[Alberta's Child]

How about a six-month blockade of the country, for starters -- if only to see if it would work?

One of the bizarre aspects of the article at the top of this thread is the focus it places on Japan's national morality, militaristic culture, etc. What makes this so silly in the context of justifying the use of atomic bombs on civilian populations is that in 1945 the U.S. decided to drop one of those two bombs on one of the only places in Japan (Nagasaki) that had a sizeable Christian population.

I'm sorry, but I smell "bullsh!t" on this one.

[redgolum]

The targeting of Hiroshima was one of those decisions that "stinks". No good explanation has ever been given for that one. Many people have suspicions about why it was selected, but again I have yet to hear or read a really good one. Kyoto, Tokyo, or about a dozen other places were probably better targets if the goal was a quick knock out punch.

By the end of the war, Japan had been in a blockade for quite some time. If Olympic and Cornet had been launched, they would have been started in November (over six months later). When you look at what the Marines would have faced in the landings, even six months would have not been enough. A buddy of mine married a Japanese national (that shocked her parents a bit!) and her parents told her they were prepared to fight with bamboo poles to defend against the US invasion. How many would have done that and other suicide attacks will never be known.

One last thing. If a full blockade had been tried, the controversy today would be that we "Should have used atomic weapons, as that would have resulted in less loss of life." Starvation is not a nice way to go either.