopted by the Western powers as a method of retaliation in a total war started by totalitarians. This is at best a half-truth. The Nazis and the Communists dabbled in terror raids on civilian targets. But they were old-fashioned and imperialist enough to hold that the aim of war is not to destroy the enemy, but to defeat his armies in the field, to occupy his country, and exploit its resources. That is why both Stalin and Hitler preferred to use their air power, not as a separate weapon of unlimited war, but as a tactical adjunct to conventional land and sea operations. In fact, the only nations which applied the theory of unlimited war really systematically were the two great Western democracies.

Yet, at first sight, terror bombing seems to me, as an Englishman, a form of warfare repugnant to our national temperament, and utterly unsuited to an island people, itself hopelessly vulnerable to indiscriminate air attack. And I suspect that most Americans also feel that it does not conform with the traditions of the American way of life"

---

It seems to me that they never asked to be bombed.

Mark Selden, Coordinator of the open access journal The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, a Senior Research Associate in the East Asia Program at Cornell University, and Bartle Professor of History and Sociology at Binghamton University, a specialist on the modern and contemporary geopolitics,

A Forgotten Holocaust: US Bombing Strategy, the Destruction of Japanese Cities and the American Way of War from World War II to Iraq, small excerpt,

"The systematic bombing of Japanese noncombatants in the course of the destruction of Japanese cities must be added to a list of the horrific legacies of the war that includes Nazi genocide and a host of Japanese war crimes against Asian peoples. Only by engaging the issues, and above all the impact of this approach to the massive killing of noncombatants that has been central to all subsequent US wars, can Americans begin to approach the Nuremberg ideal that holds victors as well as vanquished to the same standards with respect to crimes against humanity, or the standard of the 1949 Geneva Accord which requires the protection of civilians in time of war. This is the principle of universality enshrined at Nuremberg and violated in practice by the US and others beginning with the 1946 trials, which declared US immunity from prosecution for war crimes.

In his opening address to the tribunal, Chief Prosecutor for the United States, Justice Robert Jackson, Chief of Counsel for the United States, spoke eloquently, and memorably, on the principle of universality. “If certain acts of violation of treaties are crimes,” he said, “they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us....We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well.”

...That poisoned chalice was put to American lips in the 1945 trials and all the more so in subsequent wars. Sahr Conway-Lanz rightly points to the deep divisions among Americans seeking to strike an appropriate balance between combat and atrocity, and between war and genocide. But with absolute American preponderance of technological power and the threat of enemies from Communists to terrorists magnified by government and the media, in practice, there were few restraints on the annihilation of noncombatants in the succession of US wars that have exacted such a heavy toll in lives"


Truman was not "some American". Truman was the President of the USA.

---

We should also keep in mind the US and British Cold War-era radioactive experiments in civilians who were never told that they had received radioactive doses of plutonium.

You dont know that America's already corrupted :-O?

[Hakkapeliitta]

It's weird, if Hiroshima and Nagasaki hadn't been nuked, they would have been wiped out conventionally with the same end result (though without the psychological effect) and with just as many casualties, and this discussion wouldn't exist. After all, I don't remember seeing discussions about whether the bombing of Tokyo was justified, and that was more destructive.

[Chukada1]

By the way, why is the American Nazi Party allowed to function in the USA?
---
Richard Crossman, Assistant Chief of the Psychological Warfare Division of SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force). A brilliant classical scholar at Oxford University,

"The usual explanation -- or excuse -- is that strategic bombing was only adopted by the Western powers as a method of retaliation in a total war started by totalitarians. This is at best a half-truth. The Nazis and the Communists dabbled in terror raids on civilian targets. But they were old-fashioned and imperialist enough to hold that the aim of war is not to destroy the enemy, but to defeat his armies in the field, to occupy his country, and exploit its resources. That is why both Stalin and Hitler preferred to use their air power, not as a separate weapon of unlimited war, but as a tactical adjunct to conventional land and sea operations. In fact, the only nations which applied the theory of unlimited war really systematically were the two great Western democracies.

Yet, at first sight, terror bombing seems to me, as an Englishman, a form of warfare repugnant to our national temperament, and utterly unsuited to an island people, itself hopelessly vulnerable to indiscriminate air attack. And I suspect that most Americans also feel that it does not conform with the traditions of the American way of life"

---

This is off-topic. What America does is America's business.

It seems to me that they never asked to be bombed.

Not the civilians, but the Japanese government sure wasn't giving any alternative options. Japan's leaders are the ones that led Japan to destruction. Their policies of racial hatred and their treatment of human life, made sure that those bombs were going to be dropped.

I want to point out again that the Chinese had something like 0.00005% survival rate when they were captured. After eight long years of occupation, with millions of Chinese soldiers being rotated, 56 prisoners existed at the end.

Mark Selden, Coordinator of the open access journal The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, a Senior Research Associate in the East Asia Program at Cornell University, and Bartle Professor of History and Sociology at Binghamton University, a specialist on the modern and contemporary geopolitics,

A Forgotten Holocaust: US Bombing Strategy, the Destruction of Japanese Cities and the American Way of War from World War II to Iraq, small excerpt,

"The systematic bombing of Japanese noncombatants in the course of the destruction of Japanese cities must be added to a list of the horrific legacies of the war that includes Nazi genocide and a host of Japanese war crimes against Asian peoples. Only by engaging the issues, and above all the impact of this approach to the massive killing of noncombatants that has been central to all subsequent US wars, can Americans begin to approach the Nuremberg ideal that holds victors as well as vanquished to the same standards with respect to crimes against humanity, or the standard of the 1949 Geneva Accord which requires the protection of civilians in time of war. This is the principle of universality enshrined at Nuremberg and violated in practice by the US and others beginning with the 1946 trials, which declared US immunity from prosecution for war crimes.

In his opening address to the tribunal, Chief Prosecutor for the United States, Justice Robert Jackson, Chief of Counsel for the United States, spoke eloquently, and memorably, on the principle of universality. “If certain acts of violation of treaties are crimes,” he said, “they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us....We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well.”

...That poisoned chalice was put to American lips in the 1945 trials and all the more so in subsequent wars. Sahr Conway-Lanz rightly points to the deep divisions among Americans seeking to strike an appropriate balance between combat and atrocity, and between war and genocide. But with absolute American preponderance of technological power and the threat of enemies from Communists to terrorists magnified by government and the media, in practice, there were few restraints on the annihilation of noncombatants in the succession of US wars that have exacted such a heavy toll in lives"

American views for American people. This issue should be decided by Japanese, Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, Russians, British, Vietnamese, Indonesians, Okinawan, and Americans, each country should also have the sway relative to the amount of suffering that their civilians went through.

Truman was not "some American". Truman was the President of the USA.

---

Truman did not fight. Truman has less importance on this matter than an American soldier in the Pacific Theater that fought the Japanese Army. Even less say over Chinese and Korean opinion.

We should also keep in mind the US and British Cold War-era radioactive experiments in civilians who were never told that they had received radioactive doses of plutonium.

Why?

Western thoughts seems to forget who the real culprits of all that human suffering actually were...hint, they were not the Americans who killed millions of Chinese and Koreans, nor was it the Americans that forced Okinawan to be used as human shields, nor was it the Americans that made the Japanese government break every international law, nor was it the Americans that made the Japanese government go to war.

[Ludicus]

It's weird, if Hiroshima and Nagasaki hadn't been nuked, they would have been wiped out conventionally

Why?
14 June 1945, General Marshall,
"Our estimates are that our air action will have smashed practically every industrial target worth hitting in Japan as well as destroying huge areas in the Jap cities"

(though without the psychological effect)

Instant death and destruction? Its much more than that. The magnitude/effects of destruction cannot be described only by the numbers.
The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,by The Manhattan Engineer District June 29, 1946
"We have discussed among ourselves the ethics of the use of the bomb. Some consider it in the same category as poison gas and were against its use on a civil population.Others were of the view that in total war, as carried on in Japan, there was no difference between civilians and soldiers, and that the bomb itself was an effective force tending to end the bloodshed, warning Japan to surrender and thus to avoid total destruction. It seems logical to me that he who supports total war in principle cannot complain of war against civilians. The crux of the matter is whether total war in its present form is justifiable, even when it serves a just purpose. Does it not have material and spiritual evil as its consequences which far exceed whatever good that might result?"

This is off-topic.

Nope.

What America does is America's business.

?...

Their policies of racial hatred and their treatment of human life, made sure that those bombs were going to be dropped.

A reciprocal prejudice, but race did not cause the war. The main reason was an imperial rivalry over the Pacific.

The United States had, by the time of Pearl Harbor, already deeply entrenched racial hate and fear of Asians. “The Yellow Peril” fear of the Chinese developed from contact and competition on the West coast leading to restrictive property and immigration laws. The Chinese, and future Asians, were circumscribed from AngloAmerican political culture for decades before World War II. American popular culture reflected this in pulp novels with antagonists like Fu Manchu and in Capra’s WWII documentary Know Your Enemy. Transference of hatred and fear of the Chinese to the Japanese was relatively easy, especially with the post scientific racism examinations of Japanese culture emerging in the 1930s.

...These currents of hatred and distrust of the Japanese led Americans into a war with a much more vicious, take no prisoners mentality than the conflict in Germany. Collecting ears, noses, skulls and bones became prevalent in the Pacific, not Europe. Killing prisoners of war and using the Atomic bomb resulted from such dehumanization of the enemy that occurred again in the Pacific, not the European theaters. Indeed, Dower regularly emphasized the war against the “Nazis and Japs,” signifying that WWII was fought against only bad Germans, but all Japanese.

...The Japanese reciprocally had also a highly developed racial hatred of the West...Dower traces the similar trajectory of dehumanization of Westerners within Japanese pop culture. Cartoons, songs, film- the same sources of the West- confirm that the Japanese viewed the Westerners, especially Americans, as soft, effeminate, self-centered, luxury obsessed, hypocritical, etc. The Japanese used American race relations, particularly suppression of black civil rights, to vindicate their assault on imperial America. American symbols and leaders like Uncle Sam and FDR became symbols of palsy, weakness, futility in old age. Active American imperialists and soldiers were demonized in visual media with horns, hoofs, claws. Dower asserts that much of Japanese kamikaze or self martyrdom resulted from genuine fear of being caught by the demonic American forces.

...Unlike the war in Europe, however, the war between Japan and the USA was a ‘war without mercy’ because racial prejudice dehumanized both opponents.

Nicholas Cox

Truman did not fight. Truman has less importance on this matter than an American soldier

That doesn´t make sense.

...nor was it the Americans that made the Japanese government go to war.

The American oil embargo meant war. By the mid 19th century, the British had gained the control of India and other eastern countries. The French had controlled Indochina, and the Dutch Indonesia.Commodore Perry appeared in Japan in 1853. Africa was divided.USA put Philippines under its control in 1898.China was defeated by the British in the Opium Wars. In fact, it was the golden era of western imperialism. Japan was the next: in 1894, Japan defeated China and gained Tawain, annexed Korea in 1910. In 1937, Japan went to war against China, a country/region of national interest to the United States.The main cause of war was oil.

[Hakkapeliitta]

Why?
14 June 1945, General Marshall,
"Our estimates are that our air action will have smashed practically every industrial target worth hitting in Japan as well as destroying huge areas in the Jap cities"

Yes, and that was done with conventional bombing which was just as destructive as nuclear bombing.

Instant death and destruction? Its much more than that. The magnitude/effects of destruction cannot be described only by the numbers.
The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,by The Manhattan Engineer District June 29, 1946
"We have discussed among ourselves the ethics of the use of the bomb. Some consider it in the same category as poison gas and were against its use on a civil population.Others were of the view that in total war, as carried on in Japan, there was no difference between civilians and soldiers, and that the bomb itself was an effective force tending to end the bloodshed, warning Japan to surrender and thus to avoid total destruction. It seems logical to me that he who supports total war in principle cannot complain of war against civilians. The crux of the matter is whether total war in its present form is justifiable, even when it serves a just purpose. Does it not have material and spiritual evil as its consequences which far exceed whatever good that might result?"

Exactly. Wiping out a city with a nuclear bomb is not significantly worse than doing the same conventionally and the moral objections you have against nuclear weapons apply also to regular bombs that are dropped from bomber fleets.

[Ludicus]

yes, and that was done with conventional bombing which was just as destructive as nuclear bombing...Wiping out a city with a nuclear bomb is not significantly worse than doing the same conventionally

As every schoolboy knows,there is a huge difference. Truman also knew the difference: "The atomic bomb is far worse than gas and biological warfare"

moral objections you have against nuclear weapons apply also to regular bombs

Obviously,the moral objections apply also to conventional bombing of the civilian population. Major General J.F.C. Fuller, one of the century's great military historians, wrote,
"Though to save life is laudable, it in no way justifies the employment of means which run counter to every precept of humanity and the customs of war. Should it do so, then, on the pretext of shortening a war and of saving lives, every imaginable atrocity can be justified"

[Rolling Thunder]

As every schoolboy knows,there is a huge difference.

Really? Explain.

[Hakkapeliitta]

As every schoolboy knows,there is a huge difference. Truman also knew the difference: "The atomic bomb is far worse than gas and biological warfare"

One is the result of a nuclear bombing, the other of a conventional bombing. What is the signifigant difference between these two? Other than of course that more people were killed in the conventional bombing than in the nuclear bombing.

The historians you quote don't seem to be arguing against nukes specifically, but against area bombing in general.

[Ludicus]

What is the signifigant difference between these two? Other than of course that more people were killed in the conventional bombing than in the nuclear bombing.

You should know better, what makes the atomic bomb different? please think before posting. Even Truman, in 1945, knew the answer.

The historians you quote don't seem to be arguing against nukes specifically

Both, obviously both.

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"In recent summers, I have been startled, during my annual study-abroad course in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, by the frequency with which some Japanese, particularly college students, justify the atomic bombings in light of Japan’s wartime butchery and the emperor’s culpability for Japan’s colonialism and militarism. Perhaps this should be expected given the multi-layered silence imposed on Japan in regard to atomic matters--first by Japan’s own government, humiliated by its defeat and inability to protect its citizens, then by official U.S. censorship, which banned publication of bomb-related information, then by the political exigencies of Japanese dependence on the U.S. under the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty, which blunted criticism of U.S. policy, and finally by the silence of many bomb victims, who faced discrimination in marriage and employment when they divulged their backgrounds.
Many hibakusha (1) remain incensed over their treatment by the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission (ABCC), which the U.S. set up in Hiroshima in 1947 and Nagasaki in 1948 to examine but not treat the bomb victims.
Adding insult to injury, the ABCC sent physical specimens, including human remains, back to the U.S. and did not share its research results with Japanese scientists or physicians, results that could have been helpful in treating atomic bomb sufferers. Anthropologist Hugh Gusterson, who spent three years studying weapons scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, explains the process of dehumanization whereby American scientists turned “the dead and injured bodies of the Japanese into bodies of data” and then sought additional American subjects for further experimentation. By turning human beings into dismembered body parts and fragments and calculating damage instead of wounds, coldly rational scientific discourse allowed Americans to study Japanese victims without ever reckoning with their pain and suffering. One scientist even got annoyed with Gusterson for saying the victims were “vaporized” when the correct term was “carbonized.”

The Decision to Risk the Future: Harry Truman, the Atomic Bomb and the Apocalyptic Narrative
by Peter J. Kuznick,director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University, The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus.

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