The truth about Truman’s bombing Japan

[The Sage of Main Street]

More correct, the Japanese soldiers themselves killed over half the civilians.

The Okinawans had a long and often brutal occupation by Japan and at that time they were still not considered "Japanese" by those on the main islands. They had a different language, a different way of writing, even different religion and cultural beliefs. In most ways they are actually culturally related to China than they were Japan, and were part of China until 1609 when they were invaded by Japan. And for two centuries it was both tied to China as a tributary and to Japan as a vassal state. Until 1868 when Japan annexed it.

And one of the first things they did was to outlaw the use of the native Ryukyu language, either spoken or written. China tried to maintain their presence but when it was made into a prefecture in 1879 they were not even allowed to vote for their own representatives in the Diet. They were instead assigned by Japan. And they were largely treated as an occupied territory, not unlike Korea at the time. And as the Japanese soldiers did not believe that the Okinawans were "Japanese enough" to kill themselves as they should, they took it upon themselves to do it for them whenever they located them.

Or forced them to move in front of them as they conducted their "banzai charges" at the Americans.

Most of that generation is now gone, but when I was there in the 1980s and talking to an older Okinawan you had to be very careful. At that time all Japanese military personnel were actually restricted to their own bases, and those around 50 or older often took offense if they were referred to as "Japanese" instead of "Okinawan". And Japan frequently poked fun of them, regarding them as simple, stupid, and having darker skins and "barely Japanese". That was actually a common stereotype of those from Okinawa in the main islands, not unlike how many in the US consider those in Hawaii.

Thanks to the presence of Japanese media now having been in place for over 7 decades and huge numbers of Japanese moving there and spending winter vacations there that is no longer as common. But in the 1940s it really was almost a different country from Japan. Even those Japanese on Saipan were more "culturally Japanese" as when Japan took the islands during World War I they deported all the Germans that lived there and by 1920 had huge numbers of colonists shipped there. The population there was around 25,000 when the Americans landed, about 2/3 of them ethnically and culturally Japanese and the rest a mic from Taiwan, Korea, and Okinawa. And most of the thousands of civilians that committed suicide there were originally from mainland Japan. Those from other parts of the Empire primarily hid in the jungles and caves, as suicide was simply not part of their cultures.

Little Countries Cause Many Big Wars

When I was on Okinawa in 1967, my cabdriver asked if he could listen to the announcement about becoming part of Japan. So I got the impression the Okinawans were pro-Japanese, even if the Japanese had never been pro-Okinawan. Maybe they were oppressed worse when they were part of China.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

How many millions of Japanese civilians are you willing to starve to death with your blockade? Not to mention EVERY Allied POW since whatever food there would be would go to the military. Plus your blockade would allow the IJA forces on mainland Asia to continue killing civilians, allied civilian internees as well as Chinese and Commonwealth troops by the thousands per week. You always ignore minor facts like that.

Arma Virumque Cano

Japan was no worse off than Rome was after Hannibal overwhelmingly defeated them, inflicting 10 times his own losses and leaving Rome with only a few thousand veteran troops. But Rome won the war with guerrilla tactics and an incredible endurance. Except for their generals, the Carthaginians were Chickenhawks, like our own toxic rulers, and relied mostly on mercenaries, like our pathetic volunteer army.

Diploma Dumbos know little about history and are even less capable of making analogies anyway. They are also job thieves and have destroyed the economy, the government, and the culture because of their mental inferiority. Why think their way?

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

That’s the biggest bunch of lies, half-truths and misrepresentations I’ve ever read.

Gutless and Self-Obsessed Libertarian Spin

 

[Mushroom]

When I was on Okinawa in 1967, my cabdriver asked if he could listen to the announcement about becoming part of Japan. So I got the impression the Okinawans were pro-Japanese, even if the Japanese had never been pro-Okinawan. Maybe they were oppressed worse when they were part of China.

It was more generational. And as each decade passed they felt more a part of Japan.

Think of it as much of the sentiment in the South after the Civil War. There were hard feelings for the first several decades, but as each generation passed that evaporated.

 

[BackAgain]

Atomic bombs and nuclear weapons are deadly. So are hand grenades. So are Molotov cocktails. So are guns. So are bow’s and arrows. So are rocks.

The difference is the scope of the damage.

Dropping an atomic bomb on a city in Japan during the Second World War was not an easy decision. But it sure as fuck did involve a form of calculation.

To the extent that it was then calculated and believed that dropping an atomic bomb on a city would kill maybe a few thousand of “the enemy” but would save upwards of a few hundred thousand to maybe as many as a million of the allied soldiers, it was a pretty obvious choice.

We look back on it (and on the atomic bombing of Nagasaki) with legitimate horror from today’s perspective. But if we were in a similar position today, wouldn’t our leaders likely make the same decision as Truman made, then? A few thousand of the enemy versus a few hundred thousand of our soldiers (and an untold additional number of civilian deaths)?

I’m not sure it is as categorically immoral as some people claim. Horrifying? Yes. An excruciating decision to be called-upon to make? Absolutely. A fucking literal nightmare? Of course.

But that doesn’t make it the wrong decision.

 

[LA RAM FAN]

Read the thread.

toobfreak only sees what he wants to see so he won’t read it.

 

[LA RAM FAN]

The truth often is to the ignorant and closed minded.

So very true.

 

[LA RAM FAN]

If you and the other WWII myth believers read this column, your knowledge of WWII will be exponentially increased.
Why Everything You Know About World War II Is Wrong - LewRockwell

You just handed his ass to him on a platter checkmating him.

 

[LA RAM FAN]

No, a lot of ignorant conspiracy theorists believe them. Against all evidence.

Dumbfuck witnesses thst were there have exposed it asshole.

 

[LA RAM FAN]

There never was any need to invade and conquer Okinawa. Total waste.

The understatement of the century.

 

[LA RAM FAN]

Oh please.

Japan was nearly done by then. The US had near total control of sea and sky. Plus..,big plus…the leadership knew the a-bomb was nearly ready and they desperately wanted to use it. Why waste all those people on a nothing island well south of the main islands when you knew the enemy was weak and your super weapon was almost ready?

He has shit on his face in embarrassment as you owned him.

 

[elektra]

There never was any need to invade and conquer Okinawa. Total waste.

You are right, after pearl harbor we should of done nothing.

 

[gipper]

You are right, after pearl harbor we should of done nothing.

It’s that time of year again warmongers. You know? When I continue to expose your statist and mass murdering loving ignorance. Great column here. Please read.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki Were Shameful War Crimes​

By Jacob G. Hornberger
The Future of Freedom Foundation
August 2, 2023
What the film (Oppenheimer) has done is revive the popular justification for the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which is the following: That the nuclear attacks on those two cities obviated the need to invade Japan and, therefore, supposedly ended up saving many more lives than those killed in the nuclear attacks.

…..

What are the chances that Patton would have ordered his forces to bomb the village and kill all those women and children? None! There is no possibility of that at all. Patton understood that soldiers die in war. He would never have sacrificed innocent women and children in order to save the lives of his soldiers. He would have circumvented the village and incurred the casualties.

Killing those tens of thousands of women, children, seniors, and other non-combatants in Hiroshima and Nagasaki is no different in principle. If U.S. soldiers would have had to die in an invasion of Japan, then so be it. Purchasing the lives of soldiers by killing innocent people is not only a war crime, it is also an act of great shame.

Finally, it should be noted that those who continue to justify the dropping of those bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki by arguing that the bombs saved lives by bringing an early conclusion to the war will lack the moral standing to complain if another nation cites the same justification for dropping nuclear bombs on enemy cities. The possibility that Russia could cite the same justification in its war on Ukraine comes to mind. What will the justifiers of the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki say then?

Read the entire column here
Hiroshima and Nagasaki Were Shameful War Crimes - LewRockwell

 

[gipper]

It was more generational. And as each decade passed they felt more a part of Japan.

Think of it as much of the sentiment in the South after the Civil War. There were hard feelings for the first several decades, but as each generation passed that evaporated.

If only they could be educated. You’ve all seen this before, yet it never changes your warmongering minds.

Those who attack this mythology are often reflexively dismissed as unpatriotic, ill-informed or both. However, the most compelling witnesses against the conventional wisdom were patriots with a unique grasp on the state of affairs in August 1945 — America’s senior military leaders of World War II.

Let’s first hear what they had to say, and then examine key facts that led them to their little-publicized convictions:

• General Dwight Eisenhower on learning of the planned bombings: “I had been conscious of a feeling of depression and voiced to [Secretary of War Stimson] 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. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of ‘face’.”
• Admiral William Leahy, Truman's Chief of Staff: “The use of this barbarous weapon…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.”
• Major General Curtis LeMay, 21st Bomber Command: “The war would have been over in two weeks without the Russians entering and without the atomic bomb…The atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war at all.”
• General Hap Arnold, US Army Air Forces: “The Japanese position was hopeless even before the first atomic bomb fell, because the Japanese had lost control of their own air.” “It always appeared to us that, atomic bomb or no atomic bomb, the Japanese were already on the verge of collapse.”
• Ralph Bard, Under Secretary of the Navy: “The Japanese were ready for peace, and they already had approached the Russians and the Swiss…In my opinion, the Japanese war was really won before we ever used the atom bomb.”
• Brigadier General Carter Clarke, military intelligence officer who prepared summaries of intercepted cables for Truman: “When we didn’t need to do it, and we knew we didn’t need to do it…we used [Hiroshima and Nagasaki] as an experiment for two atomic bombs. Many other high-level military officers concurred.”
• Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz, Pacific Fleet commander: “The use of 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.”

Hiroshima, Nagasaki Bombings Were Needless, Said World War II's Top US Military Leaders

 

[DudleySmith]

You are right, after pearl harbor we should of done nothing.

That's actually what these weirdos believe. They hate the U.S. and think the Japs and Hitler were grand people and it sucks the U.S. won. Yet they won't leave. lol they just don't like the fact they're as expendable as anybody else and are too selfish to acknowledge citizenship carries duties and obligations, and just want to squat here for free and let 'everybody else' pamper and powder their asses for them.

Same mentality as those whiners who complain about 'undemocratic govt', but wouldn't be caught dead attending a city council meeting in their own towns or participating in any kind of civic activities, then turn around and snivel about thier taxes, water bills, whatever, never mind the 10 city council meetings nobody showed up for and the 200 people who went to the polls for the local bond election while the other 10,000 local town voters stayed home and smoked crank and watched Walking Dead or reruns of Taxi.

 

[Ringo]

UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Sunday, August 6, addressed a special message to those present at the events in Japan on the occasion of the 78th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. It is noteworthy that the text did not once mention the name of the country responsible for the tragedy, which is not surprising, since everyone knows that Russia, led by Putin, did it.

 

[DudleySmith]

UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Sunday, August 6, addressed a special message to those present at the events in Japan on the occasion of the 78th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. It is noteworthy that the text did not once mention the name of the country responsible for the tragedy, which is not surprising, since everyone knows that Russia, led by Putin, did it.

Your heroes Stalin and Kruschev killed more Russians than the American nukes ever killed by far, and it's your demented gangster Putin currently running around threatening to nuke everybody, being the nutjob he is, so buzz off, loon.

 

[Ringo]

Speaking of the bombing of Nagasaki Guterres again failed to mention who bombed Nagasaki.....
How can you do business with these lying scumbags?!
They lie as they breathe.

 

[Blues Man]

One of the foundational strategies used in WWII by both sides was the bombing of civilians.

Those were the good ol' days.

 

[gipper]

One of the foundational strategies used in WWII by both sides was the bombing of civilians.

Those were the good ol' days.

The real history is a bit nuanced. Hitler refused to bomb civilian centers early in war, abiding by rules agreed to by all the powers prior to the war. This changed of course, but only after the the US and UK initiated such bombing and he followed suit.