I have PM'd Neal.

:yep: It always amazes me that people who were not alive 50 years after the fact get so emotionally charged they cannot discuss this without coming unglued.

It's history, people.

Quoted, reprinted in big, bold, flaming gold letters, framed and nailed on the wall.

Some of the responses here reminded me why more often than not any kind of discussion about a historical topic is a pointless exercise.

Since we Europeans are 2nd class members (at least some here seem to think so), just make sure to show reverence and compassion for the US and its people on December 7th, September the 11th, July the 4th, June the 6th, July the 21st and whatever important date there may be. :03:

In regards to some of the posts:
IMHO, discussions like this are not there to change minds. Often they are being posted to gain access to new or more views and opinions from a lot of sources and very often knowledgeable people. Where else would one ask a question like that, but in an environment (Forum) where one is comfortable and know that there are a lot of people with some views and insight into the topic in question.

(Even Tribesman stayed on topic.. Props for that. At least I think he did.. :03:)

The same question was asked before, but really.. is that so bad that it came up again?
But guess what, next year it is bound to be posted again. One of the obvious reasons are new members who weren't here when it came down this time around. One solution would be that the mods could post a list with "Forbidden Topics" if this is so offensive and to avoid further occurrences.

:shifty:

I think the problem is the article that was chosen and the context in it.

Indeed. All pretty good points to note for us Europeans.

The article 'chosen' was an article that i actually happened to stumble across whilst browsing said subject matter, due to driving in the car and listening to the national broadcast service.
I didn't hand-pick it to show members what 'we' as in the people that attempt to discuss ALL sides of history that we hate the US, and have a desire to stir up trouble on the forum.
Like i said before, that is not the goal of this thread.
And yes, the article doesn't agree fully with the pro US members here, so what? Does everything that is written about the US have to be agreed upon by US citizens?
Or any other country for that matter.
Heck, look at Germany. How many articles have been written about that country, it's involvement in WW2 and other global events. Do i agree with every single thing written about that country? Hell no.
Do i get my back up about things that have been written about that country? Hell yes.
But would that stop me from attempting to have a mature and respectful discussion, in the circumstances? Without resorting to personal attacks or spamming crap in the thread? Nope.
The article posted here, and i agree, poses some serious questions and it may be easy for the defenses to come up and people getting rather irate about the way it was written, and the content of the article.
It's all good and well people having opinions and not sharing the same beliefs as others. But when the attempt to discuss matters in a mature and open-minded way fall, then that becomes an issue.
On a side note, there have been, i admit attempts made to discuss this in a mature and sensible manner.

@ Feuer Frei: I don't get the attacks on you either. Other things aside, I never thought you were supporting the article or its author, and it looks to me like your questions were honest.

Here we go again, descendants of evil axis powers trying to spin the USA as their diobolical equivalent. LMFAO Sorry we just wanted to bring a war to an end, didn't get caught up in exterminating entire races or peoples. Frankly, we should have done the same thing about ten years ago. :D

The biggest problem with the annual discussion of the Hiroshima bombing is that it is essentially sterile. There is no new scholarship on the attacks, no newly revealed documentation, no new balanced assessment of the options and no new perspectives. Rather just a rehash of the same tired mythologies, out of context quotes, hand wringing, exaggeration and 20/20 hindsight.

The article in the OP is chock full of anti-American cant and works overtime to place the attacks in the context of postwar alleged US military excesses and even throws out accusations of war crimes and mass murder. That, and placing an historical event into a contemporary ethical frame of reference. Hardly an objective foundation for rational and balanced discussion.

The atomic attacks are most certainly of historical importance but on the Internet the subject is flogged to death annually about this time. The same arguments on both sides showcasing the same evidence with vast amounts of acrimony and more than a little BS thrown in to make the desired case.

I would gladly sit down one on one to rationally and reasonably debate the subject; it is worthy of discussion but not on an Internet forum where comprehension is typically lacking, mindsets are fixed, hyperbole rules and Wikipedia is often held to represent the suppository of all knowledge.

Why should the Americans feel guilty?

Sure it was the US Government/Military that ultimately made the call to use it, and the planes had a US crews and stars on the wings but the bombs inside had uranium from Canada and South America as well as the US. Plutonium for the Nagasaki bomb came in part from Canada as well. Besides the US based research teams, research also came from Chalk River Laboratories in Ontario, and Tube Alloys in the UK. In the labs in all these countries actually making the bombs there were people of practically every nationality in Europe.

Think whatever you want about the ethical argument, but making it out as a case of "mass murdering Americans" is just ridiculous. It is about time this thread died for the year, so maybe we can make the argument more civil in 2012, huh? :up:

Thanks Steve, indeed it is true, i don't support the article. My aim was to post it and go from there. I think with this sort of topic though it will invariably stir up a Hornet's nest. Will keep that in mind in future.


Agree there.

I placed my lot in post 26 and keep to it. I am just glad I did not get bound up in such utterance. No disrespect to you Pete I just feel the question should not be put to us. We must remember that some are quite a patriotic lot and will defend any post to the last if it may mark or serve to place a stain on the use of such power, but you are due your right to say it. For me though the true right goes to the generation of that era, on both sides. :yep:

Well put, LJ. I've stayed out of the debate myself, though I might be closer to the issue than many of the more active posters, i.e., both my parents were on opposite sides in WW2, simply by accident of birth. No one consulted my mother about Pearl Harbor, no one asked my father's opinion about Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

They weren't born to be enemies, they were along for the ride, like most people in every war. My parents were lucky, in a manner of speaking: my mother survived the fire-bombing of Tokyo, and my father survived being a POW of the Japanese (something he never spoke about).

In more recent years I've done considerable research on the Spanish Civil War, which for Spaniards is as touchy a subject as the American version is for some of us. In general, those who argue loudly for one side or another weren't there. Those who were there would rather not talk about it.

Among the conclusions I've reached thus far:

1) Every war is a descent into the abyss for all parties. St. Augustine made a good case for the Just War, but in actual practice even "good guys" take part in ghastly, inhuman deeds, then hope that their honorable motives and moral calculus (killing x no. of enemy resulted in x no. of lives saved, etc.) will help them sleep at night. It doesn't always work.

2) All wars could have been prevented or ended sooner, if only people had been wiser. But they weren't. Or more to the point, their leaders weren't. And how often do decent people rise up and overthrow their psychopathic leaders in wartime? If you manage to pull it off, then you can judge those who didn't.

3) The term "we", when used to refer to one side in a war, is over-identification with a government that really doesn't care about you at all, except insofar as you are useful to it. Commoners do not take part in the key decisions, though we might be forced to carry out those decisions; we (esp. the descendants of civilians) are not collectively culpable. But rarely are the ones most responsible ever called to account unless they're on the losing side.

As for the atomic bombings of Japan, I cannot view them as moral actions. Suppose you were to view all people as if they were members of your own family? Suppose you were to view every human life as uniquely precious and sacred? Then taking part in any war, by any means, for any reason, would be deeply traumatic. You might survive it, but you would be damaged, possibly for the rest of your life.

Were there other paths to victory without a-bombs? Of course, and those were also beyond the scope of morality:

1) Total blockade and continued conventional bombardment of Japan from air & sea, possibly for months; minimal Allied losses, but mass starvation, disease, and violent death for Japanese civilians.

2) Invasion of the home islands, as described in earlier posts. Also horrific results, but with higher Allied losses, to no obvious benefit.

In any event, the people who knew of the A-bomb at the time didn't take a poll -- they didn't ask the American people, not that their opinions would have mattered anyway. They certainly didn't ask us.