Did we really have to nuke Japan?

[elektra]

Egghead responsibility? Pop history says that Oppenheimer and Einstein were "surprised" or "offended" or "angered" by the way the Truman administration dropped their creation on innocent civilians but history indicates that the scientists were the biggest proponents of testing their creation on society. When the nuclear shit hit the fan the eggheads ran for cover.

Despite Einstein ' s pleas to develop the bomb? Einstein had zero to do with the development of the bombs, not even Einstein ' s formulas were used, Einstein did write a letter urging that the bombs be built.

Oppenheimer, was he for the bomb before he was against it? He just thought he was building a firecracker to scare people, right.

 

[elektra]

Okinawa began at about the time the war in Europe was ending. It got bad PR because over 12,000 Americans were killed and another 38,000 wounded. This was not the first time Americans got to see what a dead soldier looked like. That is like saying no one was paying attention during the entire war in Europe. That is just ridiculous. What they were not accustomed to seeing were so many casualties in such a short amount of time. Okinawa came on the heels of Iwo Jima which cost 7,000 killed in action and 20,000 wounded. America was dealing with almost 5,000 killed and wounded every week from the time Iwo Jima began at the end of February until Okinawa ended at the end of June.

It was the first time that pictures of dead Americans were published in the press, that was the point. Up until that point, the Government was censoring the shit out of everything, hiding things like the 700 guys who got killed during a practice excercise for D-Day because some German torpedo boats slipped past their protection.

Point was, the Japanese government was putting out feelers for peace long before we dropped the bomb. We dropped these horrible weapons anyway.

The Japanese government was putting out feelers?

You still have not came up with a good Goggle answer, have you. The Japanese would never of surrendered, not after the Fire Bombing in Tokyo, not after the lost of Okinawa, funny how the Japanese never quit shooting, never quit Hari Kari, funny how so many fought to the death, took not one but two Nuclear attacks, and even then it was pretty rough for them to Surrender.

The Japanese Government? The Diet? The Prime Minister? Any text of the conversations? Any photos of the messages?

Tojo never attempted to surrender.

The Japanese Supreme command, never tried to surrender.

At any time the Japanese could of surrendered, laid down its weapons, and stopped killing people, but they never did.

How about some of those fast Google searches, I am sure you must of tried to come up with something better than, "The Japanese Government tried to surrender".

The Japanese government was the Military, they were in control, them and a couple of old families, the Diet, the Supreme council, so quit being vague.

Tell us who you are talking about, are you talking about the Emperor, come on, spill the beans, give us dates, give us names.

Was it Dulles in Sweden? Are you speaking of the Palace Revolt? Tojo and Germany? The Ambassador? The Prime Ministers? There were a few Prime Ministers, yes?

Joeb131 ran from this post, Joeb131 was wrong, as my reply proved.

 

[JoeB131]

My daughter is Japanese, makes my mother in-law Japanese, that makes you about the dumbest person here? Yes?

Oooookay, this just got weird. I'm done

Too many words, boy. You just needed to type, "I concede."

No, it's just that she goes into so many weird tangents I don't bother to keep up with them anymore.

 

[JoeB131]

Joeb131 ran from this post, Joeb131 was wrong, as my reply proved.

No, i don't talk to you because you are a crazy person.

 

[JoeB131]

The soviets joined the war in august, the demand for surrender came in July.

Joeb131 is wrong again, thus far every post wrong, as proven with facts.

Joeb131 is perfectly wrong.

An accomplishment of sorts.

Did you go to teh Political Chick school of debate where you just make off topic comments and declare victory.

The Soviets entered the war in August. the overran Manchuria in less than a week. The Japanese didn't even have time to get their puppet ruler Pu-Yi out of the country.

THat's why they gave up.

You see, what Americans like to forget is that the USSR did most of the heavy lifting in WWII. A couple bombs didn't make a difference. 50 battle hardened Red Army division rampaging through Manchuria and Korea and threatening Japan itself did.

 

[Camp]

The soviets joined the war in august, the demand for surrender came in July.

Joeb131 is wrong again, thus far every post wrong, as proven with facts.

Joeb131 is perfectly wrong.

An accomplishment of sorts.

Did you go to teh Political Chick school of debate where you just make off topic comments and declare victory.

The Soviets entered the war in August. the overran Manchuria in less than a week. The Japanese didn't even have time to get their puppet ruler Pu-Yi out of the country.

THat's why they gave up.

You see, what Americans like to forget is that the USSR did most of the heavy lifting in WWII. A couple bombs didn't make a difference. 50 battle hardened Red Army division rampaging through Manchuria and Korea and threatening Japan itself did.

Wow, comparing Electra to PoliticalChic is over the line unfair. Electra uses excellent sources and is promoting ideas and opinions of a long list of legitimate historians and scholars and adhering to the generally accepted what may loosely be called the Richard B. Frank school based largely on "Downfall" and Edward Drea's "MacArthur's Ultra: Code Breaking....." These are not schools of thought and works that can be shrugged off over speculative opinion. Nor are they old obsolete works that have been somehow debunked with the release of previously unknown or declassified data the way PoliticalChics sources have.
nytimes.com/books/first/f/frank-downfall.html

The Hasegawa books are being accepted and studied. Not really new, but his works are taking time to take hold. They are the viewpoints of a Japanese scholar and hence less known to westerners. They are certainly praised and get excellent reviews by professional historians and have become required reading on this subject. Racing the Enemy is a must read.
bu.edu/historic/hs/kort.html
Add to Racing the Enemy his book The End of the Pacific War: Reappraisals
h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=23499
It appears that you have knowingly or unknowingly been influenced by the Hasegawa school.

 

[JoeB131]

Wow, comparing Electra to PoliticalChic is over the line unfair. Electra uses excellent sources and is promoting ideas and opinions of a long list of legitimate historians and scholars and adhering to the generally accepted what may loosely be called the Richard B. Frank school based largely on "Downfall" and Edward Drea's "MacArthur's Ultra: Code Breaking....." These are not schools of thought and works that can be shrugged off over speculative opinion. Nor are they old obsolete works that have been somehow debunked with the release of previously unknown or declassified data the way PoliticalChics sources have.

i think they are both a little crazy, honestly. they seem to both want to spam a thread with off -tangent stuff and then think they win when everyone else loses interest.

 

[elektra]

Seriously, you stated we consistently demanded that the Emperor be removed, and that is a flat out lie.

I posted the Surrender demand that you just failed to include in your quote, failed as in purposely deleted.

NO, I don't bother with it because it was irrelevent to the point. We didn't start being reasonable about the Emperor until the Soviets got into it, and we had a reasonably fear they might get to Tokyo first.

Lies, nothing more.

How in the hell was The USSR going to get to Tokyo before us, considering we were already there and the USSR was barely in Manchuria? You do realize that the USSR entry in the War was in China.

Not reasonable about the Emperor until the USSR got in the war.

Did you miss the date of the Potsdam declaration, that was before the USSR joined the war.

The USSR joined the war in August, not before, hence joeb131 proves once again, joeb131's revisionist view is wrong. Further Joeb131 kn

Potsdam Declaration - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia
The Potsdam Declaration or the Proclamation Defining Terms for Japanese Surrender is a statement that called for the surrender of all Japanese armed forces during World War II. On July 26, 1945,

 

[elektra]

Wow, comparing Electra to PoliticalChic is over the line unfair. Electra uses excellent sources and is promoting ideas and opinions of a long list of legitimate historians and scholars and adhering to the generally accepted what may loosely be called the Richard B. Frank school based largely on "Downfall" and Edward Drea's "MacArthur's Ultra: Code Breaking....." These are not schools of thought and works that can be shrugged off over speculative opinion. Nor are they old obsolete works that have been somehow debunked with the release of previously unknown or declassified data the way PoliticalChics sources have.

i think they are both a little crazy, honestly. they seem to both want to spam a thread with off -tangent stuff and then think they win when everyone else loses interest.

Actually, honestly, "spam a thread with off tangent stuff".

EXCUSE ME!, I WAS RESPONDING TO YOUR POSTS!

simple liar you are

 

[elektra]

The Rising Sun
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Rising Sun (diasambiguation).
The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936–1945, written by John Toland, was published by Random House in 1970[1] and won the 1971 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction.[2] It was republished by Random House in 2003.[3]

A chronicle of the World War II rise and fall of the Japanese empire, from the invasion of Manchuria and China to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, from the Japanese perspective, it is in the author's words, "a factual saga of people caught up in the flood of the most overwhelming war of mankind, told as it happened—muddled, ennobling, disgraceful, frustrating, full of paradox."

I call this book a bit biased towards the Japanese side, but it is still a very accurate book, John Toland was actually married to a Japanese woman of some family standing, I believe, I would have to read the forward to be precise.

Toland interviewed many High Ranking Japanese officials from WW II for the book.

The first book from the Japanese point of view.

 

[JoeB131]

Lies, nothing more.

How in the hell was The USSR going to get to Tokyo before us, considering we were already there and the USSR was barely in Manchuria? You do realize that the USSR entry in the War was in China.

We got there first because the Japanese surrendered. They took a long look at Stalin barrelling towards them and didn't want a bunch of little Eurasian Rape Babies.

 

[Jarlaxle]

We never feared that the Soviets would get to Tokyo first.

The Soviets at best could do what they did- gobble up mainland Asian territories previously occupied by Japan- they had no way to invade Japan at all.

Actually, it wouldn't have been a problem at all for them.

A couple of airborne divisions in Hokkaido, take a major port, start offloading troops ships from Vladivostock. Easy-peasy.

Did they have the airlift and sea-lift capability for that?

They maintained about 20 paratrooper brigades, but would quickly transform them into rifle brigades when needed. They had several major jumps and many smaller ones. The Tupolev TB 3 was the aircraft used.

youtube.com/watch?v=zzMb_ue4aG4

They could drop paratroops, assuming the US didn't "accidentally" intercept them. What about sealift?

 

[Jarlaxle]

No, it's just that she goes into so many weird tangents I don't bother to keep up with them anymore.

Dude...you are wrong, you realize it, and so does everyone else. Trying to distract with idiotic flaming and trolling will not work!

 

[JoeB131]

No, it's just that she goes into so many weird tangents I don't bother to keep up with them anymore.

Dude...you are wrong, you realize it, and so does everyone else. Trying to distract with idiotic flaming and trolling will not work!

Guy, most historians are concluding that the atom bombings were wrong, and the USSR's entry into the war was what prompted Japan's surrender.

 

[Thunderbird]

I disagree with Truman's decision to drop the bomb, however I think Truman was motivated by anger at Japan rather than fear of the Soviets.

 

[JoeB131]

I disagree with Truman's decision to drop the bomb, however I think Truman was motivated by anger at Japan rather than fear of the Soviets.

I think you might be overthinking it a bit.

I think the Atom bomb in 1945 wasn't the awe-inspiring thing it is today, after most of us grew up under the threat of nuclear annihilation.

It was just another weapon in a war where all sorts of new weapons had been employed to devastating effect.

Yes, the bombs killed hundreds of thousands of people, in a war that had already killed some 70 million.

 

[Camp]

We never feared that the Soviets would get to Tokyo first.

The Soviets at best could do what they did- gobble up mainland Asian territories previously occupied by Japan- they had no way to invade Japan at all.

Actually, it wouldn't have been a problem at all for them.

A couple of airborne divisions in Hokkaido, take a major port, start offloading troops ships from Vladivostock. Easy-peasy.

Did they have the airlift and sea-lift capability for that?

They maintained about 20 paratrooper brigades, but would quickly transform them into rifle brigades when needed. They had several major jumps and many smaller ones. The Tupolev TB 3 was the aircraft used.

youtube.com/watch?v=zzMb_ue4aG4

They could drop paratroops, assuming the US didn't "accidentally" intercept them. What about sealift?

We never feared that the Soviets would get to Tokyo first.

The Soviets at best could do what they did- gobble up mainland Asian territories previously occupied by Japan- they had no way to invade Japan at all.

Actually, it wouldn't have been a problem at all for them.

A couple of airborne divisions in Hokkaido, take a major port, start offloading troops ships from Vladivostock. Easy-peasy.

Did they have the airlift and sea-lift capability for that?

They maintained about 20 paratrooper brigades, but would quickly transform them into rifle brigades when needed. They had several major jumps and many smaller ones. The Tupolev TB 3 was the aircraft used.

youtube.com/watch?v=zzMb_ue4aG4

They could drop paratroops, assuming the US didn't "accidentally" intercept them. What about sealift?

Sea lift or troop transport was not a problem. In fact, they began there attack as promised at Yalta, three days after Hiroshima. They were very prepared with two ports to launch their invasion fleets. Vladivostok in the north and Lushon (previously Port Arthur) in the south. They took the Liaodong peninsula quickly to acquire the port. Their supporting fleet consisted of a dozen surface warships, 60 submarines, numerous support vessels and troop transports. The distance needed to travel was so small that the ships could ferry supplies and troops. The air assets for the invasion consisted of over 6,000 aircraft. The invasion of the Russian hoards had already begun in Manchuria when the bombs were dropped. Russia's ability was not in question.

 

[Jarlaxle]

Then perhaps Fat Man should have been dropped on Vladivostock...

 

[JoeB131]

Then perhaps Fat Man should have been dropped on Vladivostock...

Maybe fat man should have been dropped on the truck stop where you keep picking up those hookers and the ditch-weed.

 

[Camp]

Then perhaps Fat Man should have been dropped on Vladivostock...

It wasn't necessary and would have caused a war between the US and USSR in Europe. The USSR did not know how many atom bombs we had. It was the start of the Cold War. US wasn't going to share the spoils of Japan in exchange for a few days of fighting by the USSR. They were satisfied in getting China, North Korea and the Kuril Islands. Point is the dates of dropping the bombs and was not coincidental. Dropping the bombs were directly related to the USSR breaking the neutrality pact and entering the war and hence make the bombing more about political with economic rewards than militarily strategic necessities.