August 6, 1945 at 8:16 am Hiroshima Destroyed; 2005 = 60th Anniversary Today

[Knight0440]

The Myths of Hiroshima
By Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin
The Los Angeles Times

Friday 05 August 2005

Sixty years ago tomorrow, an atomic bomb was dropped without warning on the center of the Japanese city of Hiroshima. One hundred and forty thousand people were killed, more than 95% of them women and children and other noncombatants. At least half of the victims died of radiation poisoning over the next few months. Three days after Hiroshima was obliterated, the city of Nagasaki suffered a similar fate.

The magnitude of death was enormous, but on Aug. 14, 1945 - just five days after the Nagasaki bombing - Radio Tokyo announced that the Japanese emperor had accepted the US terms for surrender. To many Americans at the time, and still for many today, it seemed clear that the bomb had ended the war, even "saving" a million lives that might have been lost if the US had been required to invade mainland Japan.

This powerful narrative took root quickly and is now deeply embedded in our historical sense of who we are as a nation. A decade ago, on the 50th anniversary, this narrative was reinforced in an exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution on the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the first bomb. The exhibit, which had been the subject of a bruising political battle, presented nearly 4 million Americans with an officially sanctioned view of the atomic bombings that again portrayed them as a necessary act in a just war.

But although patriotically correct, the exhibit and the narrative on which it was based were historically inaccurate. For one thing, the Smithsonian downplayed the casualties, saying only that the bombs "caused many tens of thousands of deaths" and that Hiroshima was "a definite military target."

Americans were also told that use of the bombs "led to the immediate surrender of Japan and made unnecessary the planned invasion of the Japanese home islands." But it's not that straightforward. As Tsuyoshi Hasegawa has shown definitively in his new book, "Racing the Enemy" - and many other historians have long argued - it was the Soviet Union's entry into the Pacific war on Aug. 8, two days after the Hiroshima bombing, that provided the final "shock" that led to Japan's capitulation.
...

Read the rest of Witness to the Ghosts of Hiroshima as well as Surviving Hiroshima: Keiko Ogura

Wiki on the Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

[Future Boy]

Dropping a huge ass bomb on their ass didnt hurt.

[SpFission]

Glad we did.

[Knight0440]

LOL eff you both. Your lack of humanity is revolting.

[SpFission]

Originally posted by Knight0440
LOL eff you both. Your lack of humanity is revolting.

Maybe they shouldn't have fucked with us. And besides, why did it take almost a week after the Nagasaki bombing for the Japanese to surrender?

[Corganist]

It was a nasty end to a particularly nasty segment of the war. There are plenty of good reasons that the bombs were dropped. The results speak for themselves. To suggest that maybe the Japanese were about to surrender anyway is just plain speculative at best and historical revisionism at worst. The Japanese were still fighting down to the last man, even as American forces made more and more progress towards the home islands. The talk from Tokyo was still adamantly against surrender under conditions acceptable to the US. And the war was nearing entering its fifth year, with no end in sight. I don't see how its all that questionable that the war-weary Americans weren't looking forward to continuing to slog through more of the Pacific War. They had no indication that just crossing their fingers and hoping that the Japanese would finally break was going to work.

[disslunker]

Originally posted by SpFission

Maybe they shouldn't have fucked with us.

yup, exactly.

[sleeper]

Originally posted by Corganist
It was a nasty end to a particularly nasty segment of the war. There are plenty of good reasons that the bombs were dropped. The results speak for themselves. To suggest that maybe the Japanese were about to surrender anyway is just plain speculative at best and historical revisionism at worst. The Japanese were still fighting down to the last man, even as American forces made more and more progress towards the home islands. The talk from Tokyo was still adamantly against surrender under conditions acceptable to the US. And the war was nearing entering its fifth year, with no end in sight. I don't see how its all that questionable that the war-weary Americans weren't looking forward to continuing to slog through more of the Pacific War. They had no indication that just crossing their fingers and hoping that the Japanese would finally break was going to work.

firstly, the results dont necessarily speak for themselves, and i reject what youre insinuating by saying that. its a hugely complicated issue and its easy to just point to the fact that they were fighting the war before the bombs, that they surrendered after, therefor the bombs ended the war. they did bring about the end quicker, but its wrong to assume, were one to do so, that the wars end wasnt imminent, bomb or not. and its not shaky speculation either, there is an abundance of information indicating such and the debate is far from over. the allies knew it then, and subsequent information has proven that japan was in fact already defeated, militarily, and it was just a matter of ending it, politically. the japanese still planned to fight fiercly in the case of an american invasion of kyushu, but the intention was to do so only in order to secure more favourable peace terms, namely to be able to keep the emperor. the US knew all of this from their interceptions of japanese messages

also the way americans tend to mythologize the fanaticism of the japanese is really pretty facile. they were indeed wildly fanatic, but it wasnt superhuman and was waning, both amongst the soldiers and the leadership. islands that were taken at the start of the war with a handful of japanese surrendering, were being taken near the end with hundreds or thousands. okinawa itself saw thousands surrender. this isnt a lot in itself, considering it was defended by over 100,000, but it was significant a sign. the japanese werent completely ignorant to the hopelessness of their situation. the soviets went on to absolutely bowl the japanese over in manchuria, the japanese had absolutely zero control over their airspace, their navy was ruined, and they were being starved by a blockade. the latter's importance is often underestimated, but it is one of the most, if not the most, important aspect that brought about the end. without supplies there is no war industry and thus no war. the allies made the same error with germany. if they focused their strategic air campaign on german supply and war industry instead of wasting time and lives firebombing irrelevant cultural cities like dresden into the ground to "defeat morale" they very well could have ended the war 2 years earlier, if not even sooner. granted, the bombing of cities succeeded remarkably in its intention and did do immeasurable damage to morale.

one level that i agree with it more than any other is the political one vis a vis the soviet union. the americans wanted to have japan, and her conquered territory in south east asia, under their sphere of influence and, fearing another russian land grab similar to the one taking shape in europe, they wanted to end the war as quickly as possible before the russians could win enough to demand a piece of the postwar pie -- or like they did with poland, just take whatever they want and essentially tell the other allies to fuck off. the coming clash between the US and the soviet union was no secret and soviet behaviour in europe proved once and for all that it couldnt be avoided. with that in mind the use of such a new and devastating weapon had a decisive political purpose with regards to US foreign policy (and it would especially strenghten the american hand in the sticky situation in europe at the time), beyond just bringing about the end of the war sooner. i admit that people often overstate the importance of this "showing off the bomb" argument, and im not one to really cheerlead for it, so whatever

and lets not even get into the stupidity of nagasaki

[sleeper]

but there obviously are a lot of reasons for the bomb, thats undeniable, most of which center around the idea of, not necessarily just ending the war, but ending it very quickly and with as little american casualties as possible. it did indeed do both, and quite well. also, the bombings, in number of casualties, were not that much in excess to what the war had seen prior. the firebombings of tokyo in 45 killed more than hiroshima. im talking from the initial blast. the gruesome burns and wounds and radiation-related problems were also largely unexpected at the time, although the way they tried to cover it up was pretty despicable. this could also be said to be a reason against the choice to drop the bomb. there is indeed something irresponsible about unleashing such a untested and relatively poorly understood weapon on a packed city. they only tested the bomb once, and it was a few weeks before the actual drop on hiroshima

that said, i think the right course of action wouldve been to forestall russian advance to hokkaido, do the "demonstrate in tokyo harbour" option for the bomb, step up the attacks on merchant shipping/bombing on land-based supply lines and war industry, and lose the lust for unconditional surrender and let them keep their emperor -- which they did anyways

[Mayfuck]

he slepper you msut be really fucking bnring in real life. shut hte fuck up

[Knight0440]

nicely put sleeper.

[Future Boy]

Originally posted by Knight0440
Your lack of humanity is revolting.

Your post wasnt exactly about the innocent people killed.
People died, that sucks, I get it.

[Nimrod's Son]

There were less loves loss in those bombs than would have been lost had they not.

[sleeper]

Originally posted by Mayfuck
he slepper you msut be really fucking bnring in real life. shut hte fuck up

i used to be embarrassed by how long i end up going on for but ive recently come to a new conclusion on the matter and i now have no shame in it whatsoever. theres nothing to be done, i just have to let it go

[GlasgowKiss]

Originally posted by SpFission



Maybe they shouldn't have fucked with us.

Yes, every single individual that died in hiroshima and nagasaki personally fucked with you.

[Mayfuck]

Originally posted by sleeper


i used to be embarrassed by how long i end up going on for but ive recently come to a new conclusion on the matter and i now have no shame in it whatsoever. theres nothing to be done, i just have to let it go

I didn't mean it anyway.

[disslunker]

Originally posted by GlasgowKiss


Yes, every single individual that died in hiroshima and nagasaki personally fucked with you.

if they fuck with one american they fuck with all of us, those sneaky slant-eye bitches they got what was comin to em !

[disslunker]

i also love this which was blantant racism.

oh well !

[Knight0440]

if they fuck with one american they fuck with all of us, those sneaky slant-eye bitches they got what was comin to em !

So Netphoria doesn't have a policy against blatantly racist pieces of shit?

[Future Boy]

Originally posted by Knight0440


So Netphoria doesn't have a policy against blatantly racist pieces of shit?

So you advocate censorship? When's your next book burning?

[Knight0440]

I do not advocate hate speech. Do you?

[disslunker]

Originally posted by Knight0440


So Netphoria doesn't have a policy against blatantly racist pieces of shit?

i'm not sure if you realize i was being sarcastic

go to the link i posted

[Future Boy]

Hes got no funny bone.

[Knight0440]

I guess I didn't realize. Maybe you could use the "sarcasm" tags? There are racist assholes on this board. It gets hard differentiating them.

[disslunker]

Originally posted by Knight0440
I do not advocate hate speech. Do you?

everybody has a right to say anything they want

i advocate freedom

[disslunker]

Originally posted by Knight0440
I guess I didn't realize. Maybe you could use the "sarcasm" tags? There are racist assholes on this board. It gets hard differentiating them.

no ive made posts referencing the fucked-up bombing of hiroshima before


i hate americas fucking stupid reactions when we are threatened
its a total adam-m mentality.

"we'll show them whos national dick is bigger!"

they killed 2000 people by bombing a naval base

we decimate two cities killing more than a 100x more people than they did


same reaction with 9/11

we fuck up the world / other countries for money/greed and then are totally outraged when they retaliate

i hate humans in general but americans totally fucking suck
and sometimes i really believe i'd rather commit suicide than contribute any more to this fucked up culture we have

[sleeper]

oh shit. wait till corganist sees that post. oh man hes going to completely fucking lose it. you can tell hes the kind of guy that bottles things up too. oh man youre dead

[sleeper]

but you do hit on an interesting, and revolting, part of the stereotypical american psyche -- which is this extremely petulant and overly aggressive attitude. i really got a kick out of all the little clips of the on-the-street reactions after 9/11, with about 1/3 saying the classic "fuckin nuke em. nuke em" line. obviously violent idiots exist everywhere, but america seems to have institutionalized their aggression into being part of the american way, or, worse, into a right. its all done with this air of moral superiority as well, which doesnt really sit well in a lot of stomachs ("spreading freedom"). i think they call it "american exceptionalism". whatever. it is an issue that resists simplification though, so ill stop here

[Future Boy]

Quit hating.

[sleeper]

i also think america is becoming dangerously nationalist. seriously. if it werent for the left keeping the right in check in this regard the US would be a cretinous mass of shit right now. i wish someone would break the ice and start bad mouthing patriotism down there. its seems like such a huge taboo, but i can foresee a kind of pandora's box thing with it

im not crazy about canada, but i am proud of how little pride canada has. relatively speaking. thats been changing a lot in the past decade, but patriotism is still being kept to a tolerable whisper. even quebec is keeping it down. to the rest of canada, quebec is still pretty scary though. the bush administration keeps making us look good though and thats really underwriting a lot of the new patriotism. people used to talk about the "canadian identity crisis", but as long as the states has some primitive hick in charge canada wont have this problem anymore and will probably see itself as the cute, north-american version of europe. but really, canada has never looked better, and this all thanks to bush