Earlier quoted context omitted.
>But these things are the province of speculation, not knowledge. Here's the opinion of the leader of the US military at the time. "It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons."…
Shouldn't we ask some people on the other side of the ocean?
The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
131–140 of 223 posts
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
This comment is contentless. It doesn't address a single specific thing the article says. Instead it offers woolly generalities ("Japan was threatened on many fronts and made the best choice it could. That much is clear") and platitudes ("all of the actions, taken together, were the reason for the war to end. Yes, Stalin played a big role. But it's not an either-or situation"). It sounds like it's saying something; i…
>"Think for a minute about what this essay is asking "What if action X did not end the war in the Pacific?" I think it was addressing the overall idea of speculation in historical events.
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you're seeking serious responses to the claim that the Soviet invasion was paramount and the atomic bombings irrelevant, /r/AskHistorians has had several threads on the subject: http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/wwii#wiki_japan_a... (I think mpyne's reply is "serious", though. It's always preferable to read first, but the argument presented in the article is not new. I did read the article, and I'm not su…
Thanks. But the first thread I ran across there could hardly be more supportive of the OP's argument: http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/u6qqo/there_h... If you can point me to counterarguments more specifically, I'll look at them.
As the top comment by /u/restricteddata points out, the argument about the Soviet role was made by Hasegawa (who the FP article did not cite). There's no refuting that the Soviet side of the story is important and relatively unrecognized (by the public). But it's hard to say exactly how events would have played out without the bomb. And the FP article's subheading, that US policy has been based on this "myth", is just a puzzling conclusion.
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#134This is why I've started to dislike revisionist history. The premise that the threat of Stalin alone forced Japanese surrender is at least as ludicrous as saying that the nuclear bombs alone forced Japan to surrender. I closed the page immediately because of the full-page popup ad, but I've encountered the premise elsewhere so it warrants examination. The first thing to realize is that for Japan, whatever else happen…
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#135The bomb was tactically economical, and nothing else. It did the work of 500 B-29s. Guess what? We had those 500 B-29s, and the bomb did nothing more than save petrol.
Quit hand-wringing.
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
This comment is contentless. It doesn't address a single specific thing the article says. Instead it offers woolly generalities ("Japan was threatened on many fronts and made the best choice it could. That much is clear") and platitudes ("all of the actions, taken together, were the reason for the war to end. Yes, Stalin played a big role. But it's not an either-or situation"). It sounds like it's saying something; i…
>"Think for a minute about what this essay is asking "What if action X did not end the war in the Pacific?" I think it was addressing the overall idea of speculation in historical events.
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#137I love UFO stories, and I love history, and I love pseudo-science. Hell, I even like counter-factuals. What if Lee had won at Gettysburg? What if Patton had actually commanded the Normandy invasion? And so forth. But these things are the province of speculation, not knowledge. Think for a minute about what this essay is asking "What if action X did not end the war in the Pacific?" Well dang, Action X could be just ab…
Yeah the US played ball by nuking japan. But saying it saved japanese people and their culture because it quickly ended the war, it's a little fast. I mean we're talking about nukes, not some poker games, those are war decision, you're still talking like the winner won because it took the best decision. Nuking is not a good decision, but it was a necessary one at the time. You're saying it like japan also thought "yeah, you nuked us, that really saved us, thanks !". When I read "bombs saved japanese", it sounds a little weird.
At least the article offer the reader some opportunity to think about the japanese perspective.
> Smells of a political agenda and manipulation.
UFO and conspiracy theories at it again ! The internet is never holding the truth, it's mandatory to not believe everything, it applies especially for this article. Consider the alternative like an opportunity to explore perspectives, not just like another one of those "deviant zealot".
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#138Vonnegut also talks about this on Slaughterhouse-V:
"The advocates of nuclear disarmament seem to believe that, if they could achieve their aim, war would become tolerable and decent. They would do well to read this book and ponder the fate of Dresden, where 135,000 people died as the result of an air attack with conventional weapons. On the night of March 9th, 1945, an air attack on Tokyo by American heavy bombers, using incendiary and high explosive bombs, caused the death of 83,793 people. The atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima killed 71,379 people. So it goes." (Chapter 9)
The nuclear attacks served their purpose, sure, but they were definitely not decisive for the outcome of the war.
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#139This is why I've started to dislike revisionist history. The premise that the threat of Stalin alone forced Japanese surrender is at least as ludicrous as saying that the nuclear bombs alone forced Japan to surrender. I closed the page immediately because of the full-page popup ad, but I've encountered the premise elsewhere so it warrants examination. The first thing to realize is that for Japan, whatever else happen…
"This is why I've started to dislike revisionist history." History is a science. This is as if you said: I don't like Max Planc or Niels Bohr Dirac, since they were questioning classical mechanics in favor of some hard to understand mambo-jambo called quantum mechanics. A true historian is a die hard revisionist, someone who is chasing "conspiracy theories" to reveal the truth using scientific reasoning based on evid…
History is a science only in the sense that "political science" is.
Re: The Bomb Didn't Beat Japan
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
>But these things are the province of speculation, not knowledge. Here's the opinion of the leader of the US military at the time. "It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons."…
When I read these revisionist pieces, I often see the same phrase you quoted: "ready to surrender." If someone is "ready to surrender," what does that mean? Well I'll tell you what it certainly doesn't mean: It doesn't mean that they've _actually_ surrendered. What a lot of revisionist writings gloss over is that yes, certain parts of the Japanese leadership were "ready to surrender." But it is well documented that s…
The only thing that matters is that Japan surrendered. That they were "thinking" about it or "close to it" is pretty much irrelevant.