The author above is an Hiroshima cultist if ever there was one.
Posted on 08/10/2010 5:42:30 PM PDT by Mrs. Don-o
Friday was the anniversary of the U.S. Bombing of Hiroshima during World War II. Monday is the anniversary of its bombing of Nagasaki.
The explosion of the Fat Man atomic device over Nagasaki is pictured. It rose eleven miles into the sky over Ground Zero.
The important thing, though, is that it—together with the Little Boy device that was deployed over Hiroshima—killed approximately 200,000 human beings. And it ended the war with Japan.
It is understandable that many Americans at the time were relieved that the long burden of the bloodiest war in human history could finally be laid down. Many then, as now, saw the use of nuclear weapons against Hiroshima and Nagasaki as a necessary step to preventing even more casualties.
However, some of the blogging being done to commemorate the attack is most unfortunate.
Consider Michael Graham, who wishes his readers a “Happy Peace Through Victory Day.”
Today marks the anniversary of the single greatest act in the cause of peace ever taken by the United States:
Dropping the A-bomb on Hiroshima in 1945. That one decision, that one device, saved more lives, did more to end war, and created more justice in the world in a single stroke than any other. It was done by America, for Americans. It saved the lives of hundreds of thousands—if not millions—of American soldiers and sailors.
So, obviously, President Obama’s not too happy about it. . . .
Euroweenie peaceniks and an annoying number of American liberals see the bombing of Hiroshima as a shameful act. What is it America should be ashamed for—defeating an enemy that declared war on us? Bringing about the end of a fascist empire that killed millions of people, mostly Asians? Preventing the slaughter of the good guys—Americans—by killing the bad guys—the Japanese?
I am not a Euroweenie or a peacenik or a political liberal or even someone opposed to the use of nuclear weapons in principle. I can imagine scenarios in which their use would be justified. I can even deal with the cheeky “Happy Peace Through Victory Day” headline.
But Mr. Graham’s analysis of the situation on a moral level is faulty.
It is true that, by instilling terror in the Japanese government, the use of atomic weapons prevented further and, in all probability, greater casualties on both sides.
Preventing further and greater casualties is a good thing, but as the Catechism reminds us:
The Church and human reason both assert the permanent validity of the moral law during armed conflict. The mere fact that war has regrettably broken out does not mean that everything becomes licit between the warring parties [CCC 2312].
It isn’t just a question of the goal of an action. The goal may be a good one, but the means used to achieve it may be evil. The Catechism states:
Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants is a crime against God and man, which merits firm and unequivocal condemnation. A danger of modern warfare is that it provides the opportunity to those who possess modern scientific weapons - especially atomic, biological, or chemical weapons - to commit such crimes [CCC 2314].
The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were definitely acts of war directed to the destruction of whole cities or—at least—vast areas with their inhabitants. The only quibbling could be about whether this was “indiscriminate” destruction. Someone might argue (stretching the word “indiscriminate” rather severely and taking it in a sense probably not meant by the Catechism) that they were not indiscriminate attacks in that they were aimed at vital Japanese war resources (munitions factories, troops, etc.) and the only practical way to take out these resources was to use atomic weapons.
Mounting such a case would face a number of problems. One would have to show that Hiroshima and Nagasaki contained such resources (not that difficult to show) and that these resources themselves were proportionate in value to the massive collateral damage that would be inflicted (a much more difficult task) and that there was no other practical way—like a more targeted bombing—to take them out (again a difficult task).
But for purposes of argument, let’s grant all this. Let’s suppose that there were such resources, and that they were proportionate in value to the massive loss of civilian lives and that there was no other way to get rid of them.
Does that absolve the U.S. of guilt in these two bombings?
No.
You can see why in the logic that Mr. Graham used. It stresses the fact that the use of these weapons saved net lives. This was undoubtedly uppermost in the U.S. military planners’ thinking as they faced the possibility of an extremely bloody invasion of Japan in which huge numbers on both sides would die.
But notice what is not being said—either by Mr. Graham or anybody else: “Hiroshima and Nagasaki contained such important war widgets that without those widgets Japan would be unable to prosecute the war. Thus by taking out those military resources we could deprive Japan of its ability to make war.”
Neither is anybody saying something like this: “We needed to scare Japan into surrender by showing them that we could destroy all of their military resources. We needed to make them terrified of losing all their military resources so that, out of a desperate desire to preserve their military resources, they would surrender.”
These are the dogs that didn’t bark, and they are why this line of argument is a dog that won’t hunt.
The reason nobody says these things is that they were not the thinking behind the U.S.‘s actions. The idea was not to end the war through the direct destruction of military resources in these two cities, nor was it to end the war by scaring Japan into thinking we might destroy all of its military resources. It was scaring Japan into surrendering by threatening (explicitly) to do this over and over again and inflict massive damage on the Japanese population. In other words, to make them scared that we would engage in “the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants.”
That means that, even if Hiroshima and Nagasaki had contained military resources that of themselves would have justified the use of atomic weapons (which is very hard to argue), our intention still was not pure. We were still using Japanese civilians as hostages to the war effort, still threatening to kill civilians if Japan did not surrender. That was the message we wanted the Japanese leadership to get—not, “We will take out your military resources if you keep this up,” but, “We will take out big chunks of your population if you keep this up.”
That meant that the U.S. leadership was formally participating in evil. It does not matter if the attacks of Hiroshima and Nagasaki could (through some stretch of the imagination) be justified in themselves. The fact is that they were used to send a message telling the Japanese government that we would kill massive numbers of the military and civilian population, without discrimination. That message is evil, and to knowingly and deliberately send that message is to formally participate in evil.
That made these attacks war crimes.
Now, make no mistake. I’m an American. I’m a fan of the U.S. But love of the United States should not preclude one from being able to look honestly at the mistakes it has committed in the past. Indeed, it is only by looking at and frankly acknowledging the mistakes of the past that we can learn from them. Love of one’s country should impel one to help it not commit such evils.
Racial discrimination? Bad thing. Allowing abortions? Bad thing. Dropping nukes to deliberately kill civilians? Bad thing. Let’s try not to have things like these mar America’s future.
Probably the saddest aspect of the article is that he thinks it's well-reasoned and he's proud of it.
I was in the Navy in WW2. So my view is certainly affected by what was going on at the time.
I understood that even after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Japanese military wanted to continue to the last man, woman and child, both military and civilian. And as I recall, after Nagasaki, Hirohito finally overruled them.
I didn’t know at the time what an “atom bomb” was, but two of them sure put an end to an unbelievably ferocious war. So I cheered what Harry S Truman had done, and basically still feel the same way 65 years later.
The author redefines the legal structure of war by pointing to the indiscriminate killing of military and civilians and then claims in his hand-wringing conclusion: That made these attacks war crimes.
1. The earlier fire bombing exacted a higher toll of civilian deaths but was not regarded as inappropriate.
2. The Japanese War Lords did not believe the first A-bomb meant they had lost the war and ignored our peace demands.
3. Russia was massing forces and by prior agreement was moving to invade Japan in a matter of weeks - which would have caused an otherwise avoidable blood-bath, extinguished the nation of Japan and given the USSR a warm water pacific port.
4. Truman would have been charged with a war crime at home if he had needlessly squandered the lives of hundreds of thousands American lives while holding the weapon that would end the war.
It was speculated at the time that there would have been close to 1,000,000 American combat dead, and at least 10,000,000 Japanese combat dead.
Also, let us not forget the Japanese started the damned war and all we did was finish it, so by dropping the bombs, we saved 1,000,000 American lives and at least 9,500,000 Japanese lives.
By forcing an unconditional surrender, we were able to rid the Japanese of their militarists which were responsible for multiple atrocities, such as the Rape of Nanking, the activities of Unit 731 (the Japanese unit which used local civilians and POWs for chemical and biological weapons experiments and the Bataan Death March. We institute a Western style form of government and Japan has prospered since the end of the war.
I am personally sickened by the number of apologists we have regarding how the war was forced to conclusion. Had Truman not ordered the use of the A-bombs, both me and my wife would not be here, because both our fathers would have undoubtedly been killed during the invasion and it's subsequent fighting.
“What are your thoughts?”
~~~
I think this guy is a moron,,,
My Dad was WIA on New Guinea in ‘43,,,
His life was shortened by his wounds,,,(died at 61yo)(RIP).
I think Gen. LeMay should have bombed Japan into a hole
in the water!,,,
Then gassed it,,,
Then bombed it some more,,,
No Quarter...
As a side note, I thought that nuclear warfare was supposed to render ground zero uninhabitable for hundreds of years?
Civilians of a country that starts a war are not innocent. The Germans of 1930s overwhelmingly supported all of Germany's wars, and it is a mistake to pin that on Hitler. They also voted in Hitler, thus delegating to him to decide on war and peace. So did the Russians of the Soviet Union. So do Islamic mothers, fathers and entire communities that raise children to be terrorist. So do "innocent" civilians who invite Taliban into their villages.
They don't like the casualties of Hiroshima? Well they shouldn't have started the war and taken the lives of Americans who were merely defending their families. The cost of Hiroshima, however large, was the least cost of ending the war (in terms of the avoided Japanese casualties as well, not only American). Thank G-d we followed through with that and saved hundreds of thousands of lives.
The critics here do what all naive people do: focus on only one side of the cost-benefit balance. They look only at the casualties of Hiroshima (cost) but hardly ever discuss the lives saved (benefit). Needless to say, this is illogical: if you only focus on the cost of food, for instance, then you should never eat anything. This is obvious in the case of food but, for some reason, people the same conclusion in the case of Hiroshima.
His assertions are baseless!
“The reason nobody says these things is that they were not the thinking behind the U.S.‘s actions.”
This is pure, uninformed garbage!
There is plenty of documentation regarding the target selection and prioritization. In fact a preferred target was bypassed due to weather.
He’s attempting to assign guilt by way of ignorant mindreading. He is WRONG!!!
And, I will write him directly, with documentation to prove that point!
We did not kill enough of the Japs to pay for the atrocities which they perpetrated.
If you will check the article, you'll see that it's neither the "atomic" aspect nor the "bomb" aspect that Jimmy Akin is objecting to per se. From the article,
"I am not a Euroweenie or a peacenik or a political liberal or even someone opposed to the use of nuclear weapons in principle. I can imagine scenarios in which their use would be justified."
His precise point is the one made by the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes, a major teaching document of the Second Vatican Council: that when the noncombatants constitute the target; when their deaths are part of the intended impact of the act; then their deaths are not justified as collateral damage.
He backs it up with this quote from the Catechism:
"Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants is a crime against God and man, which merits firm and unequivocal condemnation." The Link to the Catechism is well worth looking at for context.
It is not true that, war being bad, it's either "all" bad or it's not. The just use of military force, including lethal force, targetting military aggressors in order to force them to cease aggression, is a positive and honorable thing, however bloody it may be. It is not murder.
The unintended but foreseeable collateral deaths of civilians is likewise morally tolerable, if it is proportionate and not directly intended. (By way of analogy, this would be like the death of an unborn baby because of a doctor doing a hysterectomy on the mother's cancerous uterus.)
The intentional killing of noncombatants is murder. (Analogous to direct abortion.)
The difference between justified killing in war, and murder, is pretty well spelled out in the U.S. Army Field Manual. That's a traditional American military principle I consider essential to defend.
Yes, you are right. I reposted the criticism after I realized what he was up to. He kind of led me down the primrose path there, but it’s my duty to be sure before I post.
I wonder how Japan would have liked being the Western Pacific’s Berlin.
My father spent time in Japan shortly after the end of the war. He told me how polite the people were to him. He even had pregnant ladies try to get up and give him their seat on public transportation.
One lady told him they didn’t hold the U.S. responsible for the actions it had taken.
And now we have some blithering idiot trying to set the record straight about 65 years later.
Makes my blood boil.
The author above is an Hiroshima cultist if ever there was one.
You are assuming that our Commanders did not know the Japanese mindset which had an ultranationalist government and a state religion which worshiped the emperor.
Our Commanders knew how radical those people were and how willingly they would kill—even themselves in battle. They were brutal, inhumane and ruthless to all their enemies which made a joke of the Geneva Convention and made water boarding look like paradise. ANY regard for individual rights, life, women, and their people, was non-existent.
Our Commander knew that they would probably give up only under a dire situation and he was willing to drop that bomb and create that situation to get the insane Japanese to surrender. They didn’t care about their own people, but, our Commanders DID care about their people. They had to force the Japanese to give up and, thus, not only saving many of our men from a brutal insane tortured death, but also theirs. “Them or us” was Truman’s ONLY decision. He said “Them!”, thank God.
I see no moral ambiguity at all. Neither did my father who went onto the Island after the surrender. He was the next in line to engage in battle, and would have probably been killed, if the bomb was not dropped.
That meant that the U.S. leadership was formally participating in evil. It does not matter if the attacks of Hiroshima and Nagasaki could (through some stretch of the imagination) be justified in themselves. The fact is that they were used to send a message telling the Japanese government that we would kill massive numbers of the military and civilian population, without discrimination. That message is evil, and to knowingly and deliberately send that message is to formally participate in evil.
That made these attacks war crimes.
The above paragraph is where the essay turns to bunk. It is gratuitous to say that America is guilty of War Crimes. I gratuitously deny that fact.
The Japanese were a totally mindless mass, bent on and rejoicing in the act of suicide. Their treatment of Nanking alone gives credence that they deserve to cease as a people. But we do not think such things nor do we say such things.
America, as a nation, is not guilty of War Crimes in WWII.
Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)
I think the author forgot to mention that the US dropped leaflets in both cities and the surrounding areas telling people to leave! The leaflets told the civilians that a horrific weapon was going to be used on the city!
Too bad they didn’t believe us, maybe they could have saved a few more of their people.
This was NOT a war crime!
My dad served in Europe and his unit was on the way to the Far East when the bomb was dropped.
It is a fact that about 50% of the casualties in the Pacific Theater came after the start of officially sanctioned suicide attacks (kamikaze etc.), it is a fact that the Japanese authorities were preparing their women and children to conduct suicide attacks against invading troops and it is a fact that the die-hards were hoping too incur such horrendous losses to Allied invaders as to force a negotiated settlement in 1946-47.
The stark choices facing the Allies 65 years ago were an invasion with millions of casualties and a real possibility of stalemate, a blockade and de facto low-level war-without-end that would have civilian starvation in Japan going into incredible numbers OR the SHOCK of a new weapon that could wipe out large cities without using more than a single airplane. It took the latter to break the military dictatorship and allowed/convinced the Emperor and the civilians to surrender. Thus I disagree with the author, a weapon is a weapon is a weapon and while ideally a civilized person does not want innocent deaths, war is a profoundly uncivil activity and all of his rationale fails to convince me.
The entire argument decorrellates into a diatribe against atomic energy, and is rendered invalid by its own subterfuge.
Nice of the author to clarify. Because the author could not possibly be more wrong.
There's no doubt that the atomic bombings were a horrible human tragedy. But virtually everyone in a position of responsibility with the Japanese government admitted that without the atomic bombings, Operation Downfall, or the invasion of the Japanese mainland, would have been necessary and that the Japanese nation might have been completely destroyed.
The cost in human lives, both Japanese and Allied, would have been infinitely worse had an invasion been needed to end the war. The moral responsibility of everyone involved in war is to end it as soon as possible. That meant using the atomic bombs.
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