The traditional rules of war were that civilians were not to be targets. Obviously, those rules were not observed.
Both sides bombed civilian targets, the Allies more deliberately. The plan was to leave the German workforce with no housing, so as to interfere with war industry. That is not in accord with the rules of war. You can bomb the factories, but not whole residential districts: than is mass murder of civilians. Just because you do it from the sky, does not make it right.
If the outcome of the war had been different, Harris and the rest would have been hanged for war crimes.
But not only was this a war crime. It was also a very expensive war crime in terms of men and equipment. The casualties were enormous. It was not even a clever bit of evil. If you are going to commit a war crime, at least make it pay!
The bombings in Japan using the A-bomb were similarly war crimes. The only excuse is that they shortened the war (which was already essentially over, anyway). That is no excuse: it was still a war crime. It was also unnecessary, as Japan was in ruins, and on the verge of starvation. Japan was ready to surrender.
If you can find a copy of the The Death of Forrestal, you will learn that his suspicious “suicide” eliminated the man who was the last major obstacle to US use of the A-bomb against Japan, to the benefit of the Soviets. Read about it. It was not only a war crime, but it was done mainly to allow the Soviets to enter the war and seize Manchuria. They also took the northern half of Korea, which led to the Korean War, and a divided Korea to this day.
World War II was not a pretty picture, and there is very little heroic about it. We also came out with half of Europe under Soviet Rule. Our supposed allies! Big victory!
It was also unnecessary, as Japan was in ruins, and on the verge of starvation. Japan was ready to surrender.
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No kid Japan was not ready to surrender...
They had ammo dumps buried all over China...
are you forgetting that Japan invaded and occupied China about 10 years before they bombed Pearl Harbour ???
It took two a-bombs to get the emperor's mind right, and even then soldiers attacked the palace and attempted to prevent his recorded message from being broadcast.
A lot of folks on this forum have knowledge of the situation with Japan in the summer of 1945 because we heard it direct from the folks who were actually there doing the fighting, and a few of those folks have been posters here on FR. These people were our fathers,uncles and the fathers and uncles of our friends when we grew up in the 50’s-70’s.
Flash forward multiple decades and that knowledge has been corrupted by books written based on speculation and read by people who never heard year’s worth of multiple first hand accounts of what really happened.
You couldn’t be more wrong about the war being close to “over” in 1945. How many more Amercian casualties on the scale of Iwo Jima and Saipan would it have taken to satisfy your corrupted intellect that we should have given the Japanese a “fair” fight, not to mention the hundreds of thousands more Japanese that would have died in home island invasions?
Hint: Start with researching operations Olympic and Torch as well as Unit 731.
Japan ready to surrender? Wrong.
My father fought in the Battle of the Bulge in December of 1944. After surviving it, thank God, he would have been in the planned invasion of Japan, and he very well might have been among the million predicted casualties. The bomb prevented that.
It wasn't though. Does that make you sad?
It was also a very expensive war crime in terms of men and equipment. The casualties were enormous. It was not even a clever bit of evil. If you are going to commit a war crime, at least make it pay!
It paid off in spades on D-Day and beyond. No Luftwaffe.
The bombings in Japan using the A-bomb were similarly war crimes. The only excuse is that they shortened the war (which was already essentially over, anyway). That is no excuse: it was still a war crime. It was also unnecessary, as Japan was in ruins, and on the verge of starvation. Japan was ready to surrender.
Your revisionist history is BS. Of course, since you weren't around for the assault waves on Kyushu and beyond, it is easy to make. However, it makes you all the more a coward when compared to the men who faced that time in the boats.
World War II was not a pretty picture, and there is very little heroic about it.
I didn't think it was possible based on the rest of your post, but could you be a bigger fag?
Hmm. Got lost on the way to antiwar dot com, did ye?
The American military saw the results of this fanaticism in Okinawa when we lost a lot of men.
The way I see it, Truman had three choices: leave Japan surrounded or invade or drop the bomb and get them to surrender
Blockading the japanese would have resulted in more deaths by starvation than those killed and harmed over the decades by H and N
invading would have had a lot of our troops killed, yes even by civilians -- so it was an evil choice and he chose what would kill less american lives.
Utter nonsense. Have you ever read the invasion plan for Honshu? Millions would've been killed before our troops even set foot on the ground.
I'm sure it's very easy for you to condemn the use of nuclear weapons since you never had to fight the Japanese. Have you fought in any war?