Comments on: Eyewitnesses to Hiroshima and Nagasaki

By: t1234wbz

t1234wbz — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 06:50:30 +0000

[quote]nutritionalalchemist said: “daniel3ub said: “It’s amazing how you all americans believe in this history about “we needed to drop the bomb to stop the war”.
It’s amazing how you all americans try to compare pearl harbour to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, trying to justify the most cruel and stupid act ever committed by humankind.
I sugget you all “Barefoot Gen”, that can be found everywhere, including Amazon.com. Read this and then come back to discuss the bomb. It’s a manga, so even the dumbest american can read and understand it.”
Ok….I was going to stay out of this one, but this moron pissed me off.If you knew your history, back in WWII there was a little thing called the Axis that worked together and shared information. Before Germany fell, Hitler dispatched 10 (that we know of) submarines with all of its nuclear technology. We sunk nine. Do not think for one moment that the Japanese would not have dropped one on the U.S. if they had finished it first. Someone else also posted that the second one was not necessary as we did not understand them and there culture. Bullshit. Most of Japan follow Zen precepts. One of the most important is that you cannot think of one action without thinking of the oposite, hence they are taught to “zone” (so to speak) themselves when they enter combat. ( as the Samurai did ) About 10 years ago 60 minutes did a story on how the Japanese honored the dead in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. While discussing it with some school children, the reporter was astounded to learn that the children were never taught of the Pearl Harbor attack. Oh, and while we are on that subject, does anyone know why or how we pissed the Japanese off so badly that they would attack an isolationist Nation such as the U.S. was. Hmmmmcan we say the Nasty word of Foreign Policy. Yes, It was our terrible act of sanctioning raw materials that they were using to attack China with. Bad, Bad United States, shame on you and your terrible foreign policy (can everyone smell the sarcasm?) Oh…and I dont think anyone mentioned the Bataan DeathMarch…or how prisoners of war were treated…was this discussed. Yes, we dropped the bomb, and dammit it was necessary and I DO NOT give a shit what anyone else says otherwise. Take your America bashing crap and shove it. Some one else also spoke of civilan loses. What do you think would have happened to American civilians had they made it over hear, same thing that happened in the Phillipines and China. Does the Rape of Nanking ring a bell with anyone. Oh, and I did not get who stated the WMD’s are in Syria, thank you, no one ever says this anywhere, and it IS where they went. All you Liberals were all for Clinton when he said that Iraq had them, but of course if he wasnt to busy getting a hummer and not protecting the country from 911, he would have saw to it that they were captured.Next?”[/quote]

The world is like this because of people like you.
We are all monsters, that is the conclusion.

By: Frank G

Frank G — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 05:56:20 +0000

[quote]History Student said: “There were NO leaflets warning of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki dropped before the atomic bomb attacks.
As I replied under this site owner’s “WW2 America Warned Hiroshima and Nagasaki Citizens”, back in 1995 it was proven, once and for all, a propaganda lie by the American-chaired “Historians’ Committee for Open Debate on Hiroshima”.

In fact, a month before Mr Bellows resurrected this CIA leaflet lie, refuted by even his wikipedia source, major US newspapers like the LA Times took out page-wide coverage of the historians’ open letter/petition forcing the shamed Smithsonian Museum and its new Enola Gay Exhibit to retract such propaganda and outright lies and change their final draft.
http://www.doug-long.com/letter.htm
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0805-24.htm
FRANK G has made a similar reference to democracy as the aforementioned historians I link to,
“These unpleasant historical facts were censored from the 1995 Smithsonian exhibit, an action that should trouble every American. When a government substitutes an officially sanctioned view for publicly debated history, democracy is diminished.”
Published on Friday, August 5, 2005 by the Los Angeles Times
The Myths of Hiroshima
by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin”[/quote]

WELL SAID, HISTORY STUDENT.

By: History Student

History Student — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 03:25:08 +0000

There were NO leaflets warning of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki dropped before the atomic bomb attacks.
As I replied under this site owner’s “WW2 America Warned Hiroshima and Nagasaki Citizens”, back in 1995 it was proven, once and for all, a propaganda lie by the American-chaired “Historians’ Committee for Open Debate on Hiroshima”.

http://www.doug-long.com/letter.htm

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0805-24.htm

FRANK G has made a similar reference to democracy as the aforementioned historians I link to,

“These unpleasant historical facts were censored from the 1995 Smithsonian exhibit, an action that should trouble every American. When a government substitutes an officially sanctioned view for publicly debated history, democracy is diminished.”

Published on Friday, August 5, 2005 by the Los Angeles Times
The Myths of Hiroshima
by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin

By: Frank G

Frank G — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 17:40:31 +0000

Some of you here might think that i am milking out this subject to much, but i don’t care.
We must never forget and always remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki, this is a link to Democracy Now!
One of the better sites that I follow, about the topic of today.

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/8/6/us_attending_hiroshima_memorial_enormously_important

Frank G

By: Frank G

Frank G — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 12:22:32 +0000

65 years later, are we finally growing up?

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/08/05/un.hiroshima.ceremony/index.html?hpt=T2

http://www.entreating-minds.com/

Frank G

By: Amercitizen

Amercitizen — Thu, 14 May 2009 14:37:18 +0000

Ok for all you fuckers we wanted neutrality but we never get it. We bombed Japan because it was the only thing we could have done. Japan would have lasted forever, we couldn’t take their home island, it was too well defended and if we tried we would have lost way too many soldiers.

By: Amercitizen

Amercitizen — Wed, 06 May 2009 14:53:06 +0000

I am an American and I’m going to say it straight and clear.
In every world war we tried to stay isolationist but a couple of damn countries decided that they were strong enough to attack us. Germany would have left us alone if it weren’t for those traitorous Japs. We wanted to do through peace talks but they were sneaky about it and they attacked us, A NEUTRAL COUNTRY THAT WANTED TO BE LEFT ALONE. So we asked the stupid japanese government to surrender several times but they wouldn’t hear it. Even after we destroyed their entire Navy. They would never surrender, they said so themselves, so we warned the citizen but they wouldn’t listen. So we dropped the bombs. After the first was dropped the Jap didn’t surrender so we dropped the second. And if you think it was unfair to drop the bombs well listen to this. Japanese soldiers killed thousands of innocent american civilians on Pearl Harbor

By: BenKinsey

BenKinsey — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 16:32:53 +0000

I would’ve been content even if we would have dropped a bomb on every major Japanese city. They wanted beef and they got it and couldn’t handle it. I don’t think that we should have accepted a surrender that quickly. We should have crushed them like Germany was crushed during the WW’s.

By: Bob Nesbo

Bob Nesbo — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 11:16:33 +0000

One of my favorite authors is Paul Fussell. he was a combat infantryman in Europe, and went on to be an English professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Here is an excerpt from his book “Thank God for the Atom Bomb”. (This opens as a PDF file):
http://crossroads.alexanderpiela.com/files/Fussell_Thank_God_AB.pdf

This section of the book really offers some perspective on the whole topic.

By: Mirage_GSM

Mirage_GSM — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 08:59:16 +0000

I’ve just read through most of the comments here, and I think it is sad that it does not seem to be possible to have a rational discussion on this board. This site has some really damn interesting articles, but most comments seem to turn to insults and name calling sooner rather than later. This site REALLY neeas some moderation. Kudos to Madsam and SweetViolet for posting their opinions the way a discussion should be held!
Most arguments have been bounced back and forth several times already, and I don’t want to repeat them all, so I’ll retrict myself to two points noone seems to have adressed by now:
1) Two or three people here argued that the US “forced” Japan into Pearl Harbour by the US oil embargo against Japan. Well at the time Japan was already fighting several wars in eastern Asia, and the war crimes were not unknown to the US. There would be an outcry of unknown proportions if the US continued to sell oil (or other goods necessary to wage wars) to a country like that today. Back then the US populace was indifferent at best.
2) Hiroshima as a “civilian” target… Hiroshima was an industial centre and in WWII that means that it produced weapons and ammunitions for the war. It might not have been quite as extreme in the US, but in Japan, Germany and in fact Great Britain as well, nearly all to production was geared towards the war effort. You would have been hard pressed to find a purely “civillian” target in all of Japan. (One fact that played into the choice of targets that has not been mentioned yet, is that Hiroshima was one of the places without POW camps nearby.)

I’m a german. Members of my family died in WWII. Tens of thousands of germans died during the allied bombings of civilian targets like Dresden and other cities.
Still I am glad the allies did that – because it was necessary to depose of the fascist regime we had back then! The US joining the war and helping defeat Nazi germany was what allowed me to grow up in a democratic country without having to fear for my life constantly. A country where I might not share the opinions of my leaders or even despise some of them, but where I won’t be put in a concentration camp because of it.
By 1945 a good portion of the german people were as weary of the war as their british or french neighbours. Many even welcomed the (western) Allies, because they were afraid Stalin might get to them first. I’m not saying there weren’t fanatics who would have fought to the death – Nazi propaganda was too efficient for that, but germany had known democracy before Hitler and had known defeat in another World War. The german people knew that life would go on after a surrender and cities could be rebuilt.
Japan had never known defeat in recent history. The Japanese propaganda machine was just as efficient as the Nazi’s. It was unthinkable to surrender to an american, because americans were barbarous monsters.
Of course noone can say for sure whether Japan would have eventually surrendered without the bombs, but my personal opinion is, that the assumption of a lot more lives – civillian or otherwise) being lost in case of an invasion is a plausible one after the battle of Okinawa. Anyone who disagrees, please read this article first: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Okinawa
Everyone has to know for himself what he would have done in that position. The choice of options was rather limited:
1. Pacifist option: Do nothing.
Japan is beaten. Go home, maybe put up an embargo. Well we all know how well weapon embargos kept Hitler from remilitarizing germany…
2. Conventional option: Keep firebombing Japan until they eventually surrender.
They’d been doing that for quite some time with questionable effect.
3. Gung-Ho Option: Invade.
After Okinawa, I understand everyone who would want to avoid this.
4. Atomic option: Try to shock Japan into surendering.
They chose number 4 and it worked. Of course it was horrible for those who lived there, but was it worse than the alternatives? Maybe, but anyone who claims to be sure is lying.