Collateral Murder (merged)

[Fader_Berg]

Originally Posted by Oberon

You do realise that most of the purple hearts issued today were quite likely from the five hundred thousand that were made in preparation for Operation Downfall? It's hard to tell whether or not the casualties of Operation Downfall would have exceeded that of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but considering that at least seven nuclear weapons would have been used or available to be used during Operation Downfall, it could be argued that the civilian deaths alone would be three times higher. The devastation would not have been limited to two cities either it would have been distributed equally across the whole continent.
Very much a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea, but an invasion of Japan would have been monstrous for both sides.

Nice hypothesis... We'll never know, do we. We could have spare at least 350.000 civilian lives too. And I don't care if you're republican or democrat, by the way. Not the least...

Originally Posted by Rapto1

200,000? I think the highest estimates don't go over 150,000.
Regardless, the bombing saved many more lives than they caused.

I have proved you wrong then, haven't I. We can dispute the numbers, but it is one hell of a impressive detah toll within hours. You've just got to admit that.
I disagree over the necessarity of it all. Japan was already defeated. There wasn't much more for them to do. They didn't pose any direct threat to the US or any surrouning countries since almost the whole country was in ruins. It might had been hard to invade Japan at the time. But they had no fair option other than to surrender in the long run. I think lives could have been spared if they choosed to wait them out.
Now, there is no news that USA makes their vengence and benefit priority number one. We've seen it time after time in history. No human life without a US citizenchip (or their allies) are worth ****. That's pretty much what this video shows.

Have a nice day.