Just a few days ago, it hit me on some new level that we fucking NUCLEAR BOMBED a country. TWICE.
We are literally the only country that has done that. And it’s just sort-of this fun footnote of history. “Fine, maybe that was a whoopsie, but blah blah blah something about land invasion blah blah blah. Our baaaaad!”
In the last days of WW2, the Japanese military were getting children to make sharpened bamboo spears and training those children to attack American soldiers on sight. The elderly and women were told that they should kill themselves before potentially coming under American control.
The Japanese civilian population had been indoctrinated into the belief that western soldiers were absolute monsters who would carry out unspeakable acts on the should they become prisoners.
In the battle of Saipan, hundreds of mothers leapt from cliffs with their babies in their arms to evade capture, men would slit their children’s throats and booby trapped the bodies to injure Americans and then themselves fought relentlessly, before mostly killing themselves or being killed to prevent capture.
The level of blood shed at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was unprecedented but it did in fact save untold Japanese civilian and American soldiers’ lives.
Crucially, even after the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima Japanese High Command still refused to surrender.
What of this assertion do you disagree with?
In the last days of WW2, the Japanese military were getting children to make sharpened bamboo spears and training those children to attack American soldiers on sight. The elderly and women were told that they should kill themselves before potentially coming under American control.
The Japanese civilian population had been indoctrinated into the belief that western soldiers were absolute monsters who would carry out unspeakable acts on them should they become prisoners (ironic considering the IJA/Ns actions during the conflict).
In the battle of Saipan, hundreds of mothers leapt from cliffs with their babies in their arms to evade capture, men would slit their children’s throats and booby trapped the bodies to injure Americans and then themselves fought relentlessly, before mostly killing themselves or being killed to prevent capture.
The level of blood shed at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was unprecedented but it did in fact save untold Japanese civilian and American soldiers’ lives.
Crucially, even after the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima Japanese High Command still refused to surrender.
Have you ever even read any of the history of the proposed plan for the invasion of mainland Japan and the reasoning for opposing the Imperial Japanese Government?
Or Is this your opportunity to virtue signal to people on the internet by implying Americans are murderous pigs and the jApAnEsE dId NoThInG wRoNg?
Americans are murderous pigs and the jApAnEsE dId NoThInG wRoNg?
how about: they are both murderous pigs?
Just like Ukraine bOmBiNg CiViLiAn TaRgEtS in Russia amirite
Both sides bad I is very smart
(Of course America was bad, but not for bombing Imperial Japan)
Arguably fighting against Japan and Germany in WW2 is one of the only times the US used their military in a justifiable way. Fascism had to be stopped.
The Japanese military expected to lose 20 million people in the very first battle of the invasion, and the Americans were considering using poison gas because the casualties of fighting it out in the streets would have been in the millions of troops. People don’t realize how dark it was in 1945, food shipments had all but ceased, Japan was entering a famine; if the war had dragged on through a land invasion it would have been cataclysmic.
Knowing the necessity for the defeat of the Imperial Japanese government, the burgeoning country-wide famine, combined with the inevitable bloodbath of a mainland invasion, the Allies justified the use of nuclear weapons. Nazi Germany and the USSR were also developing their own nuclear weapon systems. A demonstration was deemed necessary.
I personally would not have authorized dropping the bombs on cities. Easy for me to say. But I certainly would have been living the rest of my days in despair at the mindless slaughter and ritual mass-suicide that would’ve ensued during the invasion of mainland Japan.
I don’t envy the choices the Allies had to make while combatting Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Imperial Japan.
as opposed to just embargo the island now that all the axis had fallen?
no, America wanted the show of force
embargo is cowardly
of course, killing civilians is manly
But thats dishonest. It assumes that:
The nuking of Japan was the reason they surrendered
The nukes were gauranteed to make then surrender.
Like would it still have been justified if Japan hadnt surrendered? Then youve committed an atrocity for no reason.
Or what about if it was a different atrocity? Would tourturing a few hundred thousand Japanese to death be justified for the same reason?
Bombing Japan == horrific but better than the alternatives we had.
Though even then there were variables.
When the US nukes Japan, almost everyone in my homeland (China) knows what’s coming next. It maked the end of a terrible age of war, and era of subjugation by inperialists. The japaneese invaders are soon gonna be gone. It was a huge relief.
Then when the news of japan’s surrender hits the news, there was celebrations throughout China. And I’m sure those in Korea and various Southeast Asian countries would also be celebrating that.
It would’ve taken months and possibly years for the US to do a non-nuclear attack of japan, and that would’ve allowed them to continue doing massacres across Asia. Civillians shouldn’t have to die for the crime of their government, but there were not many options, and this was the lesser evil.
inquisitor
potoooooooo ✅️
Denjin
NeilBrü
_cryptagion [he/him]
「黃家駒 Wong Ka Kui」 | (aka: 鳳凰院 凶真 Hououin Kyouma)
gmtom