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When we dropped atomic bombs on Japan it was mostly civilians that died and there was not a great deal of military targets in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki areas. This was a terror bombing and it worked and it worked well.

I am tired of this BS! The A-Bombs were NOT designed as "terrorist" bombs, but they damn sure were terrifying!!

Hiroshima was home to the 4th largest military supply depot in Japan! It was one of the busiest shallow-water ports in southern Japan. It was chosen because of the military depot, the industrial parks (there were several) AND because of the population level! The US wanted a small enough population to avoid excessive civilian deaths, WHILE taking out military and industrial resources!

Nagasaki wasn't even the main target for the second A-Bomb. The munitions dump at Kokura was the main target, but because the US did not want indiscriminate killing of civilians, military orders did not allow them drop the bomb WITHOUT positive sighting of the intended target! Due to weather and lag-time in rendezvous with the rest of the flights, they had to find their secondary target - Nagasaki. More importantly, weather conditions in Nagasaki almost thwarted this second run altogether, but they finally got enough clearance that they dropped Fat Man directly between two major military and industrial facilities - completely destroying the industrial facility and knocking out the deep-water ports within the city! As a side note, the ports were damaged, but the train-service was only disrupted where the tracks were missing - go figure! Again, Nagasaki was chosen based on the population levels and other military-rich targets.

If the US wanted to terrorize Japan, why wouldn't they have just dropped the A-Bombs on Tokyo and the Emperor's Palace? Because the Emperor's Palace was surrounded by three SCHOOLS! And Tokyo would have been too many civilians without many military-rich targets.

More importantly, the US dropped new, more detailed pamphlets in about nine cities, including Hiroshima and Nagasaki, telling them that their cities were going to be hit with an unbelievable force - it told them to LEAVE the city! So, if our intent was strictly to kill civilians and terrorize, then why would we tell them this? The Japanese, in an effort to conserve their fuel and aircraft also stopped defending and attacking small squadrons, and in both cases they signaled air raid, but then signaled all clear! Had the Japanese military done their part to protect their people, then neither of these would have even been a BLIP on our past-radar! There were only two support aircraft and NO fighter support with either run! And we told them where we were going to bomb!

Real terrifying!