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Hiroshima and Nagasaki
As we all know, this past week marked the 60th anniversary of the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan. Do you think it was necessary? I am currently torn on the issue. I will play devil's advocate and rebuttle all responses whether for or against. Would total invasion have been better, or were the atom bombs sufficient?
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Comments
Did I mention that I disagree with the bomb? Don't want to start a sh**fight....
The Japanese would not have stopped, that much is pretty well known. Read "The Chrysanthemum and the Sword" to get a grip on the pre-atomic japanese national mindset. They were fierce and determined. Nothing short of the threat of extinction could have stopped them. That is the one hand "It was necessary to stop them"
The other is "Dropping such a horribly destructive weapon on innocent people is completely despicable." This is also true, that vaporizing tens of thousands of innocent people and sickening hundreds of thousands more is a crime beyond comprehension.
So where does the middle path lie? I understand that the people who created and dropped the bomb were afraid for their own lives, and for them this was the only way, and most of them did this with a clear conscience. However, I weep for the incredible loss of beauty, life, and creation. When we stop being horrified by these kinds of things, then that is when I am truly afraid.
Japan was a closed country for centuries and Western influence was mainly militaristic, when the Emperor opened the doors to geijin (outsiders), in the mid - to late 19th century.
So, if you have an analylitical mindset you could view the behaviour of the Japanese in WW2 as copycatting what the Europeans had been doing for centuries.
Their punishment for (accepting the laws of the Western mindset) 220,000 people being killed in an instant.
I think it is a great measure of the Japanese character that, as a nation, they have become one of the most successful countries in the world.
If the US or UK had been subjected to the horrors of the Atomic bomb then I'm sure the citizens of those countries would have extremely large chips on their shoulders. Subsequent revenge style attacks would definately have ensued.
Akira Kurosawa made a great film about the attack on Nagasaki - it's called "Rapsody in August" - I recommend it to all of you.
In war though I don't think it's worthwhile bringing up the subject of morality.
The truth can never be expressed in words - it is when two groups of people think they have succeeded in doing so that wars occur.
I shed tears for the Chinese, Japanese, Allied Nations and Nazis in WW2.
After all they were all people.
I could not disagree more with the dropping of those bombs . I am saddened every time I think of it. We as a country go around trying to police the world of who can and can not have nuclear weapons......AND YET WE>>>>WE!>>>> are the only country savage and unconscious enough to have used the atom bomb on human beings. Think about it! We did not attack military bases with the bomb.....we dropped it in the middle of cities full of civilians....you and I ....going to work, going to school . Trying to make a life for our families. We should be very very careful in our thoughts and actions on this matter. Our government claims it was in self-defense to put an end to the war...etc. justification for murdering 50,000 + people. So taking that tack of thinking the people of Iraq would be completely justified in dropping a nuclear bomb on your hometown!?
There is never justification for murder
^gassho^
When Rome conquered Britain, with a ferocity that laid waste tribes and great tracts of land, the son-in-law of the governor wrote:
Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant.
(They make a wilderness and call it peace)
Tacitus - Agricola
Iraq, the very cradle and mother of our civilisation has been laid waste. Well done, you Western powers - you have committed matricide and we are all suffering as a result.
The effects of the nuclear destruction of a wooden city (Hiroshima) and the Chrsitian capital of Japan (Nagasaki), physical, spiritual and psychological, are still with us and I doubt that we shall work them out of our system this side of the Parousia.
As for Japan. I agree with wolf that we should not have dropped them on civilian areas. But then with the force of a nuclear bomb - how far away should it have been from civilian areas? Would any amount of milage have been far enough?
But, on the other hand, I don't believe the Japanese would have stopped short of this bomb being dropped on them. Not the civlians necessarily - just the people running the country. The emporer the military leaders. It's too bad that in wars - it's the warmongers that aren't made to pay with their lives and the lives of thier children. Maybe they would be so ready to head into war.
Anyway, my point on the mindset of the Japanese...
A good book to read is "The Rape of Nanking" about the tactics that the Japanese used on civilians when they invaded China.
Appaling is the only word I have for the atrocities the did to the Chinese people in this area.
Unfortunately, I don't really think anything other than the bomb would have changed their mindset - as truly sad as it is.
Michael
The rape of Germany by US, UK, French and Russian troops after 1945 has been carefully covered up. The atrocities of our treatment of "enemy combatants" in the latest imperial wars are the tip of the iceberg.
Would the US care to be judged by the genocide of the native peoples, or the UK by its actions in the Raj? Not a single nation has behaved well with captured peoples.
I wasn't making my earlier statement in the mindset that, "the Japanese were evil and needed to be taught a lesson.". No... not at all.
Unfortunately, civilians don't really have a say-so, especially in oppresive governments, to have a say-so about going to war or doing whatever.
I feel nothing but grief and compassion for the Japanese civilians (and even military people that were forced to do something they did not wish to do) regarding the nuking of their country.
My statement was more about "needing something that drastic to stop the war-machine mentality of the leaders".
As for the US - I also agree with you regarding that. Don't get my started on the atrocities the leaders of America have forced upon the whole world.
I agree with you, my friend. I was mostly making a statement about doing something to force Japan out of the war. Their mentality, I believe, towards other nations, acts of aggression and such would not have been halted by the US sending more troops over there to die in a long, drawn out war.
Michael