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Harry Truman's "Courage"
A little late to the great Jon Stewart/Harry Truman war criminal debate, but I just came across it today, from the May 18 issue of American Conservative. (The article is not online for non-subscribers, alas.) Stuart Reid quoted English (and Catholic convert) philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe on Truman:
I have long been puzzled by the common cant about President Truman's courage [in dropping the A-bomb]...Given the right circumstances (e.g. that no one whose opinion matters will disapprove), a quite mediocre person can do spectacularly wicked things without thereby becoming impressive.
Xeones|5.28.09 @ 3:24PM|#
...a quite mediocre person can do spectacularly wicked
things without thereby becoming impressive.
Face, Harry Truman. FACE.
Scott|5.28.09 @ 3:28PM|#
Like most Democrats, he seemed remarkably unencumbered by conscience when called upon to do shitty things in big ways to large numbers of people.
The Extispicator|5.28.09 @ 3:35PM|#
Don't be so hard on Truman. Had he not taken swift action, we'd all be driving Hondas and Toyotas and eating sushi right now. Oh, wait.
Alan Vanneman|5.28.09 @ 3:35PM|#
So what's the point, that all snotty statements are true? I find Ms. Anscombe's remark to embody the superlative of two adjectives, "fatuous" and "incorrect". Shocking to say, but being defeated by the U.S. is the best thing that ever happened to Japan.
|5.28.09 @ 3:36PM|#
Scott,
It's the moral certainty acquired from utilitarianism that allows
such a casual attitude toward atrocity. Treating individuals like
beads on an abacus for the purposes of moral calculation doesn't
give you a whit of empathy for the beads themselves.
|5.28.09 @ 3:37PM|#
Legendary stories about GEM Anscombe are eagerly collected by
Philosophy grad students.
One is that if you walked into her office hours, it wouldn't be
uncommon for you to see her nursing one of her 8 kids.
Warty|5.28.09 @ 3:38PM|#
a quite mediocre person
It's a little known fact that Harry Truman's full name was Harry
Mediocre Asshole Truman.
|5.28.09 @ 3:42PM|#
Truman: If you're here to make peace, surrender or be destroyed.
If you're here to make war, we surrender.
Dr. Zoidberg: Both good. The important thing is I'm meeting new
people.
Truman: Bushwah! Now what's your mission? Are you planning to make
some kind of alien-human hybrid?
Zoidberg: Are you coming onto me?
Truman: Hot crackers, I take exception to that!
Zoidberg: (sexfully) I'm not hearing a no.
Kolohe|5.28.09 @ 3:44PM|#
Well, the quote assumes Truman was quite mediocre, which is
true, and the atomic bombings were spectacularly wicked, which
they're not. Or rather, both propositions are arguably um, arguable
which makes this quote (out of context at least) quintessential
question begging.
As an aside the "Contraception and Chastity" essay lauded in that
obit reads almost exactly (not in a plagiarist sense though) like
that one by the thrice-divorced dude's one on gay marriage.
|5.28.09 @ 3:44PM|#
When you're done condemning HST take a minute, put yourself in
his shoes (hindsight is strictly prohibited, you know no more than
Truman did) and make the decision.
If you're honest with yourself (~8% of the human race are) you'll
admit that very good arguments for nuking at least one Japanese
city existed.
David Small|5.28.09 @ 3:50PM|#
First, the Japanese received several days warning before the first bombing. That's more than we got for Pearl Harbor. Second, even after the first bomb, they still didn't surrender. And when we dropped the second bomb it took them two more days still for them to surrender.
Warty|5.28.09 @ 3:51PM|#
you'll admit that very good arguments for nuking at least
one Japanese city existed.
Of course there were. That doesn't mean it was courageous.
Gilbert Martin|5.28.09 @ 3:52PM|#
"It's the moral certainty acquired from utilitarianism that
allows such a casual attitude toward atrocity. Treating individuals
like beads on an abacus for the purposes of moral calculation
doesn't give you a whit of empathy for the beads themselves."
Generic utilitarianism toward one's own people at all times is
wrong.
Treating the population of an enemy nation that you have been
fighting an extremely vicuous war with as beads on an abacus is
perfectly legit.
|5.28.09 @ 3:54PM|#
Treating the population of an enemy nation that you have
been fighting an extremely vicuous war with as beads on an abacus
is perfectly legit.
That made me poop my pants a little. In a bad way.
Elemenope|5.28.09 @ 3:55PM|#
If you're honest with yourself (~8% of the human race are)
you'll admit that very good arguments for nuking at least one
Japanese city existed.
The sticking point though is that vanishingly few of those
arguments go on to justify nuking a second city.
Victor|5.28.09 @ 3:57PM|#
Historians have a tendency to equate "greatness" with "number of
people murdered." Naturally Truman is admired.
For the gentleman above, who's apparently trying to make himself
out as a member of a persecuted minority by parroting the received
wisdom: presumably Truman knew what most Americans did not until
recently - that Japan had been trying to surrender since January of
1945.
Of course it's crass to deny the Mob-owned little creep HST his
moment of glory. He was, after all, only a relatively minor
murderer by WWII standards. Though he appears to've tried to catch
up with wholesale butchery of Korean civilians, not too long
thereafter.
Seward|5.28.09 @ 3:57PM|#
If we had not dropped the atomic weapons on Japan we would have likely continued to firebomb Japan for many months more. This assumes that Japan would not have surrendered short of an outright invasion and occupation. Anyway, if it was a war crime to bomb Japan with atomic weapons it seems just as likely to me that it was a war crime to bomb Japan with incendiary weapons.
|5.28.09 @ 4:00PM|#
J sub D
It appears that quite a few people don't want to admit what doesn't
fit in their narrative. They are unwilling to admit the obvious: A
war leader's obligations are to HIS sid, not the enemies. Those
total douchebags that mindlessly criticise Truman spout off like
they would indeed rather send a large number of their own to their
deaths than do what's necessary to win. No however rational
argument is going to persuade them. They are pompous,
self-important, idiots.
/justified rant
|5.28.09 @ 4:01PM|#
The sticking point though is that vanishingly few of those
arguments go on to justify nuking a second city.
I'm pretty certain I'd have waited longer than 3 days. Nukes were
in short supply and the possibility of having to drop one on the
Soviets certainly existed.
Scott|5.28.09 @ 4:01PM|#
SugarFree:
Hmmm. When John Stuart Mill's "Utilitarianism" was on the book list
for a Humanities course I took in college many moons ago, I don't
recall the prof arguing at the time that it was a particularly evil
philosophy. What a dupe I was.
I wonder if the Vulcans were Utilitarians.
Maybe Truman was a Vulcan in human drag?
|5.28.09 @ 4:01PM|#
To give Truman a little credit (not really), he inherited
whatever fucked up shit FDR had been cooking for years and had to
suddenly work with it. Remember that FDR basically shut him out of
all war planning and decisions for the whole war.
It's incredibly hard to try and understand what logic went into the
dropping of the bombs. The Japs were working on their own crazy
shit from biologicals to a Mickey Mouse nuclear operation. I assume
Truman was scared.
|5.28.09 @ 4:02PM|#
For all of my disagreements with Truman (and they don't include the "should the bomb have been dropped on Japan" debate), I have to give him credit for saying what he meant, rather than the mush that passes for political discourse nowadays.
|5.28.09 @ 4:03PM|#
Truman: Whistling Dixie! I want this sent to Area 51 for
study.
General: But, sir, that's where we're building the fake
moon-landing set.
Truman: Then we'll have to really land on the moon. Invent NASA and
tell them to get off their fannies!
|5.28.09 @ 4:05PM|#
What would have been impressive to me is if Harry had ridden the
Big One right into Hiroshima a la Slim Pickens.
That would have left no question about where the fucking buck
stopped.
Gilbert Martin|5.28.09 @ 4:10PM|#
"If we had not dropped the atomic weapons on Japan we would have
likely continued to firebomb Japan for many months more"
Indeed so.
Curtis Lemay had been running his low-level fire bombing strategy
for some time and would have continued to do so.
One fire bombing raid on Tokyo killed more people than either of
the atom bombs did.
Using one plane and one atom bomb to kill a whole lot of people vs
using a lot of planes and bombs to do so differences only in
mechanics - not morality (regardless of whether one considers that
morality to be right or wrong).
creech|5.28.09 @ 4:18PM|#
People throw around numbers like "the U.S. and its allies would have suffered a million casualties in the invasion of Japan." But why was an invasion necessary? The U.S. Navy, subs and surface vessels, were in position to throw a blockade stranglehold around Japan that would have forced a surrender eventually. Even if it took two years, it would have happened without the need for any invasion or dropping of a-bombs. On the other hand, one could make the argument that the quick wiping out of 200,000 mostly Japanese civilians was more humane than firebombing or starving them out.
matt2|5.28.09 @ 4:19PM|#
Well la di dah, look at Kolohe with his fancy big city suit
& his proper usage of "begging the question."
Quit towing the lion for Big Rhetoric, Kolohe.
Les|5.28.09 @ 4:20PM|#
Like most Democrats, he seemed remarkably unencumbered by
conscience when called upon to do shitty things in big ways to
large numbers of people.
I hope you mean, "Like most politicians..."
Eisenhower, MacArthur, and many others with very respectable points
of view opposed using the atomic bomb.
http://www.doug-long.com/quotes.htm
|5.28.09 @ 4:21PM|#
That made me poop my pants a little. In a bad
way.
"You know you're like the A-bomb, everyone's laughing having a good
time and you show up BOOM! Everything's dead!"
Gilbert Martin|5.28.09 @ 4:23PM|#
"But why was an invasion necessary? The U.S. Navy, subs and
surface vessels, were in position to throw a blockade stranglehold
around Japan that would have forced a surrender eventually."
It wasn't necessary. One of the plans being considered was a
blockade. But the plan also included continued bombing. There was
no reason that atomic bombing shouldn't have been part of that plan
as well.
Les|5.28.09 @ 4:28PM|#
There was no reason that atomic bombing shouldn't have been
part of that plan as well.
Funny, Eisenhower and MacArthur mentioned a few reasons. So, there
were reasons, you just disagree with them.
Gilbert Martin|5.28.09 @ 4:36PM|#
MacArthur and the army high command wanted an invasion for their
own personal glory.
A blockade and bombing campaign would have primarily been a Navy
and Army Air-force show and they didn't want that.
Zeb|5.28.09 @ 4:37PM|#
Every action in a war by either side is atrocious, so arguments like this don't interest me too much. Sometimes war may be necessary, but it is always nothing but bad. It was a horrible shitty thing for all parties. I doubt it was much more horrible and shitty with a-bombs than it would have been without them.
Alberta Libertarian|5.28.09 @ 4:43PM|#
//No however rational argument is going to persuade them. They
are pompous, self-important, idiots.//
Examples of pompous, self important, idiots:
"In 1945 Secretary of War Stimson, visiting my headquarters in
Germany, informed me that our government was preparing to drop an
atomic bomb on Japan. I was one of those who felt that there were a
number of cogent reasons to question the wisdom of such an act.
During his recitation of the relevant facts, I had been conscious
of a feeling of depression and so I voiced to him my grave
misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already
defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and
secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking
world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I
thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American
lives."
- Dwight D Eisenhower
"The Japanese had, in fact, already sued for peace. The atomic bomb
played no decisive part, from a purely military point of view, in
the defeat of Japan."
- Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz
""It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at
Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war
against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to
surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful
bombing with conventional weapons.
"The lethal possibilities of atomic warfare in the future are
frightening. My own feeling was that in being the first to use it,
we had adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the
Dark Ages. I was not taught to make war in that fashion, and wars
cannot be won by destroying women and children."
- Admiral William D. Leahy
"MacArthur biographer William Manchester has described MacArthur's
reaction to the issuance by the Allies of the Potsdam Proclamation
to Japan: "...the Potsdam declaration in July, demand[ed] that
Japan surrender unconditionally or face 'prompt and utter
destruction.' MacArthur was appalled. He knew that the Japanese
would never renounce their emperor, and that without him an orderly
transition to peace would be impossible anyhow, because his people
would never submit to Allied occupation unless he ordered it.
Ironically, when the surrender did come, it was conditional, and
the condition was a continuation of the imperial reign. Had the
General's advice been followed, the resort to atomic weapons at
Hiroshima and Nagasaki might have been unnecessary."
- William Manchester, American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur 1880-1964,
pg. 512.
""...in the light of available evidence I myself and others felt
that if such a categorical statement about the [retention of the]
dynasty had been issued in May, 1945, the surrender-minded elements
in the [Japanese] Government might well have been afforded by such
a statement a valid reason and the necessary strength to come to an
early clearcut decision.
"If surrender could have been brought about in May, 1945, or even
in June or July, before the entrance of Soviet Russia into the
[Pacific] war and the use of the atomic bomb, the world would have
been the gainer."
- Joseph Grew
""I have always felt that if, in our ultimatum to the Japanese
government issued from Potsdam [in July 1945], we had referred to
the retention of the emperor as a constitutional monarch and had
made some reference to the reasonable accessibility of raw
materials to the future Japanese government, it would have been
accepted. Indeed, I believe that even in the form it was delivered,
there was some disposition on the part of the Japanese to give it
favorable consideration. When the war was over I arrived at this
conclusion after talking with a number of Japanese officials who
had been closely associated with the decision of the then Japanese
government, to reject the ultimatum, as it was presented. I believe
we missed the opportunity of effecting a Japanese surrender,
completely satisfactory to us, without the necessity of dropping
the bombs."
- John McCloy
"Prof. Albert Einstein... said that he was sure that President
Roosevelt would have forbidden the atomic bombing of Hiroshima had
he been alive and that it was probably carried out to end the
Pacific war before Russia could participate."
- Einstein Deplores Use of Atom Bomb, New York Times, 8/19/46, pg.
1.
Alberta Libertarian|5.28.09 @ 4:45PM|#
//MacArthur and the army high command wanted an invasion for
their own personal glory.//
Do you have any proof of that.
Pepe|5.28.09 @ 5:05PM|#
The moral issue at the center of dropping the A bomb is really
no different than that of dropping any bomb on a city filled with
civilians. Is it morally acceptable to deliberately kill
non-combatants, including children for any reason? Is it okay to
choose to kill some innocent people to achieve the outcome of fewer
overall casualties?
The end result of such an action may be have the best overall
outcome but it does treat individual humans as nothing more than
pawns and does not respect their own rights and intrinsic value. If
shooting a baby in the head would save the lives of 100 others
would you be comfortable doing it?
DADIODADDY|5.28.09 @ 5:08PM|#
Please remember, Japan, 3rd time's the charm. BTW, no self serving quotes after the fact if you please.
Jerry|5.28.09 @ 5:17PM|#
Bombs tend to kill indiscriminately, their use can hardly be described as courageously.
Les|5.28.09 @ 5:20PM|#
Every action in a war by either side is atrocious, so
arguments like this don't interest me too much. Sometimes war may
be necessary, but it is always nothing but bad. It was a horrible
shitty thing for all parties. I doubt it was much more horrible and
shitty with a-bombs than it would have been without
them.
Can we agree that it is more atrocious to target and bomb civilians
than it is to target and bomb military compounds? I'm sure for many
of the people living in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and for all the
men, women, and children who died later of cancer and radiation
poisoning, a war without a-bombs would have been decidedly much
less shitty.
|5.28.09 @ 5:31PM|#
Didn't MacArthur want to nuke the Chinese during the Korean
War?
I think the focus of this debate is wrong. During WWII, both sides
had no trouble slaughtering civilians. Maybe we've been away from
total war too long to understand that, but it seems pretty hard to
justify today. However, once you accept that mass killings of
civilians are okay, then whether you do it with a bunch of fire
bombs or with one big bomb seems to not make much of a
difference.
I will note that rounding people up in camps and treating them
brutally before gassing them to death is worse.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 5:31PM|#
Bombs tend to kill indiscriminately, their use can hardly be described as courageously.
Good point, but only from an historical perspective. In 1945,
carpet bombing was the only kind of bombing that was possible. We
leveled Dresden in the same way as Tokyo. Even during the Vietnam
tango, bombing was very imprecise. Nagasaki and Hiroshima were both
legitimate military targets, given the technology of the
time.
There were many thousands of US troops preparing for (and dreading)
an assault on Japan.
Personally, I think the two A-bombs were justified. They shortened
the war and saved a lot of American soldiers' lives. That is good
enough for me.
|5.28.09 @ 5:36PM|#
Les
I think you indirectly touch on an important point: War makes
people think of those on the other side as sub-human, undeserving
of respect and compassion. This is true for all sides and in every
case. I don't particularly fault Truman because I think almost any
person in his position would likely have made the same
decision.
Read Mark Twain's "The War Prayer"
|5.28.09 @ 5:38PM|#
There's also the question of what you're used to. We'd been
bombing the crap out of the Axis powers for years. What's a couple
more bombed out cities?
In hindsight, I'd have demonstrated the bomb or dropped it on a
purely military target, but I have trouble condemning what happened
from their perspective at the time. It was a terrible era, and
terrible things were happening all around.
|5.28.09 @ 5:38PM|#
I am not sure why starving people into submission is any less
shitty than stopping the war in a few days by dropping the A-bombs.
The effectiveness of the USN submarine force is well known and
documented. Less well known was the effectiveness of the USAAF
mining of Japanese waters.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Starvation
MT1(ss) MayorOmalleySuxs
|5.28.09 @ 5:40PM|#
Aresen,
Not to mention Canada every time we're on the same thread, but I
have a question: How come Canada doesn't have nukes?
|5.28.09 @ 5:49PM|#
Step 1 in the Truman is an asshole argument: Explain why nuking
them is beyond the pale (with 200,00 casualties) but the FDR policy
of using incendiaries to burn an equal number of people to death in
Tokyo is not as bad?
Dead is dead. More people have died from halberds and polearms than
nukes.
Ace|5.28.09 @ 5:49PM|#
I don't see why we can't recognize it as an atrocity and also as the best thing to do in that situation. That's statecraft for you.
Gilbert Martin|5.28.09 @ 5:51PM|#
"I think the focus of this debate is wrong. During WWII, both
sides had no trouble slaughtering civilians. "
The decision as to whether WW2 was going to be fought as a total
war where the entire population of the enemy nations were
considered part of the enemy and therefore fair game for attack had
been been made long before the atom bombs were dropped.
The atom bombs were merely continuation of the same thing by
different means.
Les|5.28.09 @ 5:52PM|#
They shortened the war and saved a lot of American soldiers'
lives. That is good enough for me.
You say those things as if they're established facts, instead of
highly controversial assertions. I don't know that we'll ever know
if those things are true, but it's not the case as if they have
been established as facts.
But Pro Libertate is right. Intentionally bombing civilians, the
way both sides did in WW2, is like slavery. It's ultimately
unjustifiable. Otherwise we'd still do it. Nowadays, we merely
accidentally bomb civilians. It's a horrid and too slow-moving
process, but I'm hopeful that in time, most people will realize
that the life of a 9-year-old child in some far-away country is as
undeserving of violent death from the government as a 9-year-old
child in their own country.
(trust us! it's not like we're accidentally bombing our
people!)
Les|5.28.09 @ 5:53PM|#
The decision as to whether WW2 was going to be fought as a
total war where the entire population of the enemy nations were
considered part of the enemy and therefore fair game for attack had
been been made long before the atom bombs were dropped.
The atom bombs were merely continuation of the same thing by
different means.
This is exactly true as an explanation. Like slavery, you can
explain it, but you can't justify it.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 6:00PM|#
ProL,
"In hindsight, I'd have demonstrated the bomb or dropped it on a
purely military target"
How would you have accomplished that using a B17 and Norton bomb
sight?
Les, if you are familiar with the war in the Pacific there is
nothing at all controversial about the notion that the A-boms saved
American lives, and probably Japanese lives as well.
|5.28.09 @ 6:02PM|#
Episiarch: It's incredibly hard to try and understand what
logic went into the dropping of the bombs.
Not really. In many ways, NOT dropping the bomb would have been a
far more momentous decision. The firebombing had been going on for
some time. The a-bomb had been developed and people knew it worked.
To not use the thing, despite the after the fact hand-wringing,
would have been practically unthinkable.
Les|5.28.09 @ 6:06PM|#
Les, if you are familiar with the war in the Pacific there
is nothing at all controversial about the notion that the A-boms
saved American lives, and probably Japanese lives as
well.
Wayne, are you suggesting that Eisenhower, Leahy, and MacArthur
(and the others quoted in Alberta Libertarian's post at 4:43) were
unfamiliar with the war in the Pacific? Really?
|5.28.09 @ 6:08PM|#
How come Canada doesn't have nukes?
PL, a prety good answer,
here.
While Canada has rejected nuclear weapons, they have a pretty
extensive power program.
Both India and Pakistan made use of CANDU reactors, which had been
sold for peaceful uses, in their nuclear weapons programs.
They probably got more stuff from China and the USSR respectively,
though. But that is just a guess on my part.
|5.28.09 @ 6:11PM|#
wayne,
I'm not sure I understand. We could drop bombs precisely enough to
hit two cities; why couldn't we have dropped one on, say, an island
or a more remote military base?
Like I said, I understand the decision made at the time, especially
considering all the civilian bombing we were already doing (and the
potential cost to us of an invasion), but it still seems to me that
the option was a reasonable one. I've read why they didn't do it
that way, but I think the total war philosophy may have blinded
them to a better alternative.
Isaac,
So the reality is that Canada has paid for some nukes that we have,
all while playing the "We ain't a nuclear power" card.
Interesting.
|5.28.09 @ 6:11PM|#
Alberta Libertarian
The problem with most of those quotes is that they are self-serving
or not germane.
For example, Eisenhower's comments came to light well after the
fact, and there is considerable reason to believe that they were
developed after the fact as well. It is unlikely that he would have
been deeply briefed on the situation in the Pacific. He still had
his hands full.
Nimitz was right -- Japan had been defeated. The problem was
getting the Japanese to realize it as well.
Einstein of course was hardly privy to the kind of knowledge he
needed to speak with authority on the matter.
MacArthur, Grew, and Mcelroy are arguing about getting a surrender
-- something that is hardly a certain thing (see Richard Frank,
"Downfall").
Only Leahy really speaks to the issue at hand, and one wonders
where the hell he was during the firebombing.
|5.28.09 @ 6:24PM|#
As to Truman's courage, he was for the most part a skilled pol
who knew how to bend with the popular winds.
For example, joining the Klan in the twenties, because that was as
normal for a Missouri Democrat as a Connecticut Republican joining
the Rotary Club at the time. And then resigning because it might
mean losing the Catholic vote.
Also, recognizing Israel when the established policy of the
Roosevelt admin had been to accomodate the Arabs. But it guaranteed
the Jewish vote.
As anyone can see, very little of what he ever did demonstrated
anything resembling courage.
However, credit where it's due. In spite of his own feelings and
the prevailing semtiment in his party, he did order the end of
segregration of the Armed Forces.
To be sure, thes decision was largely one of practicality; the cost
of record keeping to maintain segregation was too high to be
continued in the modern Army.
But that aside, the move took guts and he lost votes and I'll give
him credit for doing the right thing.
Les|5.28.09 @ 6:25PM|#
Jammer,
I agree that those quotes certainly don't settle the matter.
I just think that they demonstrate that the issue was and is
militarily controversial and will probably always be so.
|5.28.09 @ 6:26PM|#
Everyone make their own spelling corrections in my previous post. There are too many for me to do it.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 6:27PM|#
Les,
See Jammer's 6:11 post.
Did the A-bombs shorten the war? The Japanese surrendered three
days after the second bomb detonated.
Were the Japanese anxious and ready to surrender well before the
first bomb was dropped? The Japanese did not surrender after the
first bomb was dropped, and in fact waited until three days after
the second bomb was dropped.
Seems prima facia to me.
PR|5.28.09 @ 6:28PM|#
that Japan had been trying to surrender since January of
1945.
they tried harder in August. Odd that.
|5.28.09 @ 6:34PM|#
In hindsight, I'd have demonstrated the bomb or dropped it
on a purely military target
There were only three or four bombs in the pipeline. Hard to
justify blowing big chunk of your inventory on a demonstration
target.
Hiroshima was a pretty significant part of the Japanese war
effort.
As I recall, the bomb detonated halfway between two "legitimate"
military targets.
The coulda woulda shoulda debate about the terms of surrender is
ridiculous hindsight, in my view. As I recall, the Japanese refused
to surrender until the Emperor took a direct hand after
Nagasaki.
From an ethical perspective, there is no difference between
firebombing and using nukes. Both are equally indiscriminate and
destructive. Nukes have an extra psychological impact, which
arguably makes them a more humane alternative. They brought about a
surrender, after all, when the equivalent damage from firebombing
could not.
|5.28.09 @ 6:35PM|#
wayne, it wasn't that hard to hit a city. Or even a large enough
military base.
ProL:
The demonstration option was dropped because IIRC, 1) Murphy's Law:
they were afraid of a fizzle, and 2) they had a feeling a warning
shot would not have had the necessary impact. Pardon the term.
|5.28.09 @ 6:38PM|#
My take on the ethics of attacking civilian targets.
I believe that,in wartime, there is no violation of ethics by the
side that responds in kind; Germany by bombing civilian centers in
England, effectively waived any claim that its own civilian centers
should not be bombed. The Japanese atrocities throughout the war
against civilians did the same in that theater.
|5.28.09 @ 6:40PM|#
R C Dean,
I'm not really disagreeing with you; I just think the total war
mindset made the Hiroshima/Nagasaki options more inevitable than
they had to be. I could be wrong, too--it's hard to put myself in
the place of the people making those decisions. God knows the times
were a lot more difficult than today.
I don't hold with condemning Truman. Like I said above, we'd
already decided that killing civilians en masse was
permissible. This was just a more dramatic iteration of that
policy. I sure the hell hope we don't do anything like that again.
Or get it done to us.
Jammer,
Yeah, I've read that. I'm not sure I agree with their decision, but
that's neither here nor there.
Jon E Cumlately|5.28.09 @ 6:47PM|#
If I believed the nonsense story that the bombings were
necessary to save a half-million or more American lives (the lives
that would've supposedly been lost in a planned invasion of Kyushu
and Honshu) then I might agree that Truman wasn't a war criminal.
Of course, I'd have to forget about Operation Keelhaul (you know,
where Truman helped Stalin round up millions of Soviet expatriates
who were then enslaved or killed) and the war in Korea (you know,
where napalm was used on civilians and dams were deliberately
destroyed flooding villages).
But, since the only reason to believe that story
is faith in pro-state historians, I can't.
Hell, Truman himself couldn't even come up with a consistent
reason.
Who
Disagreed?
Isn't RC Dean's "take on the ethics of attacking civilian
targets" the same excuse terrorists use for attacking
civilians?
wayne|5.28.09 @ 7:00PM|#
Let's face it, Americans are just evil.
First, we enticed the Japanese into attacking us at Pearl Harbor by
amassing our naval forces there and pretending to be ignorant of
their planned attack. Then we fought them all over the Pacific and
sacrificed thousands of American soldier's lives, in such places as
Guadal Canal, just to creat the moral climate necessary to justify
our use of the atomic weapons we knew we would create in several
years. Evil, pure evil!
Les|5.28.09 @ 7:01PM|#
Germany by bombing civilian centers in England, effectively
waived any claim that its own civilian centers should not be
bombed.
So, when one government deliberately murders large numbers of men,
women, and children, that means that the government of the murdered
people can now morally/ethically murder large numbers of men,
women, and children?
You can understand how this would be confusing.
Les|5.28.09 @ 7:03PM|#
Seems prima facia to me.
But it wasn't to people much more knowledgeable and experienced
than you or I.
Your post at 7:00 is just silly.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 7:06PM|#
"Your post at 7:00 is just silly."
Les, I am glad you got that, because based on all of this Monday
morning quarterbacking I am reading I was worried I might have to
dumb it down a bit.
Mike|5.28.09 @ 7:11PM|#
"I believe that,in wartime, there is no violation of ethics by
the side that responds in kind; Germany by bombing civilian centers
in England, effectively waived any claim that its own civilian
centers should not be bombed. The Japanese atrocities throughout
the war against civilians did the same in that theater."
My thoughts exactly. The Japanese were absolutely brutal with
everyone they encountered, and Truman was supposed to waste
hundreds of thousands of American lives (and probably millions of
Japanese lives)? If he HADN'T dropped the bomb, he would have been
the greatest war criminal in American history.
It is also worth noting that the bomb was dropped partially to
intimidate the USSR, and end the war quickly so that they wouldn't
stake a claim on part of Japan. I'm rather glad that the USSR
didn't get a big chunk of Japan like they did in Germany.
|5.28.09 @ 7:14PM|#
wayne,
Just to be clear, I think the U.S. was pretty much the good guy in
WWII, even more than the other Allies (certainly better than the
U.S.S.R.). The war was horrific in scale and in potential
repercussions for the loser, so it's no surprise that things got as
out of hand as they did. It's not like the Nazis--and the Japanese
leadership, to a lesser extent--weren't among some of the worst
butchers in history.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 7:18PM|#
ProL,
I agree.
In addition, I recognize it is a tragedy for children to die, on
either side. I just think this whole thing is a settled issue, and
I am not ready to label anybody on the American side a war criminal
based on our use of atomic weapons.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 7:21PM|#
"It's not like the Nazis--and the Japanese leadership, to a
lesser extent--weren't among some of the worst butchers in
history."
I am not convinced the Japanese weren't equal to the Nazis in their
butchery. Ask a Korean his/her opinion in the matter. Ask a
resident of Nanking. A small quibble in any case.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 7:25PM|#
"and the war in Korea (you know, where napalm was used on
civilians and dams were deliberately destroyed flooding
villages)."
I assume you are referring to the war between North and South
Korea. I would refer you also to the one that ended in 1945, when
they were liberated from the Japanese; that is the one that South
Koreans celebrate as their independence day.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 8:37PM|#
...a quite mediocre person can do spectacularly wicked
things without thereby becoming impressive.
Actually, this makes me picture Josef Stalin, not Truman.
Robert|5.28.09 @ 8:40PM|#
I never understood the business about limiting war to military targets. The whole idea is to inflict one's will on a population which is mostly civilian, so why not kill, maim, and destroy mostly -- preferably only -- civilians? Seems to me it'd be a safer and more effective way to prosecute a war than to go after the more difficult and dangerous, as well as less influential, military establishment.
wayne|5.28.09 @ 8:42PM|#
Jon E Cumlately,
I clicked on your name and read the editorial... Very good.
Thanks!
twv|5.28.09 @ 8:48PM|#
This debate shows the greatest danger of war: Voluntary
liberticide. War is the suspension of the rule of law. It aligns
otherwise sane individuals into two or more camps, each bent on the
other's destruction. Utter destruction, often. And the willingness
to go to total war and total annihilation is common. Even amongst
sane individuals.
This is why preparation for peace, on many fronts, is so important.
War inoculates the mind from freedom and humanity, and turns
otherwise good people into proponents of mass murder.
I am not saying that, once war has started, some horrible things
will not have to be supported by at least some otherwise good
people. I am just saying the obvious cost of even contemplating
war: Mass inhumanity of man to man.
It is not for no reason that classical liberals in the 19th century
were so generally anti-war. They knew good and well that, once war
is underway, justice and freedom cease to be possible, at least
near-term. And less likely long term, after people's minds had been
warped.
Try reading Herbert Spencer and Gustave de Molinari on the
subject.
|5.28.09 @ 9:14PM|#
Harry Truman did many things wrong; ending World War Two by
dropping the a-bomb is not one of them. His duty was to save as
many American and allied lives as possible.
-jcr
|5.28.09 @ 9:24PM|#
This is the best defense of the atomic bombing of Japan I have
ever seen
http://www.pjtv.com/video/Afterburner_/Jon_Stewart%2C_War_Criminals_%26_The_True_Story_of_the_Atomic_Bombs/1808/
It was in response to Jon Stewart calling Truman a war hero.
|5.28.09 @ 9:34PM|#
9 August, more than 5 million leaflets about the atom bomb had
been released over major Japanese cities. The OWI radio station
beamed a similar message to Japan every 15 minutes.
The Japanese text on the reverse side of the leaflet carried the
following warning:
"Read this carefully as it may save your life or the life of a
relative or friend.
In the next few days, some or all of the cities named on the
reverse side will be destroyed by American bombs. These cities
contain military installations and workshops or factories which
produce military goods. We are determined to destroy all of the
tools of the military clique which they are using to prolong this
useless war. But, unfortunately, bombs have no eyes. So, in
accordance with America's humanitarian policies, the American Air
Force, which does not wish to injure innocent people, now gives you
warning to evacuate the cities named and save your lives.
America is not fighting the Japanese people but is fighting the
military clique which has enslaved the Japanese people. The peace
which America will bring will free the people from the oppression
of the military clique and mean the emergence of a new and better
Japan. You can restore peace by demanding new and good leaders who
will end the war.
We cannot promise that only these cities will be among those
attacked but some or all of them will be, so heed this warning and
evacuate these cities immediately."
Gilbert Martin|5.28.09 @ 10:02PM|#
"This is exactly true as an explanation. Like slavery, you can
explain it, but you can't justify it."
Justify it to who?
Whether anything is "justified" or not is strictly a matter of
personal opinion. It is not something that can be empirically
proven one way or another.
And since such things cannot be proven, I see no reason to defer to
anyone else's opinion on that matter or any other.
Gilbert Martin|5.28.09 @ 10:04PM|#
"How come Canada doesn't have nukes?"
Because they are getting a free military protection ride off our
nukes.
H.F. Wolff|5.28.09 @ 10:48PM|#
"...Germany by bombing civilian centers in England, effectively
waived any claim that its own civilian centers should not be
bombed..."
Not so, it was Britain that began the bombing of civilian targets
in Germany.
Hitler did his utmost to avoid war with Britain.
People need to get their history from more reliable sources than
Hollywood, comic books, or politically correct school books.
H.F. Wolff
Abner MacGillicuddy|5.29.09 @ 12:17AM|#
Wolff
Don't you have some Jews to kill?
Oh, right, the holocaust never happened. It just should have.
And next time you'll get it right.
|5.29.09 @ 12:46AM|#
Hitler did not want war with England because he thought they
were "Aryans", not because of some moral qualm. He felt that
England should not interfere while Germany carried out its
"drang nacht osten" and clearing the slavic lands of
"untermenschen".
And while it is correct that England began deliberate bombing of
German cities (in response to accidental German bombing of
residential parts of London), there was certainly no attack on
German cities by either the Poles or the Dutch prior to the
respective bombings of Warsaw and Rotterdam. (The latter was a
deliberate terror tactic aimed at breaking Dutch resistance.)
|5.29.09 @ 12:07PM|#
And while it is correct that England began deliberate
bombing of German cities (in response to accidental German bombing
of residential parts of London), there was certainly no attack on
German cities by either the Poles or the Dutch prior to the
respective bombings of Warsaw and Rotterdam.
So, Germans bombed London, Warsaw, and Rotterdam before Churchill
bombed any German cities, is that correct?
Then my statement that the Germans waived any right to complain
stands.
So, when one government deliberately murders large numbers of
men, women, and children, that means that the government of the
murdered people can now morally/ethically murder large numbers of
men, women, and children?
That is correct. I'm not sure why you find the distinction between
aggressor and defender so confusing.
As a practical matter, allowing one side to violate the laws of war
with impunity, without immediate consequences, gives it an
advantage in warfighting and ensures that the laws of war will
never be honored. A government that exposes its own cities to
destruction by destroying its opponent's cities may think twice
about starting down that road.
|5.29.09 @ 12:59PM|#
Seward "...Anyway, if it was a war crime to bomb Japan with
atomic weapons it seems just as likely to me that it was a war
crime to bomb Japan with incendiary weapons."
Agree. and raise people one - dropping bombs on women, children,
old people. Maybe we should just understand that war is savage,
cruel and heartless.
But I am not a pacifist. But I understand that war is killing
people, in vicious manners.
IceTrey|5.29.09 @ 2:08PM|#
It's really very simple. If you bomb and kill thousands of civilians and win, you're war hero. If you bomb and kill thousands of civilians and lose, you're a war criminal.
Warmongering Lunatic|5.29.09 @ 4:17PM|#
Victor --
Sure, they were willing to stop fighting back in January. That's a
hell of a lot different than being willing to surrender.
The cabinet deadlock that Hirohito broke after Nagasaki
was 3-3; the latter 3 were insisting that any offer of peace to the
Allies included the demands that there both be no occupation of
Japan and that the Japanese government would run all trials of
accused Japanese war criminals.
So, after the Japanese were reduced to the Home Islands,
had no offensive capability, had two cities nuked, and was facing
the imminent prospect of mass startvation . . . half the Cabinet
was still unwilling to offer a real surrender until Hirohito pushed
them.
creech --
Sure, we could have just starved them out. How many millions of
Japanese should we have killed by starvation rather than the under
a hundred thousand killed with nukes?
H.F. Wolff|5.29.09 @ 6:18PM|#
Dr. A.R. WESSERLE
16 March 1981
PBS Television
"The Blitz"
---snip---
"...Both Germany and Britain initiated air raids on naval and
military targets as of 3 September 1939. However, when the British
attacks on port installations in Northern Germany ended in
disaster, with a devastating majority of bombers downed -- the
Battle of the German Bight -- Britain switched over to less costly
night air raids on civilian targets such as Berlin and the Ruhr
industrial region. By contrast, Germany replied in kind only in the
winter months of 1940/41, a year later.
Observers indubitably British, such as the late Labour Minister
Crossman, the scientist and writer C.P. Snow, and the Earl of
Birkenhead, have demonstrated that it was not Germany but Britain
that, after May, 1940, unleashed an official policy of unrestricted
and unlimited raids on civilian populations under its new Prime
Minister, Winston Churchill,..."
---snip---
As I wrote earlier, one cannot get history from Hollywood, comic
books, or politically correct text books; and ad hominem attacks
prove the intellectual shortcomings of that poster.
H.F. Wolff
Chad|5.29.09 @ 7:52PM|#
Sure, we could have just starved them out. How many millions
of Japanese should we have killed by starvation rather than the
under a hundred thousand killed with nukes?
This is exactly correct.
Typical estimates put the number of fatalities per day
during the summer of 1945 at 4000-8000. If the bombs had not been
dropped, even the most conservative end of the range would imply
that by November, more people would have died due to conventional
warfare than were killed by the atomic bombs.
Japan was not as bad off as people make it out to have been. Sure,
they had no offensive capability, but they DID have defensive
capability, which it precisely why Nimitz and MacArthur kept
pushing back dates for an invasion of the mainland. Japan planned
to make any such invasion as bloody as hell in order to win
consensions. Given what happened when we took Okinawa, Japan had
every reason to expect that they could pull this off.
The real X-factor in any historical analysis is the USSR. No one
knows what they would have done if we had not dropped the bombs.
The fact they invaded the day after Hiroshima is almost certainly
not coincidence. Stalin knew about the bombs, as he was told at
Potsdam several weeks earlier. The invasion was a land and power
grab by an empire who knew the game was up. If we didn't have the
bombs, it is very plausible that the USSR would have been quite
happy to sit back and let Japan bloody us up, and then jump in at
the end to take whatever they could get hold of.
So even from a perspective of hindsight, it is highly likely that
the bombs saved lives. Without them, the war likely would have
lasted into winter, with at least as many conventionally caused
deaths PLUS hundreds of thousands more caused by disease and
starvation in Japan, which really was on the brink of a
humanitarian disaster.
And of course, the historical record indicates that Truman's
thinking was incredibly pure. He honestly believed he was saving
tens or hundreds of thousands of American lives, and countless more
lives throughout Asia. By any definition I can come up with, being
able to pull the trigger and kill a few hundred thousand in order
to save a million takes a mountain of courage. I hope no one ever
has to make such a decision again.
Chad|5.29.09 @ 7:56PM|#
There were many thousands of US troops preparing for (and dreading)
an assault on Japan.
One of those men was my grand father. I, and many other people of
my generation, might not be here today to discuss this matter if it
were not for the bombs.
I think the biggest irony of this whole situation is that the
Japanese actually care less about this and we do. They just want to
forget WWII because of how attrociously wrong they were. We can't
get over the few murky parts of our otherwise pretty darned good
record in the whole affair.
Abner MacGillicuddy|5.29.09 @ 8:50PM|#
Shut the fuck up, H.F. Wolff, you Nazi shithead.
Look, the fact of the matter is that the record is full of WWII
allied strategists recognizing that "strategic" bombing of Germany,
Italy and Japan was nothing but a terror campaign to demoralize the
population - a campaign that failed, to a large extent.
The record is also full of testimony of those Germans (and allies
from the occupied lands) of the systematic extermination of the
Jews. Some unapolagetic Nazis boasted of their "success" at
eradicating "the Jewish menace".
If we were to have a true "Truth Commission" on the Archbishop Tutu
model in SA we would find atrocities on both sides. But in the end
those who followed the model of the Austrian corporal and his
allies the Japanese militarists will be found to had committed the
lion's share.
In spite of my misgivings about the Hiroshima and Nagasaki
bombings, and even moreso, Dresden, I remain proud of what
Americans did in the Good War.
And I understand why good Germans and Japanese citizens are ashamed
of their countries part in that conflict.
H.F. Wolff|5.30.09 @ 12:00AM|#
'...Shut the fuck up, H.F. Wolff, you Nazi shithead..."
Intellectual lightweights such as yourself, and much better brains
than you, have tried for over 65 years to establish a new secular
religion called "the holocaust".
Why? To have a shield to hide behind while picking the pockets of
the most productive countries this planet has ever known, namely
Germany and the USA.
Germany, a tiny country, was defeated after 5 years by the combined
might of all the capitalist and communist countries; yessir, an
outstanding achievement indeed. (heavy sarcasm).
With post-war "re-education" Germans had little choice but to
kow-tow to the communists of the USSR and USA. And with torture one
can elicit any statements one wishes; just ask your friend Cheney.
Germany is, in fact, still an occupied country and must dance to
the tune of the corrupt, broke, and thoroughly despised USA and its
own occupier AIPAC. But what is the USA's reason that its people
believe in these fairy tales of the holocaust while its pockets are
being picked as we write here? Stupidity?
Look up the definition of "taboo", and see how closely the
treatment of those that defy taboos compares with those that
question the new religion of the holocaust. Witch hunts of the
middle ages spring to mind?
Fact is that there is not a single shred of forensic, scientific,
or authenticated documentary, evidence, despite claims of
"mountains" of evidence by shills like you.
The judge in the case of Lipstat vs Irving, in Britain, said as
much even though he found against Irving. And this was a pretty
recent trial.
Ignorance is bliss they say. Carry on!
H.F. Wolff
Mike|5.30.09 @ 12:11AM|#
Damn, Wolff, you REALLY ARE a Nazi. Wow! Can we put you in a museum somewhere?
H.F. Wolff|5.30.09 @ 12:51PM|#
Such wit, such intellectual brilliance!
If that is your best retort no wonder the USA is tanking.
H.F. Wolff
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