Atomic Bomb did not save lives

[c659smith]

I think that sad and shameful practice first started about 2500 BC in Egypt. It has been happening ever since.

Not quite sure what you are referring to here. Islamic terrorists? Legal immigrants? Illegal immigrants? Drug trafficers? Californians?

Invaders: People who think that if they do something over a period of time, the Americans will get used to it and maybe make it legal. Then, they will be heroes in their own county. Is that what Americans died for?

**Every American knows that soldiers died to protect this country. They may be in **Iraq or somewhere else, but they are protecting this country from invasion. Politicians are supposed to protect Americans. That’s who pays their salaries. Those are the people who put them into office. Americans didn’t die so people from foreign countries could just walk in and steal everything from their children. The children those politicians are supposed to be protecting because their fathers died in combat. Is that simple enough for you? The welfare of Americans is supposed to come before anyone else in the world. Is that really happing?

But getting back to the topic, there is no factual basis to support the assertion that use of the atomic bombs on Japan killed more than they saved. The fact that many more lives, people like my father, and my uncle, says nothing about the morality of using such a weapon against civilians. By the summer of 1945, the utter brutality of the war had numbed politicians and military commanders on both sides.

---

That’s the nature of war. You have to try everything and they did. They used a weapon that was made available to them and it worked. The fact that we could be using these weapons today against our enemies and we are not shows our enemies how weak the American politician really is. Americans would rather spill American blood than be called “ruthless” or “racist” or any other name you can think of. That’s how the ENEMY wins wars. Propaganda!

They accomplish their goals by weakening American resolve. And they don’t need Atomic bombs…but they will be getting their hands on them eventually if you let them in. Who will be held responsible if that happens?

Did you see #58 post. What else do you need to have a finding that it saved lives. What I posted was factual data. If you look at all the Japanese battles in the South Pacfic and the Naval battles you will find in excess of 1 million lives lost on both sides.

Lets not forget the human rights violations to include the Batam march.

The human rights violations in Korea and China

And the mass civilian Japanese suicides as we were capturing these areas.

It was there ideology that made the nuclear bomb a neccesity rather than conventional war.

What I challenge you with is to do the research and tell me what you find in with the total deaths (Japanese and American)

The civilian suicides and why?

The children being used as Kamakazi pilots on our troops.

You have research what other people tell you and not all the facts. See where these people were during WW2

Ask them to give you geographical landmarks in those areas that only someone who researched the area or was there would know.

Verify this and ask them about the descrepancies and what is written in history and the ultimate question.

If the atomic bomb was not used how long do you think the war would have continued and how many more would have died. Ask if the U.S entered Tokyo how many Japanese would have committed suicide under the direction of there Emperor as he did in the past.

How many suicide bombers would there have been.

Remember Hirohito did not surrender after the first bomb on Hiroshima.

 

[chris_molter]

(Moved from ESCR discussion)

Chris I think you are in the wrong forum here.

Again as in the correct forum this was discussed in that the Emperor of Japan at the time (Hirohito) was Divine by the Japanese people and all obeyed and all fought or suffered the consequences in this life or the next.

If civilians are used as shields the civilians lives will be considered but should not deter from the destruction or protection of weapons or weapon systems that will cause death to another.

Ther Japanese war machine was hiding in these and many other cities.

Neither Hiroshima nor Nagasaki was exclusively a “civilian” target. One reason we chose these targets was that they contained military assets. Sometime after Spain, the notion of separating civilian and miliary targets became impossible. We need to remember that this war was a kind of chaos.

Sorry, guys, but your opinions are counter to what the Church teaches. It is no more permissable to intentionally target civilian populations with nuclear weapons than it is to use human embryos as research material to develop a cure for cancer. Our enemies’ barbaric actions do not grant us a ‘pass’ to become barbarians ourselves.

Pope Paul VI called the bombings a “butchery of untold magnitude”. Pope John Paul II called it “a self destruction of mankind” and included Hiroshima and Nagasaki with Auschwitz as places of pilgrimage.

The Catechism states:

2314 "Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants is a crime against God and man, which merits firm and unequivocal condemnation."

I know it’s tough to take. I had always supported the bombings (I come from a military family) and excused them as well (using the same rationalizations you’ve mentioned above), but when I became a Catholic, I had to start re-evaluating my positions on certain things that didn’t wash with what the Church taught, even if it seemed counterintuitive or wrong to me.

Basically it comes down to: either we can trust in the Church’s judgment, or we can join the cafeteria.

 

[ishii]

Nagasaki was the only Christian city in Japan. Song for Nagasaki is a good book about the effects of the bombing of that city. Did the atomic bomb save lives? Maybe. Was it morally permissible to drop a bomb on non-combatants? I don’t think so. To say that, however, is not to condemn those who decided to drop the bomb. They might not have the knowlege about the situation that we have now. I hope America is never faced with the kind of options that it was faced with in 1945.

Ishii

 

[edwest2]

The following is taken from a booklet distributed by The American Legion, National Defense Division, and published in March, 1947. It was written by W.B. Courtney, European Correspondent for Collier’s Magazine.

“It is not generally known, but weather considerations had much to do with the bombing dates of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Visual bombing was desirable, to insure effectiveness; but weather for that is uncertain in Japan after the end of August. If the drops had not been in that month, the war would have ended without the introduction of the atom bomb.”

Peace,
Ed

 

[RobbyS]

(Moved from ESCR discussion)

Sorry, guys, but your opinions are counter to what the Church teaches. It is no more permissable to intentionally target civilian populations with nuclear weapons than it is to use human embryos as research material to develop a cure for cancer. Our enemies’ barbaric actions do not grant us a ‘pass’ to become barbarians ourselves.

Pope Paul VI called the bombings a “butchery of untold magnitude”. Pope John Paul II called it “a self destruction of mankind” and included Hiroshima and Nagasaki with Auschwitz as places of pilgrimage.

The Catechism states:

I know it’s tough to take. I had always supported the bombings (I come from a military family) and excused them as well (using the same rationalizations you’ve mentioned above), but when I became a Catholic, I had to start re-evaluating my positions on certain things that didn’t wash with what the Church taught, even if it seemed counterintuitive or wrong to me.

Basically it comes down to: either we can trust in the Church’s judgment, or we can join the cafeteria.

Then the fire-bombing of Tokoyo was as indefensible as the atomic bombings. And the same is true of much of the targeting during the Battle of Normandy, which killed about 20,000 Frenchmen. Or the night-bombing of German cities by the RAF. The atomic bombings were no worse than any of these things.

 

[JimG]

Then the fire-bombing of Tokoyo was as indefensible as the atomic bombings. And the same is true of much of the targeting during the Battle of Normandy, which killed about 20,000 Frenchmen. Or the night-bombing of German cities by the RAF. The atomic bombings were no worse than any of these things.

Yes, the atomic bombings were pretty much on a par with other tactics of the war. They were not unique in killing civilians, or even in total firepower. The Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs are considered small-yield by today’s standards for nuclear weapons. If one is to condemn the atomic bombings, one must equally condemn other tactics used by the Allies. The Allies did win the war. The discussion would then turn to whether the war would have been won without those tactics, just as this discussion asks whether the Japanese would have surrendered without the much greater loss of life involved in an invasion.

 

[chris_molter]

Then the fire-bombing of Tokoyo was as indefensible as the atomic bombings. And the same is true of much of the targeting during the Battle of Normandy, which killed about 20,000 Frenchmen. Or the night-bombing of German cities by the RAF. The atomic bombings were no worse than any of these things.

I agree. We did a lot of things that were indefensible in prosecuting the war. None of that diminishes the heroism and sacrifice by Allied fighting men, nor does it in any way diminish the atrocities committed by the Axis powers.

If we’re supposed to be the good guys, we have to own up when we realize we’ve done something wrong, even if it was for the ‘greater good’. Remember that it is unacceptable to use evil means to achieve a good end.

 

[aspawloski4th]

The simple fact was that American fire bombing could, and did, kill 100,000 people in Japan. In Europe, the USAAF was flying 1000 bomber raids. Back to Japan, the B-29 was coming into service. The P-80/F-80 jet fighter was coming into service.

Then the Russians entered the war against Japan. So an invasion was not required. Atomic bombs were not required.

Peace,
Ed

Whatever it is you are drinking I’ll have a case of it!

 

[Lujack]

Then the fire-bombing of Tokoyo was as indefensible as the atomic bombings. And the same is true of much of the targeting during the Battle of Normandy, which killed about 20,000 Frenchmen. Or the night-bombing of German cities by the RAF. The atomic bombings were no worse than any of these things.

I think you have to put the firebombing in a different class than the targeting during Normandy or the RAF night bombings. While the firebombings were intentionally directed at the city, the Normandy bombings and the RAF night bombings were aimed at legitimate military targets, but were inaccurate. While there is a debate there, it is a separate debate. The debate over the atomic bombings and the firebombings is along the lines of “Is it acceptable to drop bombs on civilians to save civilian lives in the long run?”, while Normandy and night bombings are along the lines of “Is it acceptable to drop bombs on legitimate military targets despite the knowledge that there is a good chance of civilians being killed in the attack?”

 

[rpp]

The simple fact was that American fire bombing could, and did, kill 100,000 people in Japan. In Europe, the USAAF was flying 1000 bomber raids. Back to Japan, the B-29 was coming into service. The P-80/F-80 jet fighter was coming into service.

Then the Russians entered the war against Japan. So an invasion was not required. Atomic bombs were not required.

Peace,
Ed

By the way, there are a couple of things you should know about your post that generally invalidates your point.

The Soviet Union declared war on Japan on August 8, 1945. The first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima two days earlier on August 6, 1945, and President Truman announced it that very same day.

Next, in NONE of the islands that Allies, principally American, did air bombardment or naval bombardment lead the Japanese troops to surrender. When Okinawa was invaded, more nearly 200,000 Japanese were killed, civilians and troops. Fewer than 100 Japanese soldiers surrendered and nearly 3,000 civilians were seen jumping to their deaths from a cliff while a battalion of Japanese soldiers held off American marines who were trying to stop the suicides.

Finally, Japan, which had always been a militaristic society had, in more than 2600 years of history, not Japanese army had ever surrended.

A study, lead by former President Herbert Hoover determined that 500,000 American troops would be killed in an invasion along with 7 million Japanese civilians.

 

[c659smith]

(Moved from ESCR discussion)

Sorry, guys, but your opinions are counter to what the Church teaches. It is no more permissable to intentionally target civilian populations with nuclear weapons than it is to use human embryos as research material to develop a cure for cancer. Our enemies’ barbaric actions do not grant us a ‘pass’ to become barbarians ourselves.

Pope Paul VI called the bombings a “butchery of untold magnitude”. Pope John Paul II called it “a self destruction of mankind” and included Hiroshima and Nagasaki with Auschwitz as places of pilgrimage.

The Catechism states:

I know it’s tough to take. I had always supported the bombings (I come from a military family) and excused them as well (using the same rationalizations you’ve mentioned above), but when I became a Catholic, I had to start re-evaluating my positions on certain things that didn’t wash with what the Church taught, even if it seemed counterintuitive or wrong to me.

Basically it comes down to: either we can trust in the Church’s judgment, or we can join the cafeteria.

So conventional war on the Japanese mainland that would have killed a couple hundred million people would have been within church teaching rather than the nukes?

 

[chris_molter]

So conventional war on the Japanese mainland that would have killed a couple hundred million people would have been within church teaching rather than the nukes?

Possibly. There are too many variables to say whether a combined amphibious/airborne invasion of the home islands would be a licit option given the complexity of the situation (military/political/cultural) in '45. Remember that we cannot use evil means (indiscriminately destroying a city) to achieve a good end (ultimately saving more lives).

 

[Neversofew]

So conventional war on the Japanese mainland that would have killed a couple hundred million people would have been within church teaching rather than the nukes?

Why is it bad to use a weapon that will bring a war to an end quickly?

I think I have come up with a way that would make even a pope approve when considering the alternatives.

Instead of destoying people you destroy their cities.

Give the enemy 30 or 60 days to evacuate a city and then bomb it to the ground. You destroy the enemies resources with killing anyone. You destroy their ability to make war and they will be neutralized.

 

[Lujack]

Possibly. There are too many variables to say whether a combined amphibious/airborne invasion of the home islands would be a licit option given the complexity of the situation (military/political/cultural) in '45. Remember that we cannot use evil means (indiscriminately destroying a city) to achieve a good end (ultimately saving more lives).

Than what would have been allowed if an invasion would not have been? A blockade would have been vastly, vastly worse than the bombs because the blockade would have seen the Japanese government holding on until people were dropping in the streets of starvation.

If the bombs are not acceptable, the invasion must be, because a blockade was the most inhumane option by a wide margin.

 

[chris_molter]

Than what would have been allowed if an invasion would not have been? A blockade would have been vastly, vastly worse than the bombs because the blockade would have seen the Japanese government holding on until people were dropping in the streets of starvation.

If the bombs are not acceptable, the invasion must be, because a blockade was the most inhumane option by a wide margin.

I never said an invasion wouldn’t have been licit. If executed after all other options had been exhausted, it probably would remain the only permissible option. A blockade probably would not have been. Using nuclear weapons on cities was definitely not.

 

[chris_molter]

Why is it bad to use a weapon that will bring a war to an end quickly?

The same reason why it’s bad to kill human embryos to cure cancer. We cannot commit an intrinsic evil to achieve a good end.

 

[c659smith]

I never said an invasion wouldn’t have been licit. If executed after all other options had been exhausted, it probably would remain the only permissible option. A blockade probably would not have been. Using nuclear weapons on cities was definitely not.

The Just War Theory was asserted as an authoritative Catholic Church teaching by the United States Catholic Bishops in their pastoral letter, The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response, issued in 1983. More recently, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, in paragraph 2309, lists four strict conditions for “legitimate defense by military force”:

the damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave, and certain;
all other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;
there must be serious prospects of success;
the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated. The power of modern means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition.

This above is the cathechism of the Church. The way I read it, all was taken into account before the A-bombs were dropped. By the way leaflets were droppeed for civilians to leave these cities and gave them enough time to evacuate.

Suppose North Korea launches nuclear weapons at cities in the United States with a population factor of 3.000.000. We were able to intercept these missles and destroy them. More are getting ready to re-launch again at cities in the United States. There is no assurance we will stop these missles again. The only way to assure we destroy these missles is to launch our own nuclear attack at these cities in North Korea. Population factor 300,000,000

Is the defense just. Would the United States be justified by Catholic definition in killing 300,000,000 people?

by definition the use of nuclear weapons can be justified according to Catholic definition of just war principles.

 

[rpp]

Chris, your logic would be sound if it were not for one thing; millions of Japanese civilians would have been killed in an invasion as well. The purpose of the bombs was to limit both military and civilian losses on both sides.

Are you seriously arguing that it is moral to kill seven million (or more) civilians than to cause the death of fewer than 4% of that number? I completely understand that one cannot do evil, even if a greater good is intended. Yet at the same time, I do not think it is valid to compare this to various forms of the morally reprehensible practice of embryonic research.

Let’s review what American knew and did not know about atomic weapons and Japan as of August 5, 1945.

• Hiroshima and Nagasaki (and a few others), being among the few undamaged ports, wer a legitimate military targets.
• Despite the Alamogordo test the previous May, no one knew how destructive force of either bombs as two utterly dissimilar bomb designs were used (implosion and projectile).
• The long term effect of exposure to radiation was completely unknown.
• Japanese civilians were being compelled, under pain of death, to fight to the death.
• In previous battles, Japanese soldiers never surrendered, but rather fought to the death, often in underground caves and networks of bunkers.
• In previous battles, Japanese civilians were observed to either omit suicide, forced to commit suicide or killed outright be Japanese soldiers (Saipan and Okinawa are notorious examples).
• One of the primary motives to use atomic weapons was to limit both civilian and military casualties on both sides.
• The death of almost unimaginable Japanese civilians was unavoidable

The last point is very important.

While I will not conclusively state that the use of atomic weapons on Japan, which brought the swift surrender of Japan, was morally good, I do not think there is enough information to state that it was morally evil. To me the balance tends to lean that it was not morally evil.

 

[c659smith]

Chris, your logic would be sound if it were not for one thing; millions of Japanese civilians would have been killed in an invasion as well. The purpose of the bombs was to limit both military and civilian losses on both sides.

Are you seriously arguing that it is moral to kill seven million (or more) civilians than to cause the death of fewer than 4% of that number? I completely understand that one cannot do evil, even if a greater good is intended. Yet at the same time, I do not think it is valid to compare this to various forms of the morally reprehensible practice of embryonic research.

Let’s review what American knew and did not know about atomic weapons and Japan as of August 5, 1945.

• Hiroshima and Nagasaki (and a few others), being among the few undamaged ports, wer a legitimate military targets.
• Despite the Alamogordo test the previous May, no one knew how destructive force of either bombs as two utterly dissimilar bomb designs were used (implosion and projectile).
• The long term effect of exposure to radiation was completely unknown.
• Japanese civilians were being compelled, under pain of death, to fight to the death.
• In previous battles, Japanese soldiers never surrendered, but rather fought to the death, often in underground caves and networks of bunkers.
• In previous battles, Japanese civilians were observed to either omit suicide, forced to commit suicide or killed outright be Japanese soldiers (Saipan and Okinawa are notorious examples).
• One of the primary motives to use atomic weapons was to limit both civilian and military casualties on both sides.
• The death of almost unimaginable Japanese civilians was unavoidable

The last point is very important.

While I will not conclusively state that the use of atomic weapons on Japan, which brought the swift surrender of Japan, was morally good, I do not think there is enough information to state that it was morally evil. To me the balance tends to lean that it was not morally evil.

I agree that the Bombs dropped on Japan was morally the correct and just thing to do,
See my previous posts.

I do give a moral question though with the fake scenerio of an attack on the U.S…

Is it within the pervues in the definition of the Catholic Church of a just war to kill 300,000,000 to save 3,000,000 lives. The answer under our Church’s definition is no!

This scenrio was to bring to the table the understanding of what is a just war under the Catholic definition. A just War definition can only be used as a guide to begin war and is not defendable, reality, or useful to be used by a state in time of war.

War is never “just” once it has begun. There is only two sides, the winner and loser. You cannot compare apples and oranges. To be just one must have justice. People get hurt and killed that do not deserve it and are innocent. There is a saying that we all know and that is “all is fair in times of love and war”.

Lives of civilians, prisoners, and innocents of our enemy in war of course are always considered by the moral country, but with that being said it cannot result in the death of a member(s) own countrymen if we know as a fact that would be the end result.

It has to be the minumum amount of force necessary to end the agression and to cause defeat and surrender by the enemy with the minimum of lives lost first and foremost of our own forces.

For instance an atomic bomb used on Iraq would not meet the definition of a just or moral war.

The ousting of Sadam and his forces were by conventional war means was just. (justice was carried out) Weither the Catholic Church wants to admit it or not, it meets it’s own definition of a just war.

The atomic bombs used on Japan was just and moral

The retaliation in the fake scenerio is just and moral.

If the bombs dropped in Japan killed 1,000,000 Japanese civilian and military than it was just in order to save the lives of 1 or 1.000.000 Americans. Overwhelming and deliberate military force wins wars.

Life is not a quantitative factor in a time of war.

The main goal of a soldier is to kill and to not be killed.

 

[rpp]

I would like to repeat that I never said the use of atomic weapons against Japans was morally good. What I said was that the evidence appears to lean in th direction that their use was not morally evil. That is a significant difference.