Posted on 05/27/2016 2:40:37 PM PDT by GraceG
All these threads about Hiroshima got me to do some thinking.
What would have happened had by some miracle we didn't drop the nukes on Japan and they had surrendered after a the equivalent amount of firebombing but right before an invasion.
Some libs would think this would have been the "best Case Scenario" but I think it would have been a disaster! This is why:
After the two nukes hit Japan many news reels in the months and years after it showed off to the whole world the absolute horrors of what Nuclear Weapons could do. We saw images of Kimonos being burned into the flesh of Japanese women, Children who were blinded by the flash of the blast, and wide panning panoramic of entire sections of the cities that were flattened and burned to a crisp. The whole world had a few years of peace to catch their breath and see all the naked horror of what atomic weaponry could do. As a result the atomic weaponry became a "weapon of last resort", a weapon to only use when all other options had been thoroughly exhausted.
Now let's move back to to the "Best Case Scenario" of Japan Surrendering without needing to use the Atom Bomb....
The atomic weapon program, the "Manhattan project" would have still remained very secret to the US citizenry and everyone else in the world who wasn't a military official, the Soviets would have continued their program and would soon have the bomb around the same time they normally would have acquired it.
Based only on limited testing the impact of the bomb on civilian targets would have been only theoretical and there wouldn't be as much of a taboo on using it.
Enter the Korean War....
The atomic bomb would have been used in the opening stages of the Korean War, and probably on Military target, not the horror of a civilian target (remember at this point the US military was developing the atomic bomb to be deployed via artillery ).
Instead of two hard choices at the end of the war it would have turned into multiple "easy choices" in the opening days of the Korean war, the nuclear exchange would have been far far worse by the time Korea ended... Maybe the Korean War would have ended sooner, but if it dragged on there would no doubt have been many more nuclear exchanges....
A dangerous precedent would have been set...
We should thank Truman and the citizens who were sacrificed to end the brutal Japanese aggression in Hiroshima and Nagasaki for showing the world the Destruction of atomic weapons...
A terror that directly lead to the policy of MAD " Mutually Assured Destruction" that kept the soviet war machine in check for over 50 years!
There might not have been a North Korea dictatorship today.
The Soviet Union might have been ended in 1950. Just a thought.
[ There might not have been a North Korea dictatorship today. ]
That would be a plus, the minus may be with more casual military use of nukes we would likely had had a full blown nuke exchange with the commies.
There might not have been a communist Chinese dictatorship today.
But I’ll leave the alternate history to Harry Turtledove ... he does it much better than I ever could.
What did you have to do with it?
[ The Soviet Union might have been ended in 1950. Just a thought. ]
That would have happened had Douglas MacAurthur ran for president in 1948...
[ I was better
What did you have to do with it? ]
Nothing, but my speel check mehsted it uhp....
Just finished the third volume of the war that came early.
Our cousin was on a troop ship; headed for an invasion of
Japan - an American ship. Their CO lined them up & said,
“Look to your right, then to your left. After this invasion,
one out of every three or you will be dead. - On their way
over, Truman dropped the A-bomb. Their ship turned around
mid-way & returned home. Every Japanese citizen was ordered
to fight to the death to defend Japan with anything they
could use for a weapon. - My father was a hardened combat
veteran of N. Africa, Italy & Germany. If not for the bomb;
he would have had to go to Japan & fight them. He was in
for the duration plus 6 months. I wasn’t born ‘til after
the war. - I do not second guess President Truman.
The Japanese should be thanking America for nuking their asses and bringing them to the modern era.
They Saw how a Brokered Peace turned out, an Armistice for 20 years.
That is why they had such insistence on Total and Unconditional surrender on the part of Germany and Japan. They didn't want their sons fighting the same war in 1960.
And I think they did a pretty good job. Germany hasn't started a World War in 70 years!
*Correction: That should read “TWO out of every three of
you will be dead.”
OK, that explains it....sorry.
[ The Japanese should be thanking America for nuking their asses and bringing them to the modern era. ]
Well, Perry showed up in middle 1800’s and brought them out of the medieval age into the Industrial Age, but it took two very bright flashes of light to “enlighten them”.
I read the book “The Making Of The Atomic Bomb” and General Gates, who was in charge of the Manhattan Project said that after all that money and resources and material used the Bomb had to be dropped. Also the powers that be were convinced that Japan would surrender real quick after Hiroshima but it took the second one to convince them that we had more. The firebombing campaign obliterated something like 59 cities and there wasn’t very many to choose from to be Atom Bombed (as the book stated) that were intact so they could measure the destruction. To me, and the generation that fought thought that bombing Nagasaki was vengeance because that’s where the torpedo’s used at Pearl Harbor were manufactured. Karma is a real biatch. The liberals today didn’t live through that era and don’t know squat on how Americans felt during the war or their feelings towards the Japanese.
[ I was better
What did you have to do with it? ]
Well.... It IS a VANITY thread after all :P
Perhaps a dozen or so flashes across the middle east should enlighten the whole area.
Oh and PS, one of the reasons MacArthur was fired as commander in Korea was he wanted to use the atomic bomb.
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