Hiroshima And Nagasaki: The lesser of Two Evils

FrontPage Magazine ^ | 8/03/2001 | Jamie Glazov

[slimer]

Hiroshima and Nagasaki: The Lesser of Two Evils

FrontPageMagazine.com | August 3, 2001

THIS AUGUST 6 AND 9 marks the 56th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The use of the atomic bombs was the only alternative left to President Truman and his officials.

By August 1945, the war with Japan showed signs of continuing indefinitely. As American forces advanced closer to the Japanese mainland, the Japanese refusal to surrender did not diminish but increased. In the summer of 1945, Japan had more than 2 million soldiers and 30 million citizens who were prepared to choose "death over dishonour." This point had already been established by the kamikaze pilots and Japanese soldiers who fought at Okinawa and Iwo Jima.

The Japanese view of war was quite different from that of the American view: death in war was not something to be avoided, but to be sought. The Shinto cult, for example, which preached a radical concept of self-sacrifice, taught that suicide was glorious, while surrender was an unthinkable disgrace. It was at Saipan that even Japanese civilians committed suicide by jumping off the cliffs on the northern tip of the island rather than surrender. At the battle of Okinawa Island, thousands of Japanese had drawn themselves up in a line and killed themselves by hand-grenades, rather than surrender.

The Japanese leadership never disguised its revulsion to the idea of surrender. It repeatedly made clear its intention to fight to the last man, woman and child. The Japanese bitter-end slogan called for "the honorable death of a hundred million" -- the entire population. Allied intercepts of communications revealed that Japanese militarists were obsessed with vindicating their emperor’s, as well as their own, honor in a bloody till-the-death battle over the home islands.

This explains why at this very time the Japanese military was rapidly building up defense forces on the southern island of Kyushu, where by war's end there were 14 divisions and 735,000 troops ready to sacrifice themselves in battle.

Japan's stubborn and unsatisfactory response to the Allies' Potsdam Declaration left Truman with little choice. He knew, as General Marshall's reports confirmed, that at least 500,000 Americans would be lost in an invasion of Japan. That was a conservative estimate, as the possibility existed that up to one million Allied casualties would be suffered. Meanwhile, it was estimated that potential Japanese casualties stood at five million.

Truman and his advisers were well aware that they had just suffered 75,000 American casualties in seizing Okinawa, just a small island. The bombing of the two Japanese cities, therefore, was considered to be the quickest way to end the war with the least amount of casualties on both sides.

For nearly four years America had watched its soldiers being killed by militant and fanatical Japanese troops. And now, every day that the Japanese refused to surrender, the death toll on both sides rose, while Allied POWs and civilian internees in Japanese concentration camps were being tortured and executed.

Truman knew that if an American invasion was carried through, the 100,000 Allied prisoners of war would die. He was aware of Tokyo’s order that, at the moment that the Americans invaded Japan's home islands, the POW's were to be tortured, beheaded, and executed en masse. At many POW camps, many prisoners had already been instructed to dig their own graves. Fifty thousand POWs had already died from torture, starvation, and unimaginable abuse.

In his book The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, “revisionist” historian Gar Alperovitz denounces the American use of the bomb. His book is filled with impressive documentation and sophisticated phraseology. The problem is that the 780 pages of text and references fail to answer one question: would Alperovitz argue the same thesis if he, or one of his children, had been an Allied POW in a Japanese prison camp on the eve of Truman's decision?

Only an intellectual could create the arguments that Alperovitz does. Few academics represent better the ultimate heartlessness of ideas.

That the Japanese bore the brunt of the first weapons of mass destruction, that tens of thousands of innocent and helpless Japanese citizens died during those tragic and soul-searching days of early August 1945 is a given. They deserve our memory, as well as our grief. What is too often forgotten, however, is that the greatest crime awaiting mankind at that terrible time was not inherent in the use of the atomic bomb, but in the more horrifying reality that would have followed its non-use.

The decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki represented the lesser of two evils.

[slimer]

In the summer of 1945, Japan had more than 2 million soldiers and 30 million citizens who were prepared to choose "death over dishonour."

That the Japanese bore the brunt of the first weapons of mass destruction, that tens of thousands of innocent and helpless Japanese citizens died during those tragic and soul-searching days of early August 1945 is a given.

I see a contradiction in these statements. If 30 million of them were prepared to die for the war effort then how could there be tens of thousands of innocent and helpless ones.

[Vigilanteman]

A good share of the 30 million civilian "volunteers" were volunteered by the militarists like the civilians on Saipan. A good book (written by a Japanese scholar who lived through the era) is "The Pacific War" by Saburo Ienaga. The English edition has been published.

[slimer]

A good share of the 30 million civilian "volunteers" were volunteered by the militarists like the civilians on Saipan

In other words, I take it that they did not have much of a choice in the matter...Thanks for the book.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

We lived in Japan in the early 1950's. Our maid, Masako, told us she was made to work in a munitions plant when she was nine years old. When the plant was hit by bombs, the work continued in caves dug for this purpose. Among the items turned out were crude, "last ditch" one shot handguns, capable of fireing a single shot. She explaned the idea was to get close enough to shoot the American soldier, then get his gun and shoot others untill she was killed.
I played in these caves as a little kid with Japanese and fellow Army brat playmates only a few years afterward.

[MosesKnows]

By August 1945, the war with Japan showed signs of continuing indefinitely

I was a small boy at the time there was a slogan indicating how long the war might last; "golden gate by '48". My father came home in '45.

[fhayek]

Although I am sure that they did not think so at the time, the dropping of the bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the best thing could have happened to Japan at the time. Three reasons:

One: It saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of Japanese.

Two: Had the war continued, the Soviets would have certainly become more involved with the war with Japan. The nation would have probably become partitioned into North and South Japan, half becoming communist.

Three: Had the U.S. lost a million men taking Japan, it almost certainly would not have shown the degree of mercy and goodwill that it did after the atomic bomb attack.

[Gail Wynand]

It may well be that the dropping of atomic bombs on japanese cities resulted in less loss of japanese life than an otherwise inevitabe American (and soviet) invasion. Using this probable fact as a justification, however, subverts Americas right to use the bomb and makes it conditional upon the "benefit" of its use to the enemy. It was right for America to drop the bomb regardless of enemy, including civilian, casualities. The japanese government viciously attacked America without warning. The japanese military swept across Asia imposing an unparalled reign of brutality including to the American forces of Battan and Corrigador. In the closing months of the war and clearly losing, the japanese, rather than seek an end to the war, adopted the kamakazi sucicde plane attack that wreaked havoc on the pacific fleet and its sailors. America had every right to use any weapon at its disposal to defeat the japanese at that time and under those conditions. If America had possessed a hypothetical weapon which could have obliterated the entire japanese population it should have used it. Not only to win the war, not only to spare any signifiant number of AMERICAN casualties, but because the mere existence of such a weapon necessarily implies that at some point it may become available to the enemy whose prior brutal conduct assures they would not hesitate to use it against America.

The parallels to the present quandry in Afghanistan and throughout the region is unavoidable and therein lies the relevance and importance of the issue. America must get clear that its self defense is the ONLY justification it needs for military action, and VICTORY is the only goal. Once a person or a nation starts down the road of obscuring that truth, and confuses themselves and the world with implications that our goals and methods depend to any extent upon the effects on populations that co-exist with our enemies, we undermine our purpose and sow seeds of the impotent strategies of Korea, Vietnam and Iraq. America can choose to consider humanitarian impacts of different actions available to us. Flirtations with 'nation building' and disregard of effective actions because of collateral consequences amounts to a renunciation of the right of self defense. Our policy ought to be what Bush implied to Congress in his first full speech on the Afghan issue. We should be in a declared war against the terrorists and any who harbor them. If a nation is unable own their own to root out terrorists within their borders, they can open their doors to our military and we will do it for them. If they refuse, they are fair game and should be pounded to dust until they are gone or until they are replaced by a compliant government. The fundamentalist supporters of bin Laden clearly believe they can win a war of attrition with America by virtue of their willingness to die, kamikazi style, in unimaginable numbers in a prolonged war of attrition. If they implement such a strategy, and if it begins to consume any material number of American casualties, a thermonuclear response will be due. Pray for the souls of the innocents if it happens, pray for the soul of America if we lack the resolve or the clarity of intellect to go through with it.

[Austin Willard Wright]

Gail Wynand in the Fountainhead always viewed matters in terms of the "masses" rather than the rights of individual (including presumably Japanese babies). You are living up to your screen name.

[slimer]

Truman Had No Alternative: Hiroshima and Nagasaki Part II

[slimer]

The parallels to the present quandry in Afghanistan and throughout the region is unavoidable and therein lies the relevance and importance of the issue.

Thank you for pointing this out. It was one of the reasons I found these articles interesting and decided to post them.

See Reply #9 for Part II.

[Austin Willard Wright]

Truman had plenty of alternatives to killing thousands of babies. He could have easily had a deal that brought Japanese defeat without unconditional surrender. No historian denies this. BTW, it was FDR and Truman's dedication to unconditional surrender which served to undercut the efforts of German military officers who repeatedly tried to kill Hitler thus costing millions of lives needlessly.

[Gail Wynand]

Mr. Wright, while speculating on the nature of my perspective, you also postulate that concern for "dead japanese babies" should have entered into America's decision making equation for determining whether or not to 'use the bomb'. I would be interested in your views as to how you balance 'dead japanese babies' against the widows and orphans and lost lives of American servicemen if we had had to defeat the japs (thats what they were called) the hard way? In a later post you conjecture, based I infer on pointy headed intellectual revisionist speculation, that we could have "negotiated" some end less traumatic, but still somehow meeting America's securities needs. Putting aside that there is no real evidence that such was even possible, please explain how and why a negotiated end (it took TWO bombs to get them to surrender, by the way) with the die hard japanese, would have been any different than the other inneffectual negotiated resolutions of military conflict in the 20th century, such as WWI, Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq? Moreover, how many instances can you point anywhere in the history of civilization, where war seriously engaged in by two cultures, once openly and fully commenced, was ever truly resolved absent one side finally pounding the other totally into the dust? It is true that notwithstanding their repeated conflicts France, Germany and Britain survive as mild imitations of the powers they once were, but they did engage in chronic intermittent warfare for centuries, and one can surely argue, that the unconditional surrender of WWII, which you criticise, was in fact, the ulimate pounding into the dust that ended and resolved the previously chronic antagonisms.

[longshadow]

Using this probable fact as a justification, however, subverts Americas right to use the bomb and makes it conditional upon the "benefit" of its use to the enemy. It was right for America to drop the bomb regardless of enemy, including civilian, casualities.

As you correctly point out, the use of the Atomic bomb saving Japenese lives is a consequence that is secondary to the primary issue of whether or not it hastened the end of the war, and saved lives of Americans as a consequence.

The distinction between the Atomic bombing of Nagasaki/Hiroshima and conventional bombing of the rest of Japan's cities is in fact a false distinction: the physical damage from the A-bomb was indistinguishable from the cumulative result of repeated saturation bombing raids of Japan's other cities, and it is reasonable to assume that the citizens who died from conventional bombs and ensuing firestorms died just as painfully and completely as the civilians who died from the A-bomb.

Thus, if one wishes to engage in hand-wringing over "dead Japanese babies" from the A-bomb, one must also wring one's hands with equal fervor over the dead Japanese babies of Tokyo. In other words, the argument is not over A-bomb versus convention bombs, it is whether collateral damage by any means in time of war is ever acceptable.

Until such time as technology allows us to make "personal cruise missiles" that target a particular individual, and thus allow us to "take out" the bin Laden's, the Hitler's, the Tojo's, and the generals and officers and soldiers without risking civilian lives, collateral damage is here to stay. And to the extent that the indiginous population supports a war against us through its industrial capacity, civilian workers, in the homes, with their innocent wives and babies, will unfortuneately be viable targets until the enemy's will to fight is destroyed.

Warfare is defined as the continuation of politics by other means. In practical terms, this involves the use of armed forces, whose means to prevail include breaking things and hurting people. Suggesting that warfare, especially in 1945, could be waged in a manner where our strategic priorities should be dictated by concern over collateral damage is to ignore the definition of war and the reality of the circumstances.

[Austin Willard Wright]

You are obviously not a follower of Ayn Rand who believed that evil doers should be held accountable, not babies. Please note that her Norwegian "terrorist" in Atlas Shrugged went out of his way to spare civilians. This is a worthy model for the U.S. and fortunately Dubya, whose actions I support, is targeting soldiers not babies.

My claims are not in the least revisionist. The sticking point in August 1945 was the U.S. demand for unconditional surrender, more specifically the Japanese fear that the emperor would be deposed. No serious historian denies this. Unfortunately, most never bother to examine the differences between unconditional (a novel concept at the time) and conditional surrender.

[Gail Wynand]

you have not responded at all to my queries, you do not provide authorities or evidence for your conclusory speculations, including by the way the policy of Ms. Rand in regard to the use of atomic weapons and civilian casualties which was recently discussed on FR and which can be found easily on the net. More importantly, your assertion that somewhere between iwo jima, okanowa, and the mainland, the japs got rid of their fight to the last living civilian and never never never surrender mentality, is palpably implausible. The only 'historians' who entertain such fantasies dream in pink and are perversely jealous of anyone with the real courage and vision that it takes to win wars, thus they write their tripe.

I have agreed with you on other issues, but believe you are blindly fixated on this one.