No, it's not good that Japanese civilians died in the bombing campaigns against Japan in 1945 but bombing and bombardment of cities in WWII was accepted as a legitimate tactic by both the Axis and the Allies. We can certainly look back on it and say how horrible it was, but at the end of the day we are applying modern morality and rules of war to a past conflict.
Sure, terrorist style bombing of cities to force capitulation was seen as a valid method of waging warfare, but terrorist style bombing of the cities of an already beaten enemy for no purpose other than destruction of innocent people was kind of unprecedented even then. Generally you stop dropping bombs when the enemy is beaten, rather than dropping all your fancy new, more destructive than ever before kind of bomb as a victory lap
The enemy is beaten when it surrenders. The Japanese did not surrender until after the bombs were dropped. Even then, the Imperial military staged a coup against their own God-Emperor to stop him from broadcasting his surrender speech. They stormed the Imperial Palace and ransacked the place - the recording was smuggled out in a pile of laundry. We are taking about a country run by people with that level of deathwish, you cannot just assume that they were beaten.
Setting all of that aside, there were still hundreds of thousands of Imperial Japanese soldiers in China and Korea at the time of surrender. Those soldiers were oppressing, murdering, raping and stealing up until the very end. Just because the Japanese military ceased to be a threat to the US Fleet does not mean that they ceased to be a threat to millions of people.
There are soldiers in China that we need to stop, obviously the solution is to vaporize a bunch of innocent civilians in Japan, great idea.
The solution is to continue to fight against the aggressor occupier fascist state using all means available until they surrender. A naval invasion of Japan was projected to cause up to 500,000 casualties. A naval blockade until starvation might have caused millions of civilian deaths if you take Leningrad as an example of how a starvation blockade would go.
It is tragic and horrific when a civilian is killed in war, but civilian deaths in war are unavoidable. The guilty party are the Japanese militarists who were refusing to surrender and holding out for some deathride bloodbath (of their own civilians).
I really think you ought to watch that video before continuing to support the US in its completely unnecessary and indefensible slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent people.
As a Chinese person who's lived in Japan for many years and read about the topic pretty extensively in three languages, I don't think that I need my opinions to be validated by an Englishman.
He makes a very extensively researched and rigorously sourced case that the dropping of the nuclear bombs served no practical purpose regarding the war and that, furthermore, those responsible knew it served no such purpose.
Your position is identical to the modern, western narrative which was cooked up as a retroactive justification for an obviously unjustifiable act.
I am not watching a 2 hour long video. If you would like to summarize his most salient points then I am happy to respond to those points. If me not watching this video is a deal breaker for you then we do not have to continue this conversation.
Your position is identical to the modern, western narrative which was cooked up as a retroactive justification for an obviously unjustifiable act.
I would be interested in these western sources which use the saving of Chinese and Korean lives as an explicit justification for the atomic bombings.
Also, your position is also the position of the Nanjing-denying Japanese far right so... Idk where that leaves us if we apply your reasoning.
Sure, terrorist style bombing of cities to force capitulation was seen as a valid method of waging warfare, but terrorist style bombing of the cities of an already beaten enemy for no purpose other than destruction of innocent people was kind of unprecedented even then. Generally you stop dropping bombs when the enemy is beaten, rather than dropping all your fancy new, more destructive than ever before kind of bomb as a victory lap
The enemy is beaten when it surrenders. The Japanese did not surrender until after the bombs were dropped. Even then, the Imperial military staged a coup against their own God-Emperor to stop him from broadcasting his surrender speech. They stormed the Imperial Palace and ransacked the place - the recording was smuggled out in a pile of laundry. We are taking about a country run by people with that level of deathwish, you cannot just assume that they were beaten.
Setting all of that aside, there were still hundreds of thousands of Imperial Japanese soldiers in China and Korea at the time of surrender. Those soldiers were oppressing, murdering, raping and stealing up until the very end. Just because the Japanese military ceased to be a threat to the US Fleet does not mean that they ceased to be a threat to millions of people.
There are soldiers in China that we need to stop, obviously the solution is to vaporize a bunch of innocent civilians in Japan, great idea.
There's a video about this topic I think you would benefit from watching.
youtube.com/watch?v=RCRTgtpC-Go
The solution is to continue to fight against the aggressor occupier fascist state using all means available until they surrender. A naval invasion of Japan was projected to cause up to 500,000 casualties. A naval blockade until starvation might have caused millions of civilian deaths if you take Leningrad as an example of how a starvation blockade would go.
It is tragic and horrific when a civilian is killed in war, but civilian deaths in war are unavoidable. The guilty party are the Japanese militarists who were refusing to surrender and holding out for some deathride bloodbath (of their own civilians).
I really think you ought to watch that video before continuing to support the US in its completely unnecessary and indefensible slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent people.
As a Chinese person who's lived in Japan for many years and read about the topic pretty extensively in three languages, I don't think that I need my opinions to be validated by an Englishman.
He makes a very extensively researched and rigorously sourced case that the dropping of the nuclear bombs served no practical purpose regarding the war and that, furthermore, those responsible knew it served no such purpose.
Your position is identical to the modern, western narrative which was cooked up as a retroactive justification for an obviously unjustifiable act.
I am not watching a 2 hour long video. If you would like to summarize his most salient points then I am happy to respond to those points. If me not watching this video is a deal breaker for you then we do not have to continue this conversation.
I would be interested in these western sources which use the saving of Chinese and Korean lives as an explicit justification for the atomic bombings.
Also, your position is also the position of the Nanjing-denying Japanese far right so... Idk where that leaves us if we apply your reasoning.
how about a 25-minute video
the Red Army's advance would have led to Japan's surrender, the bombs were a warning to the USSR