why Hiroshima or Nagasaki?

[ishootblanks]

Yet they still wouldn't fully surrender because of wording. The US wanted UNCONDITIONAL surrender, the Japanese thought those terms were demeaning. Each side wanted the surrender their way. Does this mean the bombs were needed? No not at all, I haven't tried to defend the bombs at all really because an argument can be made either way about this and that and whatever. The real point is, they were given chances to surrender, every commander in the Pacific knew that Japan was done...and they still refused because of little things like wording and politics.
Its just funny how none of the wording or politics mattered anymore after the bombs were dropped. I don't know about anyone else, but after the million or so people died from the firebombings, I don't think it would take long to realize that a few words sounding demeaning or if it makes you look bad ...just doesn't matter anymore. Not like they were very honorable anyways, look what they did to the people of China and the other Asian countries they butchered. (kinda like the Nazi's huh)

Honestly, in all truth, the second bomb was only dropped to solidify American global strength, imo anyways.

Something else I want to point out as well. What is the difference between what the US did during the war, and what the USSR, Japan, Britain, Germany all did as well. They all committed mass civilian deaths, knowingly. Russia not only lost more people in the war than any other country, but also killed way more civilians than Germany ever did including the Jewish genocide Hitler tried to do.

there is a pretty big difference between civilian casualties during war.. and genocide..

[jayremy]

Meaningless considering how much collateral damage was done.



I'm not saying the distrust is unfounded.

The sad part of it is that old feuds last, and peace can't be found if old hate is held on to.

Cycles of revenge in it's basest sense has gripped Israel under the guise of territorial conflict generation to generation.

If all of humanity could let go of their hate and work to better the world, instead of trying to force their way of life on their surroundings, we could get much further in our given lifetimes.

*sigh*

Idyllic daydreaming, the inherent fear of what's different is far too gripping for most.

the Bomb was like a test run we HAD NO CLUE what effects the nuke would bring on a civilian population, yes we knew about its properties but had no clue on the measurement of damage it would do and how bad.

The worst part about the bombings was the radiation and fallout to follow, not the actual explosions themselves which were enough to scare a surrender. The larger portion died from the after effects the following months to years later, WE DID NOT EXPECT THAT TO HAPPEN. The bomb was way more powerful on human population centers than we imagined which is why we were so quick to make the decision of avoid any future use of them unless, as last resort mechanic, (or counter measure after USSR's acquisition of them).

[Foosha]

No nation bashing... oh lawrdy, it happened in the first page. People forget that the Japanese were fucking ruthless. Along with numerous prisoner of war massacres, using civilians and prisoners of war as test subjects in awful experiments (like freezing body parts and crushing them) or brainwashing their citizens to jump off cliffs when the Americans came.

As rough as the a-bombs were, they were for the right reasons. Get over it.

[jayremy]

Soldiers fighting soldiers is not the same as civillians getting vaporised in a mushroom cloud with no warning or true purpose.
Both were large cities with some military importance. Neither was irreplacable to the military. There were picked because the casualties would be devastating so they would stand a chance of scaring Japan into surrender.

USA are assholes for dropping the bomb. They had their reasoning and rationalle that allowed them to carry through with it. It was a gray decision where thousands of families were killed. Nobody in the states thought about that, the whole population cheered it as another military victory. Oh well, history is written by the victors.

Likely killing off military centers means commanders can be caught in the collateral damage, we don't want to kill those wise enough or more likely to have the sense and mind to call the surrender. A military leader in charge with his head on right would know a good time to surrender, idk about you but seeing such power 1000x+ times anything seen before I would think surely scares any commander into submission.

Leaving the clueless people to live and they may not be able to call the surrender if not even know when.

[Speaknoevil]

Actually, if man didn't force their way of life on their surroundings, we'd still be living in caves, and lions would still be the #1 cause of death for humans.

We live on this planet still because we've learned how to club it into submission. It can easily go too far (probably has) but it's a necessity.

It isn't. You are welcome to sit on your opinion though. Self awareness should dictate your actions in a seat of power, as it's no longer the basest needs.

the Bomb was like a test run we HAD NO CLUE what effects the nuke would bring on a civilian population, yes we knew about its properties but had no clue on the measurement of damage it would do and how bad.

The worst part about the bombings was the radiation and fallout to follow, not the actual explosions themselves which were enough to scare a surrender. The larger portion died from the after effects the following months to years later, WE DID NOT EXPECT THAT TO HAPPEN. The bomb was way more powerful on human population centers than we imagined which is why we were so quick to make the decision of avoid any future use of them unless, as last resort mechanic, (or counter measure after USSR's acquisition of them).

Actually we did know, the bomb had been tested, and they were aware of the radiation output.

We didn't know exactly how much pain and suffering it would cause, but who cares those women/children deserved it because factories were nearby.

[Gsara]

there is a pretty big difference between civilian casualties during war.. and genocide..

While agree with the technical term, is there really a difference in Hitlers 6-7 million Jewish murders and Stalins 15 million + murders or Japans 10 million + murders of civilians during ww2?

[ZenX]

Sigh I didn't want to do this, but for those of you stating U.S had many alternates to using those bombs:

"Truman’s Reason for Dropping the Bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki

It has been over sixty years since the USA dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, yet the question of whether the bomb should have been used remains controversial to this day. Accordingly, after Japan surrendered, almost all Americans believed that President Harry S Truman had made the right decision, however, as photos and descriptions of the effect of the bomb on Hiroshima appeared many began to have doubts. Afterwards, in the 1960s American “revisionist” historians such as Gar Alperovitz and later Howard Zinn accused their own government of having committed war crimes. They argued that the only reason Truman decided to use atomic weapons was to impress the Soviet Union. However, later historians with access to the Soviet and Japanese archives found that the traditional view was nearer to the truth that Truman actually had not better choice than to drop the bomb. In fact, the archives indicate that with their manners towards US during the war Japanese actually forced Truman to drop the atomic bomb on them.

Few Americans questioned Truman’s decision to use nuclear weapons on Japan until John Hersey published his long article on Hiroshima in the New Yorker in 1946, and followed it up with the book of the same name. Around that time photos and reports of the damage done by nuclear weapons made many Americans feel ashamed and guilty. By the 1960s the American public was willing to believe the ideas of the revisionist historians who charged Truman with committing war crimes. The revisionists argued that the atomic bomb should never have been used; in fact, several of them claim that Japan had been ready to surrender. Even within the armed forces there were questions about Truman’s action: the Army believed it would have been possible to make Japan surrender by using other ways than using the atomic bomb as Gar Alperovitz stated that according to General Curtis LeMay the war would have ended in “two weeks” (2) meaning that using the atomic bomb was unnecessary. In addition to this claim, Howard Zinn claimed that “The saving of American lives was considered far more important than the saving of Japanese lives.”(2), which means that America was only concerned with their own sakes that they did not care about how many Japanese died. However, when the number of Japanese people who were killed by the nuclear bomb was 340.000 in total and the number of people died when alternative ways used when fighting Japan which was more than a million (Wikipedia) that as the war continued more people would have died with the use of alternative ways.

As this fact was considered with the government documents which were recorded during World War II that were announced to public in 1990s, striking to Japan with alternative ways such as firebombing the Japanese cities, putting a naval blockade around Japan, invading the islands of Japan or wait for Red Army to invade Japan other than using the atomic bomb would have caused a greater loss of lives and infrastructure. that, even though Truman had these alternatives, he needed to choose using the atomic bomb.
One of the alternatives to using the atomic bomb was putting a naval blockade around the islands of Japan in order to cut their supplies that they would have been forced to surrender due to the lack of resources that were imported such as coal and oil (Wikipedia). Even though it seems that choosing this alternative would have stopped Japan, Richard Rhodes quotes writer Russell Brines who lived in Japan before and during the war as he carried over the message “We will fight, until we eat stones” (3) from the Japanese which means that cutting Japan’s supplies would not make them surrender just as stated by historian Duncan Anderson who emphasized that “Hirohito’ s will had not been broken by… the effects of the blockade…”, where Hirohito was the present emperor of the Japan who was the center of the militaristic government in Japan (Anderson 6), which means that as long as the Emperor had no intention to surrender Japan would not stop fighting, thus, would not surrender. When these claims and facts are taken into consideration a naval blockade of Japan would not able to force Japan to surrender that this alternative would have been useless when compared with the effect caused by the atomic bomb.

Another alternative that was suggested by the US Army Chiefs was continuing the firebombing of Japan and as it was suggested by General Curtis LeMay that continuing to firebomb Japan would have caused Japan to surrender, however, it was not a possible alternative for the use of atomic bomb as it killed more people as and as the former firebombing of Japanese cities did not caused Japan to surrender. As to be more specific, with the use of fire bombs on Tokyo more than 100,000 people died and a million were injured (Rhodes 5), whereas, 140,000 people were killed instantly by the atomic bomb and a 100,000 died later from the radiation poisoning (Anderson 2). In addition, even though Hirohito had witnessed the firebombing of Tokyo from his palace, he completely ignored it and did not give the command of surrendering even after this situation where Japan had its 65 cities already burned with firebombing. Hence, firebombing cannot be an alternative to using firebomb as even such a horrible event did not stop Japan from fighting.

Other than these, an alternative for the use of the atomic bomb was suggested by General Douglas MacArthur as an invasion of Japanese Islands which was named as Operation Olympic that would start with the invasion of Kyushu and would be carried on until the Japan accepted to surrender (Wikipedia), however, such an invasion would have caused the time of war to lengthen that there would be greater losses of lives. Regardless of that, even though General Douglas MacArthur claimed that an invasion would only cost for the lives 47,000 American Soldiers (Anderson 4), however, it has been calculated relative to the number of dead American soldiers and Japanese people during the invasion of Okinawa where for every American soldier, 20 Japanese people died that during another possible invasion of Japan or its islands, at least two million Japanese and a 100,000 American soldiers would have died (Anderson 7). This means that in the conclusion of an invasion there would have been greater losses than in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as both American soldiers and Japanese people would have died where Japanese would suffer the greater loss.
As the last suggested alternative for the use of atomic bomb was to wait for the possible Soviet invasion of Japan to happen that they would have forced Japanese to surrender, however, as the author Robert Cowley claims,

“It's not just that the Soviets would, in just over two weeks and at minimal cost, have picked up a large share of the Japanese marbles that had taken the Allies almost four years and thousands of lives to gather. If their landing force had established so much as a beach hold on Hokkaido - and American raiders had apparently gone ashore there with little resistance that summer - the Soviets would have had a legitimate claim to the island, a significant (and no doubt troublemaking) role in the formal surrender preparations, and a zone of a partitioned Tokyo. Just think of the Cold War implications of a Berlin in the Pacific. (Looking on the positive side, we could have blockaded the Soviet zone of Tokyo in response to Stalin's blockade of Berlin in 1948, which might have ended that crisis - or created a more general one.) Consider, too, the deadening effect of a Soviet Hokkaido on Japan's reconstruction - or the inhibiting effect that a hostile occupying force on a home island would have had on our decision to intervene in Korea, using Japan as a base. The chances for future regional and international conflict seem infinite.” (1)

In other words, USSR should not have been allowed to invade Japan even if it would help the war to come to an end because of the reason that they had taken over the countries they have liberated in World War II and did not leave them until their dissolution in 1991. In addition to this reason, during the invasion of Germany, USSR has violently raped and murdered German civilians as they have advanced (Anderson 1) and by considering this fact they were going to do the same to Japanese civilians as well. Hence, as Truman was concerned with the lives Japanese citizens as much as he did with Asians and as he had foreseen the possibility of a crisis that would result in during the occupation of the Northern side of the Japan by the Soviets which is similar to the ones that will happen in Germany and Korea that he could not have allowed USSR to invade Japan.

As Truman had taken all of these alternatives into consideration, he came to the conclusion that the best choice was to drop the atomic bomb on Japan as other alternatives were not suitable that with one of them used and as the war needed to be ended in the shortest time with the least loss.
Since 1995, historians who worked on both Russian and Japanese archives were able to prove that Japan did not intend to surrender but that was ignored by revisionist historians such as Howard Zinn who claimed that “Japan was defeated, in disarray and ready to surrender.”(3), which means that Japan had no intention of fighting left that they were ready to surrender, however, as it has been stated by the military historian Richard Frank, Japan had plans on continuing with the war as they had a “military buildup at Kyushu” (7) and had their artillery filled with suicide bombers that Truman was left with no choice except than using the atomic bomb on Japan to end this war.

In the eyes of Japanese inner cabinet named as the Big Six, Americans were morally brittle and if Japan kept fighting: American soldiers were going to get tired and would want to go back to their homes that it would be easier for Japan to get better terms when they negotiate to surrender (Rhodes 7). In order to construct this situation Big Six planned the operation named as Ketsu-Go (Operation Decisive) where Japan was going to fight a final battle on their homeland. Moreover, according to the MAGIC intercepts that are recorded by bugging the Japan’s communication systems, Big Six had accurately predicted the exact location of USA’s invasion plan named Operation Olympic’s starting point on Kyushu’s shore (Rhodes 7) and they located “10 Imperial Army divisions plus additional brigades” (Rhodes 8) which means that instead of showing any intention of surrendering, Japan wants to continue fighting and lengthen the battle to get American soldiers frustrated that they would give up the fight and return home that they would get better terms when they surrender.

Another fact that shows Japan’s intention to not surrender is their artillery filled with suicide bombers such ones that are airborne as they are pilots flying planets full of explosives called as Kamikazes, ones that are explosive filled mini-submarines driven by humans with called as Human Torpedoes and ones that are mobile on land with explosives attached to them with additional sharp metal pieces that would scatter around when they explode, moreover, these are capable of destroying tanks and destroyers(Wikipedia) and they had 8,000 Kamikazes, hundreds of Human Torpedoes (Anderson 6) and “One Hundred Million Bullets of Fire”(Powers 102) which consists of 102 million Japanese civilians using spears that can also be attached with bombs. Considering these numbers and resting on the facts reflected by them, Japan had no intention to surrender that they had left Truman no other choice than using the atomic bomb.

Revisionist historians argue that Truman overstated the number of casualties expected in the invasion as Zinn claimed that “Numbers were wildly thrown into the air…” (3), numbers of possible losses were not calculated accurately. However, as others point at the ferocious fighting up the island chain leading to Japan where for every American soldier, 20 Japanese people died that during another possible invasion of Japan or its islands, at least two million Japanese and a 100,000 American soldiers would have died (Anderson 7). Thus, when considering the devastation and losses caused by the war which were ten times the losses caused by atomic bomb (Wikipedia) that the war had to be stopped quickly whereas the alternative plans could not end it before the end of 1945 and as US was aware of the Japanese Atrocities where Japanese soldiers killed more than thousands of soldiers of allied forces including US Army soldiers and killed millions of civilians they left Truman no other choice than to use the atomic bomb.

In addition to having to be concerned about American soldiers being killed or wounded and Asians killed, Truman also had to worry about the prisoners-of-war held by the Japanese. Reports of Japanese atrocities had reached the US in 1943 “…when a small group of Americans escaped from a camp in Davao.” where 5,200 of American soldiers were already dead (Pimentel 3) and continued dying during the Bataan Death March. Later on, as the president of US, Truman had to protect its citizens as US soldiers were continued to be killed, thus, this situation forced Truman to use the weapon that will put an end to this war as soon as possible; which was the atomic bomb.
Aside from their atrocious manners towards American soldiers Japanese had other atrocities which happened before the World War II and continued throughout the time of war where the amount of people killed surpassed 20 million where approximately 11 million of them were civilians where almost every female got raped by Japanese soldiers (Wikipedia).
The Nanking Massacre is one of these atrocities where according to the U.S. government documents declassified in 2007, Japanese soldiers have killed 300,000 civilians within Nanking and killed 500,000 more within the area surrounding Nanking where they have raped every woman before and after they killed them (Wikipedia) that as a conclusion, Japan was committing terrible war crimes and they needed to be stopped. Aside from the Rape of Nanking, the atrocity that forced Truman to use the atomic bomb on Japan was the Bataan Death March where only 512 American Soldiers out of 11,751 soldiers managed to survive as they have escaped from the camp (Wikipedia). Thus, Japan forced Truman to drop the atomic bomb on them as they have left him no other choice than using it.

During the time of World War II and later on, US was accused guilty by its own citizens for not offering Japan the opportunity to surrender by offering them good terms. However, it was later learned that even though Japan was offered with relatively better terms than Germany had in the three weeks period of Potsdam Conference, they rejected the given offers scornfully that they have left Truman no choice other than to use nuclear weapons on them. Conversely, Japanese historian Professor Tsuyoshi Hasegawa claimed that “…assurances were taken out of the Potsdam Proclamation precisely because American leaders wanted to have the warning rejected so as to justify the bombing.” (qtd. by Alperovitz 2) meaning that America did not guaranteed the staying of Japanese Emperor even though they were aware of the fact that Japan would not accept such a declaration that America could justify the dropping of the bomb with giving the claim that Japan did not wanted to surrender and did not leave them any choice. However, as Akira Iriye a Japanese political scientist and historian of American diplomatic history stated that America, in the Potsdam Declaration “…issued on July 26, called on the Japanese government to proclaim an unconditional surrender…” (1) as Truman cannot explicitly let Emperor Hirohito stay in charge of Japan as he is regarded as a war criminal, however, in the finalized form of the Potsdam declaration instead referring to the emperor institution a new term was added which was the "freely expressed will of the Japanese people."(Iriye 2) meaning that Japanese people were free to make a choice on the kind of government they want to have where they could keep the emperor as their leader if they wanted to. Even after this change, Japan did not intend to surrender as the Prime Minister of Japan; Baron Kantaro Suzuki told the press that “it would not be necessary to take the declaration seriously." (qtd. by Iriye 3). In other words, even though given such a chance to survive from an intense fight Japan had chosen not to surrender that, in the end, they forced Truman to use the atomic bomb as he had no other choice left where they were dropped to Hiroshima on 6th of August 1945 and to Nagasaki on 8th of August 1945.

As to consider these facts that have been demonstrated so far, it can be concluded that, as Japan was given chances to surrender which were refused by them scornfully, they forced President Truman to use the atomic bomb on them. To expand this argument to be more accurate, Truman could have chosen the alternative ways to make Japan surrender, however, he had seen that having to choose such alternatives would only cause more losses to both sides. Consequently, even though some of the alternatives such as firebombing were applied where Emperor Hirohito watched, half of the Tokyo burning down into ashes and still not wanting to give up. Furthermore, aside from having any intention on surrendering Japan still wanted continue fighting as they had started putting their plan; Ketsu-Go into action in order to frustrate Americans and get better terms when they were ready to negotiate. In the meantime, Japanese continued to kill Asians and American Prisoners of War that accordingly, as Truman was concerned with the lives of both Asians and American soldiers, Truman had to make a choice to stop Japan. Finally, Japan had given up their last chance to surrender when they refused accept the terms in Potsdam Declaration scornfully that in the end, they left Truman almost without choice. In other words, when these reasons are taken into consideration, Japan forced Truman to drop the atomic bomb on them as they had left Truman who wanted put an end to this war with the least loss; with no other choice.

Work Cited

Zinn, Howard. “Means and Ends: The Atomic Bomb.” The Zinn Reader. New York: Seven Storey Press, 1991.

Rhodes, Richard. “B-29’s Over Tokyo.” The Making of the Bomb. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986

Anderson, Duncan. “Nuclear Power: The End of the War Against Japan.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwa...clear_01.shtml

Frank, Richard B. “Why Truman Dropped the Bomb.” The Weekly Standard, 08/08/2005,
Volume 010, Issue 44

Pimentel, Marc. “Migration of Doom: Bataan Death March.”
http://ussslcca25.com/bataan.htm

Alperovitz, Gar. “Hiroshima After Sixty Years: The Debate Continues.”
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0803-26.htm

Iriye, Akira. “The Failure of the Potsdam Conference.”Power and Culture: The Japanese-
American War 1941-1945. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard UP, 1981.

Cowley, Robert. “The Soviet Invasion of Japan.” What If? The World’s Foremost Historians Imagine What Might Have Been. New York, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1999.

"

So mods still keen on letting the discussion on this topic continue?

This was a research paper I had prepared during my sophomore year...

[Lordender]

The A-Bomb was used to send a message that it was time for the war to end. The Japanese were beaten and didn't want to give up, they were prepared to fight down to the last child and eventually the USA got sick of it, used the bomb to end the war.

[Zonned]

Striking the hearts of the enemies and they will surrender. We brought the war to their people (civilians and their homes, which most of the fights were just islands and sea battles neither nation really full assaulting mainlands), not to be mean evil douches but the japs were getting desperate -Kamikazes and w/o finding a way for an easy surrender the War would've been much more bloody and likely more would've died from both sides and ruined economy, just in general more "bad stuff" was coming if we didn't act with a "bang".

As it was evident, the tactic worked the Japanese government saw what happened, and actually citizens turned hatred towards their own gov for starting it. It was a sudden devastating blow, our last resort and I believe we even warned them, but as you can expect they shrugged it off as a bluff, about our nukes.

Like many countries in the 19th and early 20th century they believed the United States was a weak upstart and not fit to be their rival.

First we taught Britain, and then Spain, and then Germany and Japan... it wasn't until after defeating all of them that other countries actually started respecting us.

[Merendel]

Soldiers fighting soldiers is not the same as civillians getting vaporised in a mushroom cloud with no warning or true purpose.
Both were large cities with some military importance. Neither was irreplacable to the military. There were picked because the casualties would be devastating so they would stand a chance of scaring Japan into surrender.

USA are assholes for dropping the bomb. They had their reasoning and rationalle that allowed them to carry through with it. It was a gray decision where thousands of families were killed. Nobody in the states thought about that, the whole population cheered it as another military victory. Oh well, history is written by the victors.

Your opinion is noted and yet in the end as horific as it was it likely saved far more lives than the bombs took. Dont kid yourself even in man to man fighting through the streets civilians die, often as many if not more than soldiers. Many civilians accross the entire country would have died had the USA been forced to invade as well as many many more soldiers on both sides. In addition to that there is no way the US could have finished a ground based invasion before Russia became involved in the fight as well. Had japan been conquered by a joint US/Russian force the surrender would have been on terms similar to what happened with Germany. Had Russia beaten the US to the invasion altogether (they had a much closer landmass to launch from) they very well could have tried to crush the Japanese cultural identity and they definitely would have lost their sovereignty. On the other hand because they surrendered only to the US Japan kept their sovereignty and their culture and became a very strong nation quite quickly after the war. They also kept far more of their population as they would have fought till there was no hope anymore, the bomb proved there was none long before the need to wipe out a sizable percentage of the population in a bloody conflict became required and hence the surrender.

[Xevan]

The Fire bombings were way more devastating than a nuclear bomb, and they did not lead to a surrender. There were a lot of people who thought that Japan wouldn't surrender with the threat of nukes either. That is why they dropped them.

They only had three bombs, why in the world would they waste them on a scare tactic that might not work when they could wipe out a military target. You have to remember that they were fighting people willing to commit suicide for victory. Anything to avoid sending troops to the mainland was advised as soon as possible.

Except fire-bombing required 100's of airplanes. Now imagine the number of airplanes in a firebombing mission but all carrying nuclear payloads.

[haxartus]

The US had to get them to surrender before Stalin entered Japan.

[novazeros371]

Now everyone agrees that dropping atomic bombs on japan was a horrific act but the alternative that was considered at the time was actually quite worse. Operation Downfall would have caused millions in casualties to the American military with hundreds of thousands in fatalities. In fact when Truman asked his generals(who didn't know of the Manhattan Project at the time) to formulate this plan, so many purple hearts were made for the impending casualties that they are still being distributed today.

[Defengar]

I think it should have been 3 targets each one a few days apart. One in the mountains 100 miles out from Hiroshima. The next 20 miles out from a different city.
Then if no surrender drop the 3rd on -- Nagasaki. That way there would still be surprise but we would make clear that the third bomb would hit a city if they did not surrender.

It should have been done this way. Giving them a real clear chance to surrender.

Dude, we didn`t have a third one.

We had 2. It would have taken 9 months to make another.

---------- Post added 2011-11-28 at 02:59 AM ----------

Little known fact. There was actually an assassination of the emporor planed by several of Japans top brass when he told his advisers he was going to surrender.

The plan was to kill Hirohito, take control, and fight to the last man. Good thing it was uncovered (I believe said generals were executed before the surrender took place as well).

[Garnik]

Like any other terror bombing. Planting fear in Japan by killing their civilians, and eventually force them to surrender.

[Bodygrinder]

The bombings were to scare japan out of the continued suicide bombings (kamikaze strikes.)

After seeing what japan was planing (sending every person in the country to their deaths by kamikaze) the U.S. had to make a hard choice, either way mass amounts of death was inevitable.

[Mouni]

WTF is a "Firebombing?"

And Firebombing killed more than the nukes...but the nukes were 2 bombs...correct me if I am wrong but wouldnt the firebombing be literally thousands and thousands of bombs?

[Wells]

Firebombing was carpet bombing with incendiaries that razes cities.

Many many many people died to these tactics and whole cities were leveled.

It became fairly common towards the end of the war in Europe.

[obdigore]

Firebombing was carpet bombing with incendiaries that razes cities.

Many many many people died to these tactics and whole cities were leveled.

It became fairly common towards the end of the war in Europe.

Napalm sticks to puppies and small children!

Did they have Napalm in WW2? I thought it was 'invented' in the '60s?

[Jodah]

The point of using the bombs was to demoralize the Japanese to the point of surrender. That is nearly impossible to do if you target only soldiers. Soldiers are supposed to be fighting, their deaths, while still tragic, are expected. Civilians are the ones that can pressure a government into surrendering.

Also keep in mind that while the nuclear bombing did kill many people the firebombing (IE a more conventional method of bombing) of Tokyo caused more immediate casualties than Nagasaki or Hiroshima (separately, not combined). Yes the war could have been ended without the use of them but just as many people, if not more, would likely have died if conventional bombing had continued.

---------- Post added 2011-11-28 at 10:21 AM ----------

Napalm sticks to puppies and small children!

Did they have Napalm in WW2? I thought it was 'invented' in the '60s?

Nope, the original Napalm was actually invented for WWII because the Japanese controlled the rubber needed for other incendiaries. The Allies developed a new incendiary using latex instead of rubber and called it napalm.

Napalm B, the incendiary available (not used since the UN ban on incendiaries) to the US now was developed in the 60s and is the commonly accepted Napalm now but the original was from WWII.