67 years ago yesterday

[dogtowner]

You keep repeating already-debunked falsehoods. That is not an argument. Can you please make one?

.

it suits his isolationist leaning so not likely to budge.

 

[Johnny Tremain]

"Japan was ready to surrender."

Then why--didn't they?
In retrospect--a poor decision on their part.
Not unlike the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor.
That was--their decision.

Two nukes seems to have hastened the decision to surrender.
And--saved lives.
BTW--do you feel any remorse about what Japan did to China and Korea?

 

[Gipper]

As I have already pointed out, avoiding killing so many was not an option open to us, whether we had dropped the Bomb or not. See post #22.


As I have already pointed out, Japan was in no way ready to surrender. Only a few of their members of government were making the suggestion - and getting repeatedly shouted down by the large majority of war hawks in that same government. See post #22.


You keep repeating already-debunked falsehoods. That is not an argument. Can you please make one?

.

What you posted in post #22 was your opinion. You failed to back it with any expert opinion. I on the other hand, I have backed my opinion with links to experts including statements from generals, admirals, administration officials and the great liberatian PhD Ralph Raico and lawyer/author John Denson.

You have chosen to believe the lie promoted by the stinking progressive Truman. You would certainly not believe pronouncements from progressives today. Why back then?

You will find no person more patriotic, more pro-American, more conservative then me. Finding the bombings wrong does not mean one is anti-American, but it does mean one is clear thinking and truly conservative. We must condemn wrongs whenever and wherever they happen, particularly one as horrific as the atomic bombings.

Please read the links I posted and do additional research on this terrible event. You will be enlightened.

 

[Little-Acorn]

What you posted in post #22 was your opinion.

That the Japanese govt had retained many armed troops on the home islands expressly for the purpose of resisting an invasion, and were training all civilians (including men, women, and children) to fight the American troops with kitchen knives, spears, and rocks, is not an "opinion", but a documented fact.

That most of the Japanese government were against surrendering, despite the voices of a few doves, is also not an "opinion", but a well documented fact.

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/japan-surrenders

[My notes inserted in boldface -LA]

The invasion of Japan promised to be the bloodiest seaborne attack of all time, conceivably 10 times as costly as the Normandy invasion in terms of Allied casualties. On July 16, a new option became available when the United States secretly detonated the world's first atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert. Ten days later, the Allies issued the Potsdam Declaration, demanding the "unconditional surrender of all the Japanese armed forces." Failure to comply would mean "the inevitable and complete destruction of the Japanese armed forces and just as inevitable the utter devastation of the Japanese homeland."

On July 28, Japanese Prime Minister Kantaro Suzuki responded by telling the press that his government was "paying no attention" to the Allied ultimatum. [Note: This does not sound like a govt "ready to surrender" to me -LA] U.S. President Harry Truman ordered the devastation to proceed, and on August 6, the U.S. B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, killing an estimated 80,000 people and fatally wounding thousands more.

After the Hiroshima attack, a faction of Japan's supreme war council favored acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration, but the majority resisted unconditional surrender.

On August 8, Japan's desperate situation took another turn for the worse when the USSR declared war against Japan. The next day, Soviet forces attacked in Manchuria, rapidly overwhelming Japanese positions there, and a second U.S. atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese coastal city of Nagasaki.

Just before midnight on August 9, Japanese Emperor Hirohito convened the supreme war council. After a long, emotional debate, [Note: If the Japanese govt was "ready to surrender", why was there a long, emotional debate at this meeting? -LA] he backed a proposal by Prime Minister Suzuki in which Japan would accept the Potsdam Declaration "with the understanding that said Declaration does not compromise any demand that prejudices the prerogatives of His Majesty as the sovereign ruler." The council obeyed Hirohito's acceptance of peace, and on August 10 the message was relayed to the United States.

Early on August 12, the United States answered that "the authority of the emperor and the Japanese government to rule the state shall be subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers." [Note: This caveat was absolutely necessary, since it was under that emperor and government the Japanese had invaded China, attacked the U.S., and waged 8 years of the most brutal war in human history. Leaving them as sovereign rulers, would have been the equivalent of leaving Adolf Hitler (had he survived) as the leader of Germany after that nation surrendered -LA] After two days of debate about what this statement implied, Emperor Hirohito brushed the nuances in the text aside and declared that peace was preferable to destruction. He ordered the Japanese government to prepare a text accepting surrender.

In the early hours of August 15, a military coup was attempted by a faction led by Major Kenji Hatanaka. The rebels seized control of the imperial palace and burned Prime Minister Suzuki's residence, but shortly after dawn the coup was crushed. [Note: Does this sound like a government that was "ready to surrender"? -LA]

The idea of leaving the war-at-all-costs Japanese government in place as sovereign rulers, would have gutted any "surrender", and in fact left it as no surrender at all. As I said above, doing this would have been the equivalent of leaving Adolf Hitler (had he survived) as sovereign leader of Germany, unanswerable to the "victorious" Allies. The very notion was bizarre beyond words. Of course it was summarily and totally rejected by the Allies, as it had to be. The Japanese government's continued insistence on it, led directly to the deaths of hundreds of thousands more Japanese citizens.

Fortunately, once the U.S. was forced by the Japanese govt's intransigence into continuing the slaughter, they managed to find a way to do it without endangering American lives. They sent just a few planes with one atomic bomb, rather than continuing the horrific firebombing raids, or even worse, invading the Japanese home islands.

The notion that Japan's government was "ready to surrender", ignores the fact that what they wanted was not a surrender at all, but merely a cease-fire during which the same govt that instigated and carried out the entire Pacific war of aggression against so many of its neighbors, could remain in place and in a position to do the same again, at some future time. The request that they be left in power, was received with appropriate astonishment and incredulity by the U.S. government, despite the wishful thinking of some who were horror-stricken over the slaughter that had already taken place. Fortunately, saner head prevailed, and the Japanese REFUSAL of the only surrender terms that made any sense, merely led to the further slaughter of their citizens but NOT of Allied troops, at last. Exactly as it should have.

 

[Johnny Tremain]

If the fire bombings of January 1945 did not shake the Japanese into surrender--then it was full-speed ahead to drop the atomic bobs.
Japan--had their chances--more than once.
They chose NOT to surrender.
The blame is squarely theirs--no matter what happened.
I have stood on the decks of the USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor--and the guys under my feet agreed with me.

War--is truly Hell. And they started it.
You reap what you sow--and they reaped the Whirlwind.

Don't join Walter Mondale and the San Francisco democrats and Blame America First.

 

[Little-Acorn]

The U.S. use of the most horrific weapon ever invented - one that could destroy an entire city AND ITS OCCUPANTS in one blazing burst - and the simultaneous Russian invasion of Japanese-held Manchuria as the second Bomb went off, convinced the Japanese that they faced adversaries whom:

1.) The Japanese could not stop;
2.) The adversaries didn't care if they exterminated every last Japanese person on Earth, and were WILLING to do it.

Once the Japanese were convinced of this, THEN they abandoned their ridiculous "leave our government and Emperor in charge and not under your control" demand, and agreed to ACTUALLY surrender. And the slaughter immediately stopped. Until then, they had NO intention of actually surrendering. And so the war rolled on, with "bigger artillery" (as Truman referred to the Bomb) coming from the east, and bigger armies coming from the west, slaughtering the Japanese wholesale as they went... just as armed forces have always done since time immemorial in war.

 

[Johnny Tremain]

Hirohito was knee-deep in planning the attack on the USA and later "cleansed" to appear to be a peaceful person.
He was not and he should have been hanged along with his buddy Tojo.
His wife seemed polite, though.

 

[Gipper]

That the Japanese govt had retained many armed troops on the home islands expressly for the purpose of resisting an invasion, and were training all civilians (including men, women, and children) to fight the American troops with kitchen knives, spears, and rocks, is not an "opinion", but a documented fact.

That most of the Japanese government were against surrendering, despite the voices of a few doves, is also not an "opinion", but a well documented fact.



The idea of leaving the war-at-all-costs Japanese government in place as sovereign rulers, would have gutted any "surrender", and in fact left it as no surrender at all. As I said above, doing this would have been the equivalent of leaving Adolf Hitler (had he survived) as sovereign leader of Germany, unanswerable to the "victorious" Allies. The very notion was bizarre beyond words. Of course it was summarily and totally rejected by the Allies, as it had to be. The Japanese government's continued insistence on it, led directly to the deaths of hundreds of thousands more Japanese citizens.

Fortunately, once the U.S. was forced by the Japanese govt's intransigence into continuing the slaughter, they managed to find a way to do it without endangering American lives. They sent just a few planes with one atomic bomb, rather than continuing the horrific firebombing raids, or even worse, invading the Japanese home islands.

The notion that Japan's government was "ready to surrender", ignores the fact that what they wanted was not a surrender at all, but merely a cease-fire during which the same govt that instigated and carried out the entire Pacific war of aggression against so many of its neighbors, could remain in place and in a position to do the same again, at some future time. The request that they be left in power, was received with appropriate :astonishment and incredulity by the U.S. government, despite the wishful thinking of some who were horror-stricken over the slaughter that had already taken place. Fortunately, saner head prevailed, and the Japanese REFUSAL of the only surrender terms that made any sense, merely led to the further slaughter of their citizens but NOT of Allied troops, at last. Exactly as it should have.

This may be a more accurate description

Baldwin concludes that the unconditional surrender policy ". . . was perhaps the biggest political mistake of the war . . . . Unconditional surrender was an open invitation to unconditional resistance; it discouraged opposition to Hitler, probably lengthened the war, costs us lives, and helped to lead to the present aborted peace."
The stark fact is that the Japanese leaders, both military and civilian, including the Emperor, were willing to surrender in May of 1945 if the Emperor could remain in place and not be subjected to a war crimes trial after the war. This fact became known to President Truman as early as May of 1945. The Japanese monarchy was one of the oldest in all of history dating back to 660 B.C. The Japanese religion added the belief that all the Emperors were the direct descendants of the sun goddess, Amaterasu. The reigning Emperor Hirohito was the 124th in the direct line of descent. After the bombs were dropped on August 6 and 9 of 1945, and their surrender soon thereafter, the Japanese were allowed to keep their Emperor on the throne and he was not subjected to any war crimes trial. The Emperor, Hirohito, came on the throne in 1926 and continued in his position until his death in 1989. Since President Truman, in effect, accepted the conditional surrender offered by the Japanese as early as May of 1945, the question is posed, "Why then were the bombs dropped?"http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig2/denson7.html
Other U.S. military officers who disagreed with the necessity of the bombings include General of the Army Douglas MacArthur,[75][76] Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy (the Chief of Staff to the President), Brigadier General Carter Clarke (the military intelligence officer who prepared intercepted Japanese cables for U.S. officials),[74] and Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet.[77]
"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, Commander in Chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet.[67]
"The use of [the atomic bombs] 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." Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy, Chief of Staff to President Truman.[78]

Your source claims they wanted their entire government to stay in tact. This was never a request and as such, made up by the propagandists who want Americans to believe the heinous act was morally correct. I also believe the chief of the OSS and later head of the CIA, Allen Dulles over a summary from the History Channel....this from him:

Allen Dulles, chief of OSS operations in Switzerland (and subsequently Director of the CIA). In his 1966 book The Secret Surrender, Dulles recalled that ‘On July 20, 1945, under instructions from Washington, I went to the Potsdam Conference and reported there to Secretary [of War] Stimson on what I had learned from Tokyo – they desired to surrender if they could retain the Emperor and their constitution as a basis for maintaining discipline and order in Japan after the devastating news of surrender became known to the Japanese people.’

And this:

Could the Emperor have convinced the militaristic government to surrender before the
dropping of the atomic bomb? Three considerations must be made. First, as noted earlier,
although the government was militaristic, peace factions still existed both within the government
and among the Japanese people.19 Secondly, the military fought on behalf of the Imperial Will.
If the Imperial Will endorsed and authorized a Japanese surrender, the militaristic elements of
the government would have instantaneously lost all authority to continue forcing the Japanese
people to war. Thirdly, if the Allies had proffered peace terms which ensured the safety of the
Emperor after the war, since the military also fought on behalf of the safety of the Throne, the
military would have lost all reason to continue fighting to the death. Summarily, with the
Imperial Throne and a faction within the government supporting peace, in accord with Japanese
Shintoism, the Japanese people would support their Emperor in surrendering rather than the
military’s desire for a fight to the death.

Hopefully we can agree that the bombing is without question controversial. I do not think it justifiable.
1. America should not make war on civilians.
2. Did we really need to occupy Japan?
3. Morally and ethically, the bombing was reprehensible.

 

[Johnny Tremain]

Hindsight--is 20/20.
Going to war without absolute victory--at whatever cost--as it's goal, is the worst possible scenario.
Remember what war is all about--you kill them--or they will kill you.
Don't provoke someone who can hurt you--then cry when they do.
Caveat emptor.
Morality is absent--that is WHY they call it "war".
Stopping these people--trumped anything else-- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_war_crimes

 

[Little-Acorn]

This may be a more accurate description

Or it may not be. In fact, it isn't, as I have already pointed out.

Your source claims they wanted their entire government to stay in tact.

Nope, but they wanted the people who had started, carried out, and continued the war to stay in sovereign power, not answerable to the Allies they had attacked and tried to destroy. As such, their "demand" was ludicrous on its face, and unacceptable. Their continnued intransigence and insistence on such a blatantly farcical form of cease-fire (for which the two-legged forgetteries of today swallow hook, line, and sinker the term "surrender" when it was nothing of the kind), lengthened the war... NOT the Allies, who fought the entire warr for the same, unchanging purpose from day 1: To eliminate the people who thought that attacking, torturing, and destroying thei neighbors for economic or political purposes was a "good" idea. Japanese insistence on keeping exactly those people in power, resulted in the lengthening of the war and the slaughteing of hundreds of thousands more Japanese citizens, until they changed their minds with a little help from Dr. Oppenheimer and Comrade Stalin.

My sympathies for their oh-so-ancient form of government. Maybe that oh-so-ancient form of government should not have attacked nearly every neighbor they had, tried to take over, slaughter, torture, and enslave so many peoples, and commit some of the most atrocious crimes in the history of mankind. Then their neighbors would have been fine with their keeping their emperor, their government, and all the rest. But when they started doing those things, keeping the structures that did them became unacceptable. The idea that anybody thinks them even remotely plausible now, is testimony to the baffling blindness and revisionist insanity that infects so many people who forget all too easily the facts of the situation.


This was never a request and as such, made up by the propagandists who want Americans to believe the heinous act was morally correct. I also believe the chief of the OSS and later head of the CIA, Allen Dulles over a summary from the History Channel....this from him:


And this:



Hopefully we can agree that the bombing is without question controversial. I do not think it justifiable.
1. America should not make war on civilians.
2. Did we really need to occupy Japan?
3. Morally and ethically, the bombing was reprehensible.[/quote]

 

[Little-Acorn]

Hmmm, system timed out before I could edit in all of my reply. Here's the rest:
-----------------------------------

Hopefully we can agree that the bombing is without question controversial.

Of course. Anything can be made "controversial", simply by having two sides arguing over it. Doesn't matter if one side's position is ludicrous, blind, and completely contrary to documented fact. It still worms its way into the definition of "controversial". Even Mitt Romney's tax returns are "controversial".

1. America should not make war on civilians.

Civilians should not make war on America... either by attacking directly, or by supporting governments who attack, torture, enslave, and destroy. When they do, America gives them a Bad Time. If they don't like it, they shouldn't start it.

2. Did we really need to occupy Japan?

Yes, we really needed to. Unless you can come up with some better way of making sure that the country that did the attacking, torturing, enslaving, and destroying wih such gay abandon, and who showed every sign of wanting to continue doing so right up till the end, won't rise up, dust themselves off at some later date, clear away the wreckage, and start building up more forces to try it again, as historically has happened when victorious nations foolishly didn't occupy for a while the nation that started the slaughter (see: Germany after WWI, less than 30 years previously).

Of course, we DID have another alternative open to us: Total annihiliation of the Japanese people, which we could have achieved a lot more easily and inexpensively after running the Hanford plant and Y-12 another year or two. We chose not to exercise that option. We offered surrender terms, which the Japanese accepted (after a little more persuasion from Dr. Oppenheimer and Comrade Stalin), and then we ceased all hostilities immediately.

3. Morally and ethically, the bombing was reprehensible.

War is reprehensible. I wish Japan had not decided to use it to try to achieve the far-East domination they had decided was their "right". But once they started their war, war is what they got, in spades. It didn't turn out the way they had hoped.

But complaining about it now (which the Japanese actually aren't doing, having at least the honesty to stand up and admit their error in starting and conducting the war, only a few even-more-kooky-than-usual Americans are complaining about the resulting slaughter) is not only far too late, but is even directed to the wrong people. They should be complaining to the people who decided to start the war, not to the people whom they attacked and who then (correctly) struck back with everything they had.

 

[Little-Acorn]

You are missing the point. The Japanese had already asked for surrender terms....this is a FACT.

They asked for nothing of the kind.

In FACT, they asked to be left alone, with mostly the same Emperor and government in place who had started the war, run the war, committed some of the most horrible atrocities in the history of mankind, and invaded almost every neighbor they had, who had anything worth stealing. And with no accountability to the Allies.

That's a "surrender" like I'm Usain Bolt.

What the U.S. offered, was a surrender. One that ceased hostilities, gave back conquered territories to the countries they had invaded, and put the Allies in charge... without punishing the Japanese any more.

If they Japanese thought they should get any better terms, they were dreaming even more than when they attacked Pearl Harbor and thought they could get away with it.

They should have thanked the Allies for such comparatively generous terms.

But they deliberately and consciously REFUSED to surrender, even with a huge, hugely armed enemy literally surrounding their islands with fleets larger and more powerful than had ever existed.

And so they got the consequences of that REFUSAL.

If they didn't like it... they had a choice. Too bad they didn't take it.

 

[Gipper]

They asked for nothing of the kind.

In FACT, they asked to be left alone, with mostly the same Emperor and government in place who had started the war, run the war, committed some of the most horrible atrocities in the history of mankind, and invaded almost every neighbor they had, who had anything worth stealing. And with no accountability to the Allies.

That's a "surrender" like I'm Usain Bolt.

What the U.S. offered, was a surrender. One that ceased hostilities, gave back conquered territories to the countries they had invaded, and put the Allies in charge... without punishing the Japanese any more.

If they Japanese thought they should get any better terms, they were dreaming even more than when they attacked Pearl Harbor and thought they could get away with it.

They should have thanked the Allies for such comparatively generous terms.

But they deliberately and consciously REFUSED to surrender, even with a huge, hugely armed enemy literally surrounding their islands with fleets larger and more powerful than had ever existed.

And so they got the consequences of that REFUSAL.

If they didn't like it... they had a choice. Too bad they didn't take it.

So, because the Japanese would not accept our stringent surrender terms, it was okay to incinerate 200k+ civilians. Because they attacked us at Pearl Harbor (which of course, FDR did all he could to get them to do), it is okay to murder civilians wantonly. I think not.

Truman could have merely waited a month or two and the navy and air blockade would have brought them down. Or, he could have accepted their terms of allowing the Emperor to stay (which he did anyway after the a-bombs). Much better options in my book.

Secondly, we did not need to occupy Japan. We do not need to occupy anyone. This neo-con crap of policing the world is causing our nation many problems. It is best to follow the advice of our Founders and mind our own business. We had essentially destroyed Japan BEFORE the bombs were dropped. Dropping them was overkill and was not really to force them to surrender, but to notify the world of our power and it was hoped, scare the stinking commies and keep them from invading Japan, Korea, and Manchuria.

 

[Little-Acorn]

So, because the Japanese would not accept our stringent surrender terms

They were in no way stringent, as I have already pointed out.

"Stringent" is what the Japanese themselves did to enemy troops and civilians who surrendered to them (see the Bataan Death March, the Rape of Nanking, Japanese treatment of ALL prisoners of war, etc.)

"Stringent" was what Hitler did to the Jews who turned themselves in to him.

We could have done that, too. We certainly had the tools in place.

We chose not to.

Instead, we offered Japan an immediate cessation of ALL hostilities, and to let them keep the lifestyle they always had (whatever was left after their own leaders emasculated and starved the country for 8 years of war), minus the leaders of that government - a far cry from what nearly any other enemy would have offered them.

it was okay to incinerate 200k+ civilians.

Correction: 200K more civilians. We had already been incinerating them by the thousands, long before the Bomb was dropped. And also dropping literally millions of leaflets in Japanese telling them in no uncertain terms that the slaughter would continue unless they surrendered, either by overthrowing the government that was the mainspring behind their own endless atrocities, or by other means of persuasion. The firebombing raids against Tokyo, Kobe, Nagoya, and other large cities made it very clear to the Japanese (govt and civilians alike) that we COULD and WOULD keep it up if they didn't surrender... and this was all before the Bomb. We were already quite capable of obliterating large portions of any city we wanted to. The Bomb was merely a continuation of that same policy, and it didn't even increase the death toll per raid. It merely let us continue what we had already been doing, but with less risk to our own military personnel.

We offered the Japanese generous terms, considering what they had unleashed upon that part of the world. And we also made it very clear what would (keep) happening if they refused those terms.

They refused.

So the Big Show kept on rolling along, as we had promised... and as they asked for by refusing our comparatively generous terms.

It's called War. And they chose to keep it going, knowing full well what it would entail including fiery destruction of entire cities, when they had an excellent chance to stop it and get something far better.

Truman could have merely waited a month or two and the navy and air blockade would have brought them down.

Ask the troops who fought them on every island from Guadalcanal to Iwo Jima to Okinawa, just how effective privation would be in getting them to lay down their weapons. Your dreamy-eyed wishful thinking is not only astonishing to me, it is an insult to every American who laid down his life proving you wrong. Yet you cling to this strange delusion despite mountains of facts that say otherwise.

Or, he could have accepted their terms of allowing the Emperor to stay

With that Emperor (who had supported the war for half a generation) still being a sovereign ruler whom the allies had no authority over. You keep leaving that part out for some reason... and I can guess the reason.

I've already pointed out (and you have carefully ignored) that this would be like letting Adolf Hitler stay in power, with no accountability to the Allies, in Germany after their capitulation, had he survived. The very idea is ludicrous, astonishing,... and completely unacceptable to those who had bled a large portion of their national blood and resources stopping that same Emperor who had inflicted that war on them and continued it in the most bloody fashion possible.

Secondly, we did not need to occupy Japan. We do not need to occupy anyone.

As I have already pointed out (and again you have carefully ignored) that had been tried already: Defeating an enemy who had started a war and tried to destroy you, only to let them go their own way after the cease-fire and "trust" they will be nice afterward. The end product of this misguided trust, was the rise of Adolf Hitler, the rebuilding of an immense military designed solely for offense and aggression, and a subsequent war even worse than the war (WWI) that the Allies had fought to stop that nation in the first place. Your statement that "we didn't need to occupy Japan" is somewhere between ignorant and insane.

 

[Gipper]

You say I am ignoring your posts, but you are wrong.

I have posted the views of generals, admirals, and experts who said Japan was unable to prosecute war against the US in July '45. They were done. I believe the opinion of people who were there. I have also posted that Dulles and others in the our government were approached by the Japanese to surrender well before the August bombings. The only condition they asked was that the Emperor stay on the throne. They did not require that the entire government stay in place. The only asked that the Emperor stay as a figure head. And this is EXACTLY what Truman allowed after he dropped the bombs....you have stated that keeping Hirohito in power is akin to leaving Hitler in power...well than why did Truman allow Hirohito to stay on the throne?

You have failed to recognize the propaganda campaign waged by the Truman and his progressive allies after he received criticism for the bombings. The big lie that 500k American soldiers would die if we had to invade is complete fabrication. The US army estimated 46k would die if we invaded. Why would Truman lie?

And again, you fail to comprehend my position. Even if the Japanese government refused all surrender terms, is it just to wantonly massacre 200k+ civilians? Are the civilians to blame for the horrific acts of their government...so they must be murdered....You apparently think so. I do not.

And we did have to occupy Japan primarily to keep it from being overrun by the commies. Had we agreed to a peace before completely obliterating Japan, they might have been able to fight the commie Soviets and Chinese without our involvement.

Here is another opinion of the bombings from a true conservative...like myself.

by Thomas E. Woods, Jr.
Recently by Thomas E. Woods, Jr.: Learn Austrian Economics



In time for the anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the leftist National Catholic Reporter treats us to an entirely conventional rendition and defense of that awful episode in U.S. history, a rendition I might have expected to read in the neoconservative Weekly Standard. (Thanks to Laurence Vance for the link.) My comment, which is “awaiting moderation,” ran as follows:
I am shocked that this kind of jingoism and raw collectivism would soil the pages (so to speak) of the NCR. I would expect this in the Weekly Standard. The use of formulations like “Japan started the war” helps to evade all the relevant moral questions; if “Japan” started it, can “Japan” be laid waste? Their political class makes an idiotic and suicidal military move, so every single three-year-old in the country becomes subject to bombing, poisoning, being burned or buried alive, etc.? At what point do we start questioning the logic of this, instead of formulating all our arguments as if this were simply an obvious moral given?
Instead of asking these hard questions, the kind of questions we are trained from early childhood not to ask, indeed not even to be intellectually equipped to formulate, NCR gives us a collectivist propaganda piece. Anyone who criticizes the decision to drop the bomb is trying to “defame our country” (again, in classic neocon style, conflating the decisions of a small circle of officials with “our country”).
I guess the editor of the Paulist Catholic World was trying to “defame our country”? Or how about L’Osservatore Romano, which also criticized the bombings? Or the great Catholic philosopher G.E.M. Anscombe? Or even Pat Buchanan, who denounces the bombings as acts of barbarism?
Oh, but “we” had to burn all those kids alive, comes the reply. Why, that’s all the fanatics in Japan would understand! (What if the author had said the police needed to kick in the heads of certain races of people because that’s all they would understand? Would you thoughtlessly nod your head at that?) Completely left out of the discussion are the genuine alternatives that existed to dropping the bomb, alternatives that could have worked even with the incorrigible Japanese. (Of course, whenever someone mentions “alternatives” to a decision made by the U.S. military, he is instantly derided as some kind of leftist dreamer.)
For what these alternatives were, and for something a little more significant than mindless, knee-jerk cheering of the U.S. military, as if this group of government employees were sacrosanct, I recommend this short piece by historian Ralph Raico.
Reprinted with permission from TomWoods.com.
http://www.tomwoods.com/blog/left-liberal-catholics-yay-for-the-atomic-bombings/