ChefDude

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-10888571

http://gizmodo.com/5606053/this-it-h...nuclear-attack

It's said part of the reason to drop those bombs was to save more lives from a continued assault by the americans and russians on japan. Another possible reason was a show of force to the russians.

Defintely a sad moment in history, but my late grandfather told me some pretty horrific first hand reports of life as a japanese PoW.

what are your thoughts on what happened and why and whether it was justified?

The Zohan

and just as importantly - my birthday today

as for your question it is a difficult one to answer although your have pretty much in posing the question. It probably saved civilian and military casualties/lives and did send a strong message to the Soviets considering how weak Europe was post VE day.

Steve vRS

I think it was a tragedy for those involved and maybe the second bomb was over kill - not like the Americans

However, if it had not happened and the world hadn't seen the real world effects of a nuclear bomb, would the cold war have stayed cold?

Steve

David Lock

Agreed. And the second para is very true. It must also have played a role in the realisation that nuclear power stations had better be pretty safe or else. Chernobyl excepted. dl

Reffro

Just to add a little perspective, the fire bomb raids on Tokyo killed more people and caused more damage than either Hiroshima or Nagasaki. There are not many worse ways to die than being burnt alive and/or being suffocated as all the oxygen goes to feed the fires.

mykp

I used to be of the opinion that what happens in war is a neccassary evil to defeat your enemy, then I went to Hiroshima, and then I went to Nagasaki.

I would never ever wish the things I saw at their museums on anyone, no matter what malice or past indiscretion they had put on my people.

You also need to bare in mind that even today the people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki are still suffering the effects of these bombs and the radiation from them.

It may have saved american lives but at the cost of hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Japanese.

Steve vRS

Just to add, a nuclear powerstation cannot explode like a bomb. The two technologies are quite different.

In case Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is reading

Steve

Simon C

If a nuc power station goes, its just a dirty bomb, albeit a very very large 1.

David Lock

Fair enough but I guess radiation is common to both and that's frightening enough.

And 10 out of 10 for spelling AhmedsDinnerJacket correctly

dl

Steve vRS

Cut and paste is your friend!

andythejock01wrx

The only way I can remember his name is by calling him "I'm a dinner jacket"!

Leslie

I really hope that never actually happens again. We all have to make up our own minds whether it was justifiable at the time and also to drop a second bomb on Nagasaki.

It has left lasting effects of course, up to the present day.

I would have dropped one in retaliation if we had been attacked with nuclear weapons during the cold war. The whole idea was to leave the Soviets in no doubt what would happen to them if they tried it on. Our raision d'etre was to be ready to go if we had been attacked and because they knew that, to stop such a conflict ever happening.

We knew only too well that if it had, that would have been the effective end of the world as we knew it. There are some who say that the cold war period was one of the safest periods of our existence since smaller wars were discouraged by the situation.

One of the problems is that there always seems to be some country trying get get into the nuclear weapons club. The other one is that being in that club guarantees a seat at the Top Table and that is so important to the politicians.

Don't ask me how the future will pan out with regard to nukes!

Les

stormyuklondon1

I was at the Hiroshima peace museum last Thurdsay, and completely agree with the above. very moving experience for both my wife and I..

Mifo

iTrader: (10)

At the time, were there any other options to bring an end to the war?
The japanese had plenty of oportunities to surrender before these bombs were dropped .
They were intent on fighting to the death and the war would have gone on a lot longer with even more people dying.

Never want to see innocent civilians getting killed but this was the fastest way to get the war over with.

Kieran_Burns

iTrader: (1)

It saved many more Japanese lives as well don't forget...

Many, many Japanese commited suicide on Okinawa rather than be captured by the Allies http://www.japanfocus.org/-Aniya-Masaaki/2629, and many were forced to.

The japanese mainland was full of suicide citizen squads, planes terror traps - all designed to inflict a huge blooshed on anyone who invaded and would result in the mass deaths of anyone who fought

Had the Allies landed there would've been millions killed - and while the bombs were horrific, they were the lesser of two evils - the japanese people were killed by the Military who refused to end a fight way after they should've.

Ray_li

going by the amount of Chinese people killed by the Japanese during WW2 a few older genertion Chinese are glad it was dropped and the war ended.

10,000,000 to 20,000,000 killed http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties

andythejock01wrx

Good point by Ray Li (the Nanking massacre in 1937 being one obvious example - the Japanese Imperial Army raped, beheaded and shot some 300,000 Chinese civilans yet denies it till this very day).

There are obvious arguments against the dropping of the two A bombs in August 1945 - apart from the awful level of civilian death and long term suffering, given that the USAF was regularly carpet bombing Japanese cities before hand, plus the fact that the Russians were poised to launch their devastating invasion of Japanese occupied Manchuria, you might imagine that the Japanese were about to surrender anyway.

However, if you've seen "The World at War", you may havre spotted the Japanese foreign minister of 1945 saying that in his view Japan was not about to contemplate surrender and that the intention had been to fight to the bitter end. In particular there were many, from members of the dominant military government to young army officers that intended to die rather than surrender.

Added to that, based on the heavy toll the US Marines had suffered in their island hopping campaign (albeit not nearly as heavy as the Japanese defenders who often fought to the last man), the Americans had extrapolated that the cost to the US armed forces of an invasion of the home islands of Japan might be around the 600,000 mark if not considerably more.

Overall, although we can never be sure, it seems that the dropping of the bomb may indeed have saved lives. Certainly we can never know exactly when the Japanese would have surrendered otherwise.

Andy

Leslie

Thats true enough.

Les

Simon C

It was going to happen and had to, whether it was 1945 or 1985. Once that level of power had been obtained it was going to be used. Sadly human nature being what it is, made it inevitable that an A bomb was going to be dropped at some point.

The 1 good thing that did come out of it, its made sure that another 1 hasn't been used since.

Leslie

I keep on having the horrible thought that the Nagasaki one which was different to the Hiroshema one was dropped just to see if it worked!

Les

David Lock

Were any other nations developing a nuclear bomb or was it just USA at the time? dl

Midlife......

iTrader: (2)

The Germans were developing nuclear power (using heavy water instead of graphite as a moderator)............not much of a leap to develop a bomb.

remember the film "Heroes of Telemark" LOL

Shaun

r32

I think thats a damn good answer.

TonyBurns

iTrader: (3)

The japanese were drawing the war out in the pacific, the kamazazi pilots were inflicting serious damage to american war ships which the americans needed to support any invasion of the japanese mainland, which would have cost millions of allied and japanese lives.

So, what is the lesser of 2 evils? hit 2 industrial cities or invade and lose millions?

What you also have to remember is that the americans had no idea what the after effects of the A bombs were as they were never tested on human subjects, and Oppenheimer would probably have never gone though with the Manhattan project if he knew before hand the subsequent outcome of these 2 bombs.

There are pictures of american officers within a few months of the bombs being dropped examining the devastation they did, even at that time little was known about the after effects of a device like this, ChefDude's 2nd link really shows this, the black rain caused by the blast would have been contaminated, and those people were very lucky to survive 300 feet from the centre of the blast, considering these were air burst (maximum damage, less fall out) i was amazed that anyone within a mile survived.

The only good thing that came out of this was that no one has since used a nuclear device on a population since, but as we have seen, governments still lacked vast knowledge on these and similar devices all the way through to the late 50's when they stopped putting people close by exploding bombs

Theer should also be a little mention about Nagasaki, the devastation here was far less due to the bomb actually not going off where it was suppose to, if it had then the casualties would have been considerably higher

Tony