Was it a war crime when US nuked Hiroshima & Nagasaki?

Its mind-boggling that anyone would try to equate the D-Day landings with Pearl Harbor.

Au,

I agree that one of the downsides of eliminating the draft is that young people are deprived of the experience and education that comes from serving. We've raised several generations who seem to have little appreciation for the soldier's contribution. Never having served in the military many of our citizens can't seem to get beyond the dramatic depictions in film and television. Political Correctness has given rise to the idea that all war is wrong, stupid and fought for silly reasons. To some it is a shame to honor those who fell in defense of freedom. The modern hero isn't the patriot and soldier, but the nay-sayer and pacifist protester. All those who volunteered or were drafted and served from 1776 to 2004 are regarded by some as suckers. Oh what we have come to.

At one time only those who served in the military were even considered full citizens. Historically, Americans have always been suspicious of a standing, professional army. After every war we cut the military down to the minimum. With the advent of high-tech modern war that can go from start to finish in a matter of hours, the draft army was totally inadequate. The skills required takes years to develop, and as lethal as modern war can be there just isn't enough time to prepare civilians for battle anymore. The cost of the draft isn't just in dollars, more importantly it is in lost resources and efficiency in the regular arms.

Still, one can remember how the sergeants of yesteryear might have reacted to folks like Lodp. A saw a DI once throw a springfield, butt first to a smart-ass recruit who stood paralyzed as the rifle smacked him in the face. After that the recruit was much less bother to the company, or the DI. Now, we don't do such things and it really does produce better and more effective soldiers.

Ack! MA, I am old, too - but while you might not like what lodp is saying, I think there is no call for that type of insult about presumed age! You degrade your excellent debate skills thus.

I know, who died and made me goddess.....but you just shocked me with that one.

And it's not easy to shock you, dlowan, I know. However, even my usually easy-going personality has its limits and there come times when it will not tolerate fools gladly. It is not a matter of my 'not liking' what lodp is saying. It is true bewilderment on my part as to why someone who, obviously, knows and/or understands so little about the subject, would even wish to participate in a discussion like this.

I'm sorry if I offended you, dlowan. I can't repeat that same phrase to lodp. No sorrow there at all.

There's no need to get personal about this. I doubt you can assess my knowledge of WWII on the basis of the few remarks that I've made. Appearantly, the profound background that is claimed by some contributors is keeping them from seeing the obvious. And that is, to answer your question, why I am here. I can't believe how those incredible atrocities can be accepted by liberal intellectuals as a justified means, merely because the Americans did it, not somebody else.

I see that my remarks are not within your establishment paradigm (explains why nobody took the effort of responding to a particular point).

As for the D-Day - Pearl Harbor comparison, the point was that the bombing of Pearl Harbor was unjustified no matter if it was a sneak attack or not. And of course D-Day was a sneak attack, it just happened to take place some time after war was declared, nothing special about that, happens all the time, says nothing about the legitimacy of the attack. So, any more questions?

"Donuone Latine loquebar? Me ineptum!"

Speaking off-topic and personal, there's a mistake in you sig. age doesn't mean good latin skills, eh? It's supposed to be DENOUNE (DENUO+clitic NE), not donuone. gotcha

The problem with the nonsense which Lodp is peddling here is that it is so much after the fact, and so much divorced from the total reality of the times, that the smug tone Lodp takes is offensive to those with more proximate knowledge and experience. Millions of Americans served in that war, the the statistics which Lodp offers up (without attribution) are far less impressive when compared to the more than 9 million who actually put on a uniform and went into combat zones.

Lodp glibbly asserts that someone could have resisted or dodged the draft, but with precious little knowledge of what life was like in the United States in 1945, and the extent to which such a choice would have been a life-altering disaster. To have expected an 18 or 19 year old to have followed such a course in the face of a nearly universal patriotic attitude of service to nation is more than a little naive. Of course, the comparison of the Normandy invasion to the attack of Pearl Harbor is ludicrous. As for it being a surprise, The Rommel Papers show that Rommel was aware months in advance of the great likelihood of a landing there, from reviewing the bombing patterns from Eisenhower's "Transportation Plan." That the Germans dealt ineffectively with the invasion was a product of a flawed doctrine of meeting the invasion forces in the interior, and not overwhelming surprise.

It is possible to get a real sense, an authentic sense of a time and place. It requires, however, more than running down a few links on the internet. It requires a lot of reading, deep and wide, over many years. I suspect that Lodp has not done this in regard to the second world war--if Lodp contends that s/he has done so, then i despair of that person's comprehensive abilities.

My numbers concerning draft resistance (350.000 cases total, 43.000 actual refusers and 1 in every 6 men in federal prison being a conscientious objector) are taken from Howard Zinn, 1980. A People's History of the United States. London: Longman. p. 409.

I consider being torn to shreds in a crater on Okinawa more of a a life-altering disaster than maybe spending some time to prison. Especially if it's for the sake of American economic supremacy in the south pacific .

You'll have to excuse my English BTW, I'm not a native speaker.

If you are reading Howard Zinn, then you have nothing to contribute which i, personally, will consider to be verifiable. Mr. Zinn is most famous (perhaps i should say notorious) for bending "historical facts" to suit his political agenda. Mr. Zinn's productions bear exactly that relationship to history that Christian Science does to science.

Good luck, though, in your future efforts at interpreting history, although i do suggest a broader reading, and carefully vetting your sources before making public statements.

Well, tackle my numbers instead of discrediting the sources. I guess your sources are far from having a political agenda, and present a fair and balanced view on why everything the US did in the past was inevitable.

I would also add that when interpreting history, perspective is extremely useful. Assuming for the sake of discussion (and only for the sake of discussion, as i am contemptuous of Mr. Zinn) that the figures you cite are correct, one need condider probabilities. Receiving a draft notice in 1945 and accepting induction would entail a very high probability of never hearing a shot fired in anger. Receiving a draft notice in 1945 and refusing to serve would entail a very high probability of going to prison, and suffering the aforementioned life altering disaster. The assumption that someone drafted in 1945 would be "torn to shreds in a crater on Okinawa" takes little to no consideration of probability into account.

I've never stated nor even implied that everything the United States has done in the past was inevitable--this is typcial of your earlier "you people" remark, in that you seem to think you've figured us out, and that we are lacking. If that truly were the case, then i would wonder why you bother with us. You have made an extraordinary claim, and those making such claims have the burden of proof--those refusing to accept the claim have no burden to disprove the claim.

Zinn is widely known to be an unreliable source. You can sneer at me for telling you as much, but it won't alter the circumstance.

You're right, I didn't take that into account.

What's your comment on the the total oil and scrap metal embargo of the US against Japan that preceded the Pearl Harbor bombing? Bruce Russet (No Clear and Present Danger. New York: Harper&Row 1972) says that "Japan's strike against the American naval base climaxed a long series of mutually antagonistic acts. In initiating economic sanctions against Japan the US undertook actions that were widely recognized in Washington as carrying grave risks of war"

I said "people like you" and I wasn't referring to anybody specific engaged in the current debate, but to apologists of US atrocities in general. That drew the wrath of the people who've been around here posting longer than me, thus claiming supremacy.

I see no problem with that statement, and i think that the administration acted properly in imposing the embargo. Japan suffered terrible earthquake damage in 1923--the military were prepared to meet the exegencies of the emergency, which the civilian government were not. They extracted their price, and the constitution was changed to give the Army and Navy ministers a selective veto power. The Prime Minister appointed the Army and Navy minister, but each had to be an active duty officer, and as the services controlled the retirement list, they could quickly and easily dispose of any officer appointed to such a post to whom they objected.

By 1935, the military completely controlled the Japanese government, and when the young officers of the Imperial Army in "Manchuko" (Japan's puppet state in Manchuria) decided to invade China, there were no repercussions from the civilian side of the government. This is why i consider the Roosevelt administration's embargo response appropriate.

The attack on Pearl Harbor was one of the most daring and successful operations of its type in military history. The Japanese had their failings as well, though--Nagumo would not launch succeeding attacks, and just wanted to scoop up his winnings and run. This is understandable, he was a battleship man, with no previous experience of naval aviation--he was appointed to command the First Air Fleet based on seniority. Quite frankly, the United States was not prepared to deal with a war situation, and our intelligence and communications services were laughably inadequate to the situation.

Information on the evolution of the Japanese government from 1923 to 1935 is readily available from a wide variety of reliable sources. For the most exhaustive and reliable source for the Pearl Harbor debacle, i recommend At Dawn We Slept, Gordon William Prange--this was reprinted in paperbound edition by Penguin Books, 1991.

I don't know that Ash has claimed any supremecy to you, and that would be quite out of character--it was in response to one of his posts that you made your "you people" remark. If you wish to consider us all to be "apologists for US atrocities" here, you're unlikely to get a cordial discussion. You are also unlikely to learn anything, nor to have the opportunity to teach us anything.

Do your agree then, that the war in the pacific was about economic supremacy and markets in China, rubber, tin and oil of South-East Asia?

No, i don't.

No, i don't. That such matters were a proximate cause for the Japanese attempt to erect the "Greater East Asia Co-prospertiy Sphere" ought not to be doubted. That these things were the only factors, and that these things were all that motivated the United States, however, is redolent of the kind of propaganda which Mr. Zinn is fond of retailing. If anyone tells you that an historical event of the magnitude of the Second World War arises from a simple cause, or a simple set of causes, they are playing fast and loose with historical truth.

As I just said, the phrase I used was "people like you" and that, obviously, wasn't refering to you guys, but to Asherman himself and people that share his views.

That does not for a moment alter my criticism. I am politically at the opposite pole from Ash. I respect both his knowledge of and honesty about history. A locution such as "people like you" given without a specific attribution is going to be resented by more than the person you had in mind writing it. As you know nothing of Ash except for the few selected posts here which you have read, you are in no position to judge him, let alone rest of "us guys." You were justifiably offened to have been criticized for youth--but that does not lessen the callow and insulting nature of your earlier posts. Asherman and the rest of us here are a justifiably offended by the characterizations which you have flung out, rather like the pattern of a shotgun blast.