Re: Sometimes ya just gotta nuke em
At 04:36 AM 2/4/96 -0500, James M. Cobb wrote:
Neither dropping nuclear weapons on Japanese cities nor an invasion of Japan was necessary to secure surrender of the Japanese government.
After the first nuclear bomb was dropped, the Japanese government held a cabinet meeting in which they summoned Nishina, head of the atomic program, and asked him if he could duplicate atomic weapons within a few months. After two nuclear weapons had been dropped on Japan, the cabinet concluded that Japan faced utter destruction with nuclear weapons, and some advocated surrender. But according to emperor Hirohito "At the time of the surrender, there was no prospect of agreement" Even with two nuclear weapons, surrender was far from assured. It was touch and go: Had the coup succeeded, Japan would not have surrendered, and a considerably more nuclear bombing would have been necessary. The bullet holes in the imperial palace testify that even after two nuclear bombs, there was a substantial faction of the government determined not to surrender. It was certainly true that Japan was defeated, and reasonable people may disagree on justice of using nuclear weapons under these circumstances, but to claim, as Alperovitz claims, that Japan was on the verge of surrender, is not a mere difference of opinion on the interpretation of the facts, but a simple, crude, barefaced, blatant lie. --------------------------------------------------------------------- | We have the right to defend ourselves | http://www.jim.com/jamesd/ and our property, because of the kind | of animals that we are. True law | James A. Donald derives from this right, not from the | arbitrary power of the state. | jamesd@echeque.com
On Sun, 4 Feb 1996 jamesd@echeque.com wrote:
After the first nuclear bomb was dropped, the Japanese government held a cabinet meeting in which they summoned Nishina, head of the atomic program, and asked him if he could duplicate atomic weapons within a few months.
Japan's nuclear program effectively ended on April 12th when the headquarters were destroyed (by conventional bombs). There program never really got very far, lacking both funding and Hungarians :)
It was certainly true that Japan was defeated, and reasonable people may disagree on justice of using nuclear weapons under these circumstances, but to claim, as Alperovitz claims, that Japan was on the verge of surrender, is not a mere difference of opinion on the interpretation of the facts, but a simple, crude, barefaced, blatant lie.
That's a pretty strong statement; the Japanese government was split into two camps, with the hawks slightly in the acendancy. Facts were changing on the ground, making it clear that things were about to get a lot worse (Stalin was about to enter the war against Japan, supplied were running short and gettirng worse (thanks to intercepts); Curtis LeMay had reduced just about every city apart from Hiroshima and had command of the air. All these factors could very well have changed the balance of power within the government without the presence of nuclear weapons; no sure thing, but not impossible.
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