Re: Obama Ridicules McCain's Wealth

On Aug 30, 5:06 pm, Raymond <Bluerhy...@aol.com> wrote:
> On Aug 30, 4:36 pm, Hiroshima Facts <hiroshima_fa...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > On Aug 28, 8:54 am, Mr Soul <pc...@comcast.net> wrote:
>
> > > > We deliberately decided to highlight exactly how much damage the
bomb could
> > > > do. When the goal is to cause the enemy to surrender, that is the
kind of
> > > > target you pick.
>
> > > Ah but you see, I don't buy that goal. I think the goal was to show
> > > Stalin what we had at the expense of innocent people & children.
>
> > You are wrong. The goal was to show Japan what we had, at the expense
> > of important Japanese military centers.
>
> > > > Why was it any more immoral than killing the same number of people
with
> > > > conventional bombs in the span of two days? Dead is dead.
>
> > > Both are immoral but using atomic weapons is particularly gruesome and
> > > like I said, there's no warning or chance to escape.
>
> > No warning..... except for all the leaflets we dropped warning
> > civilians to flee because we were coming to bomb the city in coming
> > days.
>
> "Those who plot the destruction of others often fall themselves".
> ---- Phaedrus
>
> On August 6, 1945, at 8:15 A.M., President Harry Truman gave the OK
> to
> the pilot of a single B-29 bomber to drop its solidarity atom bomb on
> Hiroshima, Japan.

Nonsense.  Truman did not approve each A-bombing individually.



> The bomb instantly killed 80,000 people. Those near
> ground zero were vaporized and the bombing led to some 140,000 deaths
> in later years from radiation infections.

140,000 is an estimate for total dead at Hiroshima.

No more than a few thousand would have died from radiation injuries in
later years.



> Truman did have alternatives but wanted to upstage the Russians and
> avoid the expected early August Red Army attack against Japan.

Wrong.  Truman was pursuing all the alternatives, in the desperate
hope that one of them might make Japan surrender without us invading.

One of the alternatives was encouraging Russia to go to war against
Japan.



> SEE:
> THE DECISION TO USE THE ATOMIC BOMB:
> PART III
> by
> Gar Alperovitz

Not if I can help it.  Alperovitz deliberately distorts the facts.
His books are full of disinformation.



> In Parts I and II of this response I have reviewed the argument of
> THE
> DECISION TO USE THE ATOMIC BOMB and some of the evidence upon which
> it
> is based which has been ignored or mis- represented in the recent
> debate. The central thrust of this is that President Truman was
> advised
> that he had alternatives to using the new weapon,

No one was offering alternatives "to the bomb".  All the alternatives
were "to the invasion".  The bomb was one of those alternatives to the
invasion.



> that a "two-step"
> combination of (1) the expected early August Red Army attack together
> with (2) assurances for the Japanese Emperor seemed likely to end the
> war.

No one knew what was likely to end the war.  Some people thought
giving assurances regarding the Emperor would encourage surrender.
Others thought it would encourage intransigence.

Some wanted to guarantee that we would let "Hirohito's line" remain as
constitutional monarch, but they wanted to leave open the option of
deposing Hirohito himself.



> Furthermore, there were still three months available to test
> whether this was so before a Kyushu invasion could begin in November.

The final decision was that we should not give our position on the
Emperor before Japan offered to surrender.



> The evidence now available also indicates that once the atomic test
> proved successful, there was a strong desire to discard the Russian
> option--and indeed, now, to stall or possibly even prevent a Red Army
> attack.

Odd that Truman kept encouraging it then.....



> General Marshall believed . . . these weapons might first be used
> against straight military objectives such as a large naval
> installation
> and then if no complete result was derived from the effect of that,
> he
> thought we ought to designate a number of large manufacturing areas
> from which the people would be warned to leave--telling the Japanese
> that we intend to destroy such centers. . . . Every effort should be
> made to keep our record of warning clear.

Marshal's advice was followed to the letter.  Hiroshima was a major
military center.  Nagasaki was a large manufacturing center.  And we
dropped leaflets warning people to flee because we were going to bomb.



> We also noted that by June 18, 1945 the President's Chief of Staff,
> Admiral Leahy--the man who presided over meetings of both the Joint
> Chiefs of Staff and the Combined U.S.-U.K.Chiefs-- recorded his own
> judgment in his diary (seven weeks prior to the bombing of
> Hiroshima):
>
> It is my opinion at the present time that a surrender of Japan can be
> arranged with terms that can be accepted by Japan and that will make
> fully satisfactory provisions for America's defense against future
> trans-Pacific aggression. [THE DECISION, p. 324.]

He only said such things years in hindsight.  Unless you can show that
Truman had a time machine, it isn't too relevant to Truman's thinking
during the war.



> The U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey concluded that "in all probability
> prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the
> atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the
> war and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated." [THE
> DECISION, p. 645.]

Also hindsight.  Unless you can show that Truman had a time machine,
it isn't too relevant to Truman's thinking during the war.



> We do know, however, that the question of American casualties was not
> an overriding consideration in the choices made in connection with
> these decisions--

Actually, historians have made it very clear that the motive for the
bombs was indeed to spare American lives.



> and, too, that several thousand men in arms lost
> their
> lives during the months U.S. decision-makers held back a
> clarification
> of terms while they waited for the atomic bomb.

The clarification of our position on the Emperor was only held back
for a couple weeks.

And given what we now know of Japan's position during this period,
they wouldn't have been likely to surrender any earlier had we made
that clarification earlier.
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