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

lodp
Sorry it was sort of a low blow. That said the thread was and is about that particular bombing. Was it right, wrong or necessary or a criminal act? Not about what lead up to the war. I would just add that Japanese aggression, slaughter and atrocities in China had much to do with the US's actions against Japan. No act ever stands alone.
I am sure you know where I stand on the action.

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If you constrain the discussion that way, there can't be any fruitful discussion.

That's just like saying a trial of, say, a manslaughter case should only look at the very moment when the killing occurred. That won't lead anywhere.

Moreover, in a thread of this size, I don't think anyone will object to widening the scope a little (particularly as it doesn't seem to prevent any discussion closer to "the topic").

I would like to see your reaction to my points.

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It's good that we are able to acknowledge the atrocities committed in our past, but what disturbs me more than anything is our inability to learn from history.

Japan's aggression in China and elsewhere before and during WWII is common knowledge, but neither Europe nor the US did anything until Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. We were still realling from the depression, and our government was in no position to act alone. The US was however responsible for restricting trade to Japan. Whether that constituted the right of Japan to expand for the purpose of obtaining raw materials is the 64 thousand dollar question. How would the US have acted if we were restricted from trade during that period in our history? As for the atomic bombing of Japan, it was the right decision for President Truman. We must allow for the times - the length of the war, and the cost to our country in fighting both fronts in Europe and Asia. I'm not so sure that the bombing started back before Pearl Harbor. We do know now that both Germany and Japan were working towards making the atomic bomb. We won that race.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

It's good that we are able to acknowledge the atrocities committed in our past [...] As for the atomic bombing of Japan, it was the right decision for President Truman

That doesn't sound anything like acknowledging atrocities of your past, does it?

Again, I think it's wrong to set all the parameters in advance, and then discuss the event only as a tactical issue.

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Everything in warfare is tactical. You leave out the tactical, and we can dismiss all the politicians and generals, because they are of no use.

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The parameters of the discussion were setup by it's author. If you want to discuss the reason behind Japans bombing of Pearl and whether it was justified or not that is IMO a completely different subject. You may want to start one.

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Japan was trying to surrender, or at least finish the war when the atom bombs were used. Communications had been channelled through Switzerland. The sticking point was the status of the Emperor, the allies holding out for unconditional surrender. After Nagasaki, the Japanese signed a surrender document that allowed for Hirohito to remain on the throne as a constitutional monarch. Why not before?

Was it a crime? All warfare is criminal in my view. Was the atom bombing specifically a war crime? I don't know, thats for lawyers to earn their crust debating. It may not have been a crime, but it was most certainly an experiment. And a demonstration to the USSR of American power.

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Steve (as 41oo) wrote

Quote:

All warfare is criminal in my view.

History teaches us it is only the actions of the loser that are considered criminal. To the victor belong the spoils. :wink:

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All warfare is criminal, but nations must defend themselves from aggression. The nature of man does not allow us to break down our defenses.

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au1929 wrote:

In reading the link you provided I see nothing that defines the rules of war. Where are the specific prohibitions that were in effect prior to WW2

Customary law is something like an international version of common law. There isn't really a list of statutes.

Sometimes (like the Nuremburg trials) the court will codify customary law for purposes of their trials, but usually it is based on court precedents, with courts historically considering certain acts a crime and punishing them accordingly.

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Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

Japan was trying to surrender, or at least finish the war when the atom bombs were used.

Yes, but they were not trying to end the war on terms that were acceptable.

Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

Communications had been channelled through Switzerland.

The Japanese government had just begun communications with the Soviets to get them to mediate unacceptable negotiations with us.

They did not try to open communications with the US until after Nagasaki.

Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

The sticking point was the status of the Emperor, the allies holding out for unconditional surrender.

ONE sticking point was the Japanese demand that the Emperor be guaranteed complete sovereignty as ruler of Japan.

Other sticking points were their demands that there be no occupation of the Japanese islands, that Japan be in charge of trying their own war criminals, and that Japan be in charge of demobilizing their own military.

Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

After Nagasaki, the Japanese signed a surrender document that allowed for Hirohito to remain on the throne as a constitutional monarch. Why not before?

They signed a document that did not give them the guarantee that they demanded.

The document they signed gave MacArthur the ability to remove the Emperor at his pleasure.

You'll have to ask the Japanese why they would not sign Potsdam before the bombs. They were certainly given the opportunity to do so.

Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

Was it a crime?

Yes, but it was for a good cause.

Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

it was most certainly an experiment. And a demonstration to the USSR of American power.

The military always takes advantage of military use of new weapons to see how they perform.

But the purpose of the bombs was not to perform an experiment, or to send any message to the Soviets.

The purpose of the bombs was to make the Japanese stop their quest for unacceptable terms, and accept our surrender terms.

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I fundamentally disagree.

By mid 1945, Japan was finished. The problem for the US was two fold:

1. Keeping Japan in the war long enough to enable the atomic bombing experiments to take place "legitimately".
2. Finding and preserving city targets undamanged from conventional bombing to enable a true measure of the atom bomb's destructive power to take place.

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Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

By mid 1945, Japan was finished.

Yes, but that did not mean they were ready to accept our surrender terms.

While we were going to win the war, how we were going to win was a different question.

Had it required invasion and subjugation of the entire Japanese homeland to secure capitulation, casualty estimates for US soldiers ranged from a quarter million dead and three quarters of a million wounded, to half a million dead and millions wounded.

Even if they would have capitulated upon our gaining a foothold on the islands, that still would have required the equivalent of a D-day invasion (or two) on our part.

We were desperate to get them to accept our surrender terms before invasion was necessary.

Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

The problem for the US was two fold:

1. Keeping Japan in the war long enough to enable the atomic bombing experiments to take place "legitimately".

Had that been a US objective, it wouldn't have been a problem, as Japan was more than willing to not accept our surrender terms.

Unfortunately, our goal was the opposite, getting Japan to accept our terms as quickly as possible. And they were much less obliging at doing that.

Steve (as 41oo) wrote:

2. Finding and preserving city targets undamanged from conventional bombing to enable a true measure of the atom bomb's destructive power to take place.

That was not a problem. We had already preserved three targets already for just such purposes (Hiroshima, Kokura Arsenal, and Niigata).

In addition, there were 15 or so cities that were not able to be targeted reliably with radar guidance, meaning that they were escaping our bombing raids unscathed. One of these was Nagasaki.

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One of the reasons the Japanese surrendered was because American and Soviet troops were closing in right? Soviet army conquered Manchuria and I do not think the Japanese emperor wanted a Soviet invasion. They might have surrendered even without the bombs being dropped, but I'm just speculating.

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Maybe something can be garnered from this article on the Surrender of Japan. http://www.ibiblio.org/pha/war.term/093_03.html

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Ray wrote:

One of the reasons the Japanese surrendered was because American and Soviet troops were closing in right?

I would go so far as to say it was THE reason.

Ray wrote:

They might have surrendered even without the bombs being dropped, but I'm just speculating.

That is in fact the view of mainstream historians.

However, at the time of the bombings, we did not know that this was a likely outcome. When we dropped the bombs it seemed to us that Japan was nowhere near accepting our terms.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

Maybe something can be garnered from this article on the Surrender of Japan. http://www.ibiblio.org/pha/war.term/093_03.html

A good link. It starts with the terms we gave in Potsdam.

Then it gives the first Japanese attempt to surrender to us (which took place after Nagasaki), and the unacceptable term the Japanese still demanded in it: "with the understanding that the said declaration does not comprise any demand which prejudices the prerogatives of His Majesty as a Sovereign Ruler".

Then our response to their first surrender attempt, which included the term: "from the moment of surrender the authority of the Emperor and the Japanese Government to rule the state shall be subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied powers who will take such steps as he deems proper to effectuate the surrender terms".

Then Japan's acceptance of all our terms.

Japan was about a week from having the next nuke hit Tokyo (a part of Tokyo which had avoided our previous bombing raids) when they finally accepted our terms.

The plutonium core was going out the door at Los Alamos on August 11 when we got word of their attempt to surrender the previous day. Bombing was projected around August 17-18. (Implosion assemblies were already waiting on Tinian.) However, we delayed shipment 3 days to see if they were going to finally surrender. On August 14, shipment resumed, for a projected bombing on August 20-21, but it only got to the coast of California when we got word that they had surrendered for real.

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"When we dropped the bombs it seemed to us that Japan was nowhere near accepting our terms."

Can you back this up or is this just speculation on your part Orally?

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Steve (as 41oo)
Can you back up any of the statements you have voiced?

Quote:

.1 Keeping Japan in the war long enough to enable the atomic bombing experiments to take place "legitimately".
2. Finding and preserving city targets undamanged from conventional bombing to enable a true measure of the atom bomb's destructive power to take place.

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All, I think we must back up a bit to late 1945 during the war to understand what really happened. As all of us understand, hindesight is always 20/20, but we must understand the mood and perceptions of the war when it was happening - not 55 years later when it's so easy to criticise what should have happened. From my perspective, I find everybody's opinion to have legitimacy. Even I, a Japanese American, have always felt that President Truman made the right decisioin. It's because I never had the information that I posted in the above link which may have swayed my opinion if I had known more about what had proceeded the bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima (the home of my ancestors). I have my own bias', don't we all?

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

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