Posted on 12/18/2006 3:03:14 PM PST by sushiman
Shoichi Nakagawa, a senior Liberal Democratic Party politician has called the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan in 1945 a crime and inexcusable.
Nakagawa, policy chief of the ruling LDP, made the comments after visiting the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum, a ruling party official said.
(Excerpt) Read more at mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp ...
Dec 7, 1941 was an unforgetable ATROCITY.
THEY SHOULD NEVER FORGET IT.
I have always had considerable difficulty with the idea of directly targeting non-combatants in wartime. But you make an excellent point, one that suggests the moral ambiguity of the situation: Would it really have been better if we had waited to have our own civilians annihilated en masse?
And, as others have pointed out, Imperial Japan's hands were hardly clean, from the bombing of Pearl Harbor to the rape of Nanking.
That said, I am still not entirely comfortable with the thought of our incinerating innocents, even in the service of a larger (and righteous) cause. But would even more innocents have been killed in years of house-to-house fighting? Dunno. Once again, this strongly suggests the moral ambiguity of the situation.
In the end, it was essential to the free world that the Axis powers (including Japan) should be defeated. Even Japan itself has benefited enormously from the post-war transition to a Western-style democracy.
It is just hard to have anything other than mixed feelings about the bombing of civilians--even if the phrase "an inexcusable crime" is clearly hyperbolic.
He seems to have forgetten the Rape of Nanking and other Japanese atrocities during WW-II not to mention the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. In reality the dropping of the atom bombs saved Japan from even greater civilian casualties that would have ocurred with an invasion. Note the US was prpared to use poison gas if necessary during Operation Coronet and had already shipped supplies to the Pacific in late 1945.
Well we keep buyuing their Toyotas so who won the war? My Father-in-Law, a WWII veteran of the Island campaign in the Pacific, used to own a Camry, and is now on his second Subaru!!
Ending a war is a crime??
Your response is noted, thanks. I think I read somewhere that there was also a third bomb in waiting that had Japan not surrendered unconditionally was to be dropped. Can't remember the name of that one.
Military history ping
Japanese politicians discuss history - revisionist style.
Okinawa X 10000
This is what Wikpedia states (yeah...I dislike Wikpedia too):
By contrast, allied nations such the U.S., UK and Canada, tried to treat Axis prisoners strictly in accordance with the Geneva Conventions. This sometimes created conditions for POWs better than those their fellow soldiers enjoyed at home. The lower rank prisoners were used for work on farms and road maintenance and were compensated for their work as required by the Geneva Convention. In addition, as word spread among the enemy about the conditions of Allied POW camps, it encouraged surrenders, which helped further Allied military goals. It may have raised morale among the Allied personnel when the usefulness of this approach was accepted by reinforcing the idea that this humane treatment of prisoners showed that their side was morally superior to the enemy. At the end of the war in Europe, the allied nations were not able to treat all prisoners in accordance with the Geneva Conventions. As in ancient times, German prisoners were used as slave labourers for an uncertain time and sent like chattels from one custody power to another to rebuild Europe.
In the Pacific War, Japan did not follow the Third Geneva Convention. American, Australian, British, Canadian and Dutch prisoners of war held by the Japanese armed forces were subject to brutal treatment, including forced labour, medical experimentation, starvation rations, and poor medical treatment. No access was provided to the International Red Cross. This treatment resulted in the very high death rate of 37% in Japanese prisoner of war camps. Escapes were almost impossible because of the difficulty of white men hiding in Asiatic societies.
In this event, I overstated the death rate in German POW camps, and slightly understated the Japanese brutality by 2%. But the difference between the two is much broader.
I don't apologize for the fact I don't give a rip about how many lives it saved of theirs. They were ruthless in what was done to our men. Unspeakable crimes.
Absolutely - It was MORALLY the right thing to do. It saved at least 5 times the numer of lives it took. If their government had surrender, we wouldn't have found it necessary to do it. Screw this guy - or maybe just drop a little nuke on his house.
Okinawa convinced our military men of the necessity of the A-bombs. But it seems we might have had to repeat the dose if the fanatics had been able to prevent the Emperor from intervening. My understanding, however, was thar it would have been awhile, October or later, before we had more bombs. IAC. the alternative was a blockade which would have starved the Japanese to death. Many more than 250,000 would have died. This is because the fanatics were suicidal.
The last I heard, Subaru was owned by GM. I might be wrong... but, they do build good cars. And, many are made over here. Ohio "exports" many Honda's. Like I said, we haven't had any trouble from them since we nuked 'em. I spent lots of time in Japan in my Navy days, I like the country and the people. I'm just glad I wasn't there in the 1940s.
Shoichi Nakagawa, a senior Liberal Democratic Party politician has called the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan in 1945 a crime and inexcusable.
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The bombing saved hundreds of thousands of lives, including Japanese lives. If this jerk wants to judge the past by the mind set of the present he should reflect on Japan's behavior before, during and after WWII. They still refuse to address as a nation the horrors of their own actions.
Truman was 100% correct in ordering the hit on the two Japanese cities. No doubt, no regrets, no apology...period.
Keep in mind the Japanese do not learn about their crimes in their history classes.
And that's why it's even a more serious problem. It's official government denial much as the Muslims indoctrinate their populace
We fought our way from island to island and the resistance just got fiercer the closer we came to Japan. We suffered heavy casualties on Okinawa. Everything we knew at that time pointed to a horrendously bloody fight if we had to conquer the main islands by invasion.
It could have been much worse for Japan.
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