G
GEddie
Guest
And all the more so to those involved at the time.
- Status
T
Tsuwano
Guest
You last question reminds me of a talk I attended given by an elderly woman who had survived the bombing of Nagasaki. She felt it was useless to approach the bombing as either a victor or a victim. One had to strip away one’s nationality and race and focus exclusively on that which is common to all persons; namely our humanity. She felt that it was wrong to either cast blame or attempt to justify the bombing, because in doing so we must define ourselves, our side, as separate from the other, and in doing so we miss the very essence of what the bombing can teach us; that there is no them, but only a we. The Japanese didn’t suffer the bombing, we, humanity, did. The Americans didn’t drop the bomb, but we, humanity, did. This was her path to a reconciliation of sorts with her fate and her great loss. Maybe this is the correct approach to finding the right answer.I agree with you once more that those who conducted and participated in the war had a slanted, racist view. I also think that this view was, to large extent, reciprocated by the Japanese.
While many of the underlying premises were undoubtedly false, the fact remains that these were the premises that the people of that time were working with when they made the decision to use the A-Bomb…
As for the article, the photograph accompanying the article would seem an odd way to train people for firefighting duty…
I understand that these units were primarily formed for support purposes, but the article also makes clear that this role was to be changed and they were to be trained for both regular and irregular warfare against the invading army.
The whole thing is just so complicated…Who really knows what the right answer is.
Peace
James
L
Light1111
Guest
I already mentioned former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara’s contributions to this discussion, as he reflected on these events in the documentary film “Fog of War.” He was a very high-ranking officer under LeMay (who headed up the operations in the Pacific Theater), and was partially responsible for the decisions to drop the incendiary bombs all across Japan, in the weeks leading up to the dropping of the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
One thing he said in the film gave me great pause, and I think it needs to be mentioned here.
He said that General LeMay made the point that if the U.S.A. lost WWII, they would have been prosecuted as war criminals (due to the nature of the incendiary bombs–the way they destroyed whole towns, and vast numbers of civilians).
Well, McNamara said, “What makes it right if you win the war, but wrong, if you lose the war?”
The fact is, there is no “right,” when it comes to killing whole villages, one after the other, in such a cold, calculating way. Even the men making the decisions at the time, spoke quite frankly amongst themselves about how truly wrong it was. They saw it, at the time, as the only course of action they could take, that would positively win the U.S. victory. But the truth of the matter is, it’s never right to be the perpetrators of such vast devastation, particularly when we’re talking about civilians on the ground. In many of those cities, there were no troops stationed–it was known the bombs would impact only civilian lives. The purpose was to bring Japan to its knees. It worked.
McNamara agreed to the making of this documentary film because he felt that the men and women currently in power, the world over, could learn from the lessons he had learned, through such great duress, during his time in WWII and Vietnam. I do hope his warnings didn’t fall on deaf ears.
Peace to all of you.
One thing he said in the film gave me great pause, and I think it needs to be mentioned here.
He said that General LeMay made the point that if the U.S.A. lost WWII, they would have been prosecuted as war criminals (due to the nature of the incendiary bombs–the way they destroyed whole towns, and vast numbers of civilians).
Well, McNamara said, “What makes it right if you win the war, but wrong, if you lose the war?”
The fact is, there is no “right,” when it comes to killing whole villages, one after the other, in such a cold, calculating way. Even the men making the decisions at the time, spoke quite frankly amongst themselves about how truly wrong it was. They saw it, at the time, as the only course of action they could take, that would positively win the U.S. victory. But the truth of the matter is, it’s never right to be the perpetrators of such vast devastation, particularly when we’re talking about civilians on the ground. In many of those cities, there were no troops stationed–it was known the bombs would impact only civilian lives. The purpose was to bring Japan to its knees. It worked.
McNamara agreed to the making of this documentary film because he felt that the men and women currently in power, the world over, could learn from the lessons he had learned, through such great duress, during his time in WWII and Vietnam. I do hope his warnings didn’t fall on deaf ears.
Peace to all of you.
J
JRKH
Guest
J
JRKH
Guest
Yes I hope so too.
I refer you to the post right above yours for what I think the best overall answer is…
Humanity done it to itself and we can only hope that humanity learns from the mistakes.
And this can be applied equally well to the A-Bomb, conventional bombing or to war in general.
Peace
James
S
sidbrown
Guest
No. It was not humanity who dropped the A-Bomb. It was a few American politicians in charge of the war who made this immoral decision.
But these Americans set a precedent for others to follow with their smoke and mirrors justification for killing thousands of innocent civilians.
L
Light1111
Guest
I’m amazed by this woman’s ability to see this, and I agree with her wholeheartedly. There have been a few war films that attempted to depict both sides of the line with the same careful hand. An example is the film “The Thin Red Line,” a Vietnam war-film, that received little attention as it came out at the same time as “Saving Private Ryan.” In this film, “America” is not depicted as heroes (nor villains); neither is the VietKong depicted as heroes or villains. Instead, the senseless violence of both sides is showcased; the despair, fear, anguish, and trauma of both sides; the civilian experience is underlined. The film goes out of the way to show that in war, in the up-close aspects, we cannot “choose a side.” At that ground level, all we have is the suffering of human beings, the suffering of animals, the suffering of the forests. In this close-up inspection of a war, we realize that our compassion goes out to each individual whose lives have been impacted.
I have never been in the military, but my Dad was stationed in Vietnam with the Army for several years. He’s only just begun talking about that time in his life, all these many years later. He has a diagnosis of PTSD and he suffered a mental breakdown 15 years ago – after living a “normal life” all of those years.
He has shared a bit, and I’ve also gathered a bit from watching documentaries, from reading, even from having clients who served in the Gulf War, or our two recent conflicts. For anyone who’s ever seen “Jarhead,” about the Marines stationed in the Gulf War, who never fought, but who suffered the trauma of being “ready” and “vigilant” for 90 days, before returning home, having never entered into one battle – there is an important lesson there. At one point in the film, a single Marine tries engaging the others into a discussion regarding the ethics of their charge. Everyone jumps on this young man, telling him that politics aren’t their business; they’re to do what they’re told.
This is true of all war heroes, all war criminals, all innocents, all soldiers. People are caught in the cross-fire; they’re stuck following orders. At that ground level, whatever the ethics, concerns, plots, schemes of the higher-ups, the combatants aren’t part of that maelstrom. They instead are merely following orders. They don’t question; they perform.
If that’s true of our soldiers, that is true of all soldiers, across the board. One follows orders. One does what one is told, “in the name of his country.” Because of that, we do find a common human element.
When individuals defend the human rights of the troops, often the rebuttal is, “Support our Troops!” But these defenders are supporting the troops – their right to a life; their right to their personality; their right to life history that does not involve killing; that does not involve witnessing others being killed; that does not involve such sustained, ongoing trauma. PTSD is a terrible thing, and people report not recognizing their loved ones, who have returned from battle. I can’t imagine what my Dad had been like – I’ve only known him post-trauma. He is so jumpy, and this is decades after the fact. It’s clear how deeply he’s been impacted. He sleeps with a gun under his pillow.
Perhaps we can recall the way H.Ross Perot lost so many supporters, when he began complaining that the VietKong was coming in his kitchen window–in Texas? This was a successful multi-billionaire, with all the resources in the world available to him. How could he have lived in such a senseless delusion, all those years? The trauma of war never fades.
He’s but one soul, and others have felt as he has. My heart goes out to each one of them – whatever race, nationality, ideology, station in life. Whatever thoughts they might harbor. We are all humans, and we’re all in this together.
R
Ridgerunner
Guest
I haven’t read all the posts, so if this is redundant, ignore it.
There is substantial reason to believe the bombings were virtually “conspiracies” between the U.S. and the Japanese dictatorship, or that they at least represented a “conversation” of a sort.
It may be noted that the Emperor’s “surrender speech” to the nation couched it in terms, not of defeat, but of saving the Japanese people from possible annihilation. That was pregnant with meaning in the Japanese culture.
Japanese had, for centuries, been taught that they were a “sacred people”; the most important people on earth. In the early 20th Century that concept was highly emphasized, because it fit the imperialistic ambitions of the ruling class. There was also, during the period, a revival or re-emphasis of the Code of Bushido; virtually a death worship. Cherry blossoms (interesting that cherry trees were gifted to the U.S. by Japan) symbolized the bloom of the heroic warrior in battle followed by the blood red of the cherry itself. The “fight-to-the-death” ideal encountered by American soldiers throughout the Pacific, along with the institution of Kamikaze and, indeed, the civilian suicides encountered, made it clear that this ethic had very much sunk in.
But annihilation was another thing. It was all well and good for soldiers and (some) civilians to “bloom as flowers of death”, as it was termed. It was quite another for the entire “sacred race” to no longer exist.
So, when defeat became absolutely inevitable, the leaders fought on. There was really no way to surrender without negating the very thought process they had so painstakingly fostered. There is a respectable body of scholarly opinion that holds that the Japanese leadership wanted a way out but couldn’t find one. That they were at least preparing for a “Gotterdammerung” ending (fighters stored in caves, last minute development of jet engines, work on ABC weapons) that really would subject the entire people to the “blooming as flowers of death” denoument. Obviously, the fire bombing of Tokyo did not, to them, seem sufficiently threatening of annihilation to provoke a surrender. Devastating as that was, it was “ordinary means” of the time, whose effect could, if with difficulty, be moderated.
Atomic weapons were another thing entirely. In addition to holding out the distinct possibility that they could (unlike the bombing of Tokyo) wipe out the imperial family (an unthinkable thing), they at least strongly suggested the capability, real or not, of annihilation of the entire “sacred race”.
So, the atomic bombs presented seemingly final threats to the two things Japanese culture could not accept; the two things that really would “overrule” Bushido; termination of the “divine” line supposedly descended from the semi-mythological emperor, Jimmu, (the pillar of the whole Shinto “religion” and social order) and the extirpation of the sacred race.
The Japanese leadership knew about the potential for atomic weapons. After all, they had been working on it themselves, and it is absurd to suppose they were unaware there was an “atomic race” going on, and with a power whose scientific and industrial capacities far outweighed their own. They had to know America would develop atomic weapons fairly soon, and that it would use them.
After the first bomb, Truman broadcast his threat of exactly the thing that could let the Japanese leadership off; annihilation of the nation of Japan. The second bomb, closely following the first, was confirmation that America could (if only in time) deliver many more.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki (plus the American concession that the “Emperor system” would be preserved in the event of surrender) got the Japanese leadership “off the hook”, so to speak. That’s an awful judgment of them. But then, awful judgments of Japanese leadership were justified by many other events.
Was the American government justified in entering into this “conversation”? It’s difficult to think of any way it could have been avoided.
Did all Japanese see eye to eye with the leadership? No, but many, if not most, did. I had the great good fortune once to meet a former member of the Kwantung Army which fought the endless war in China. Horrible as that was for the Chinese, it was also horrible for the Japanese soldiers who, being soldiers, did their share of grumbling and whispered resentment of the leadership. Still, he said, when planes flew in from Tokyo bearing some “prince of the blood” or other, which always, it seemed, presaged some new push somewhere, it was unthinkable to actually oppose the will of the Emperor, represented by those princelings. Skeptical though they might be in a military sense, Japanese were not prepared to attempt to “turn the universe upside down” mentally. It must be remembered that in Japanese culture, one would meet the Emperor in the afterlife and be just as subject to him as in life. How one comported oneself now relative to the will of the Emperor would determine how the Emperor regarded oneself in the hereafter. It was one thing to be prepared to defy some army officer. It was quite another to defy the proclamations of a member of the imperial family who, everyone knew, represented the will of the Emperor himself.
This former Japanese soldier did, at the time of our conversation, blame the Emperor for those things that happened, and, later in life, considered the Emperor the primary criminal in the whole thing. But, he said, he did not do so at the time. It was his belief, right or wrong, that the evolution of his thought was reasonably typical of all Japanese.
There is substantial reason to believe the bombings were virtually “conspiracies” between the U.S. and the Japanese dictatorship, or that they at least represented a “conversation” of a sort.
It may be noted that the Emperor’s “surrender speech” to the nation couched it in terms, not of defeat, but of saving the Japanese people from possible annihilation. That was pregnant with meaning in the Japanese culture.
Japanese had, for centuries, been taught that they were a “sacred people”; the most important people on earth. In the early 20th Century that concept was highly emphasized, because it fit the imperialistic ambitions of the ruling class. There was also, during the period, a revival or re-emphasis of the Code of Bushido; virtually a death worship. Cherry blossoms (interesting that cherry trees were gifted to the U.S. by Japan) symbolized the bloom of the heroic warrior in battle followed by the blood red of the cherry itself. The “fight-to-the-death” ideal encountered by American soldiers throughout the Pacific, along with the institution of Kamikaze and, indeed, the civilian suicides encountered, made it clear that this ethic had very much sunk in.
But annihilation was another thing. It was all well and good for soldiers and (some) civilians to “bloom as flowers of death”, as it was termed. It was quite another for the entire “sacred race” to no longer exist.
So, when defeat became absolutely inevitable, the leaders fought on. There was really no way to surrender without negating the very thought process they had so painstakingly fostered. There is a respectable body of scholarly opinion that holds that the Japanese leadership wanted a way out but couldn’t find one. That they were at least preparing for a “Gotterdammerung” ending (fighters stored in caves, last minute development of jet engines, work on ABC weapons) that really would subject the entire people to the “blooming as flowers of death” denoument. Obviously, the fire bombing of Tokyo did not, to them, seem sufficiently threatening of annihilation to provoke a surrender. Devastating as that was, it was “ordinary means” of the time, whose effect could, if with difficulty, be moderated.
Atomic weapons were another thing entirely. In addition to holding out the distinct possibility that they could (unlike the bombing of Tokyo) wipe out the imperial family (an unthinkable thing), they at least strongly suggested the capability, real or not, of annihilation of the entire “sacred race”.
So, the atomic bombs presented seemingly final threats to the two things Japanese culture could not accept; the two things that really would “overrule” Bushido; termination of the “divine” line supposedly descended from the semi-mythological emperor, Jimmu, (the pillar of the whole Shinto “religion” and social order) and the extirpation of the sacred race.
The Japanese leadership knew about the potential for atomic weapons. After all, they had been working on it themselves, and it is absurd to suppose they were unaware there was an “atomic race” going on, and with a power whose scientific and industrial capacities far outweighed their own. They had to know America would develop atomic weapons fairly soon, and that it would use them.
After the first bomb, Truman broadcast his threat of exactly the thing that could let the Japanese leadership off; annihilation of the nation of Japan. The second bomb, closely following the first, was confirmation that America could (if only in time) deliver many more.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki (plus the American concession that the “Emperor system” would be preserved in the event of surrender) got the Japanese leadership “off the hook”, so to speak. That’s an awful judgment of them. But then, awful judgments of Japanese leadership were justified by many other events.
Was the American government justified in entering into this “conversation”? It’s difficult to think of any way it could have been avoided.
Did all Japanese see eye to eye with the leadership? No, but many, if not most, did. I had the great good fortune once to meet a former member of the Kwantung Army which fought the endless war in China. Horrible as that was for the Chinese, it was also horrible for the Japanese soldiers who, being soldiers, did their share of grumbling and whispered resentment of the leadership. Still, he said, when planes flew in from Tokyo bearing some “prince of the blood” or other, which always, it seemed, presaged some new push somewhere, it was unthinkable to actually oppose the will of the Emperor, represented by those princelings. Skeptical though they might be in a military sense, Japanese were not prepared to attempt to “turn the universe upside down” mentally. It must be remembered that in Japanese culture, one would meet the Emperor in the afterlife and be just as subject to him as in life. How one comported oneself now relative to the will of the Emperor would determine how the Emperor regarded oneself in the hereafter. It was one thing to be prepared to defy some army officer. It was quite another to defy the proclamations of a member of the imperial family who, everyone knew, represented the will of the Emperor himself.
This former Japanese soldier did, at the time of our conversation, blame the Emperor for those things that happened, and, later in life, considered the Emperor the primary criminal in the whole thing. But, he said, he did not do so at the time. It was his belief, right or wrong, that the evolution of his thought was reasonably typical of all Japanese.
C
cargau
Guest
Fascinating insights, Ridgerunner…This certainly illuminates the struggle on all sides.
Help me understand, Does the moral standard consist of the US avoiding the use of the A bomb in any and all cases regardless of motive? Or, could there be instances where the use of the weapon could be justified?
Is it an issue of motive, magnitude, collateral damage? Or is the A bomb so frightening that it becomes repulsive? In this case judgement resorts merely to one’s opinion based on their own repugnancy.
At what point does any bombing become immoral? If only ten civilians died, would that still be immoral?
As Sherman said, “War is hell”. It is awful that war should ever take place. Our own human condition lends itself to the horrible tragedy of war. Technology has afforded recent generations of humans to be exposed to the reality of weaponry that can be far reaching and thus involve non-combatants where it seldom did before.
In the movie, Patton, the general tells his troops, “You don’t become a hero dying for your country, you become a hero getting the other dumb bastard to die for his country”.
Hard to argue with the general’s point. The nature of war is that death occurs. The goal is aways to win. Use of available technologies and forms of weapons that gives one side an edge has always been sought after.
There must be some concrete criteria that is in place to make this judgement. Critreria that is based on Christ and His Church?
Personally, I find it hard to be overly critical of President Truman. His decision to use the bomb was done to expidite the war’s end. That is his job as president. He had a bomb that would end the hostility and he chose to use it. I wonder, if the Japanese had access to the bomb, would they have used it against us?
L
Light1111
Guest
Indeed, that is an excellent question: Would the Japanese have used the A-bomb on us, had they access to it?
At the risk of continuing to trumpet the same horn! This is another topic addressed by Robert McNamara in “The Fog of War.” He talked about the “13 days” of the Cuban Missile Crisis, when it was Kennedy, Kruschev and Castro in one of the most tense two-week periods in American history.
McNamara recalls the events of those days in painstaking detail, explaining how, ultimately, we “got out of it” by responding to a soft message Kruschev delivered – instead of the “hard message,” as was Kennedy’s impulse. It was Tommy Thompson, who had lived with Kruschev and his wife for a period of time, who poked up and said that he believed Kruschev would like to report to the Russian people that he’d saved Cuba. Thompson encouraged Kennedy to permit Kruschev to take this “story” to the Russians, to allow him to become Cuba’s hero. It worked.
Decades later, after he’d long since retired, McNamara attended a lecture in Cuba, presented by Castro, and attended by world leaders and former world leaders. One of the topics was the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Castro was saying that Cuba had thousands of war heads on the island during that 13-day period, and they were aimed at the U.S.
McNamara asked for Castro to stop. He said he must have gotten the translation wrong. Castro waited for his question.
McNamara: “Mr. President, I know I heard you wrong. Did you just say you had thousands of war heads on the island – and were prepared to use them? If so, what would you have done, had it come to that? What would have happened to Cuba, if you’d ordered for them to be put to use?”
Castro responded: “First of all, it’s not what would have happened if I had given the order–I had given the order. Second: What would have happened to Cuba? Well, we would have been totally annihilated.” Then he went on to say: “Mr. McNamara, if you, or if President Kennedy, had been in my shoes, you’d have done the same thing.”
McNamara, reeling, responded: “Mr. President, I hope to God you’re wrong. Pull the curtain down over our heads?!”
This is one of the finest examples I’ve seen, of how desperate and deadly war can become. Here, unbeknownst to the U.S.A., Castro had given orders for thousands of war heads to be sent off to our country – he was willing to extinguish his entire nation, just to target ours.
McNamara concluded: “What one has to understand is that these were rational individuals. Castro was rational. Kruschev was rational. Kennedy was rational. Rational individuals almost brought about the ends of two nations on this earth.”
“Rationality will not save us.”
When it comes to nuclear weapons, one misjudgment could spell the end of nations. The lesson presented by McNamara, stunning on its own, is one we must take to heart.
At the risk of continuing to trumpet the same horn! This is another topic addressed by Robert McNamara in “The Fog of War.” He talked about the “13 days” of the Cuban Missile Crisis, when it was Kennedy, Kruschev and Castro in one of the most tense two-week periods in American history.
McNamara recalls the events of those days in painstaking detail, explaining how, ultimately, we “got out of it” by responding to a soft message Kruschev delivered – instead of the “hard message,” as was Kennedy’s impulse. It was Tommy Thompson, who had lived with Kruschev and his wife for a period of time, who poked up and said that he believed Kruschev would like to report to the Russian people that he’d saved Cuba. Thompson encouraged Kennedy to permit Kruschev to take this “story” to the Russians, to allow him to become Cuba’s hero. It worked.
Decades later, after he’d long since retired, McNamara attended a lecture in Cuba, presented by Castro, and attended by world leaders and former world leaders. One of the topics was the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Castro was saying that Cuba had thousands of war heads on the island during that 13-day period, and they were aimed at the U.S.
McNamara asked for Castro to stop. He said he must have gotten the translation wrong. Castro waited for his question.
McNamara: “Mr. President, I know I heard you wrong. Did you just say you had thousands of war heads on the island – and were prepared to use them? If so, what would you have done, had it come to that? What would have happened to Cuba, if you’d ordered for them to be put to use?”
Castro responded: “First of all, it’s not what would have happened if I had given the order–I had given the order. Second: What would have happened to Cuba? Well, we would have been totally annihilated.” Then he went on to say: “Mr. McNamara, if you, or if President Kennedy, had been in my shoes, you’d have done the same thing.”
McNamara, reeling, responded: “Mr. President, I hope to God you’re wrong. Pull the curtain down over our heads?!”
This is one of the finest examples I’ve seen, of how desperate and deadly war can become. Here, unbeknownst to the U.S.A., Castro had given orders for thousands of war heads to be sent off to our country – he was willing to extinguish his entire nation, just to target ours.
McNamara concluded: “What one has to understand is that these were rational individuals. Castro was rational. Kruschev was rational. Kennedy was rational. Rational individuals almost brought about the ends of two nations on this earth.”
“Rationality will not save us.”
When it comes to nuclear weapons, one misjudgment could spell the end of nations. The lesson presented by McNamara, stunning on its own, is one we must take to heart.
E
estesbob
Guest
It is debatable whether Cuba had any nuclear warheads ,more or less thousands of them. What is not debatable is the fact they had no way whatsoever of delivering those warheads against targets in the United States. That was what the whole missile crisis was about-keepingh them from having the delivery capability.
E
estesbob
Guest
I believe the bombings were also a not-so-subtle message to the Soviet Union about our ability to stop their further expansion
S
sidbrown
Guest
In 1946, a report by the Federal Council of Churches entitled Atomic Warfare and the Christian Faith, includes the following passage:
“As American Christians, we are deeply penitent for the irresponsible use already made of the atomic bomb. We are agreed that, whatever be one’s judgment of the war in principle, the surprise bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are morally indefensible.”
In 1967, Noam Chomsky described the atomic bombings as “among the most unspeakable crimes in history”.
The 1946 United States Strategic Bombing Survey, written by Paul Nitze, concluded that the atomic bombs had been unnecessary to the winning of the war.
Pope John Paul II declared in 1995: “[T]he direct and voluntary killing of an innocent human being is always gravely immoral.” By definition, this precludes deliberate attacks on civilian populations. As the Roman Catholic catechism sums up the doctrine: “Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities . . . is a crime against God and man.”
J
JRKH
Guest
What did this article say about the firebombings of English, German and Japanese cities that occurred between 1940 and 1945?
Now we know what Noam Chomsky’s opinion is…So who is Noam Chomsky?
Of course it wasn’t “necessary”. The Japanese had lost the war…The use of the Atomic Bombs wasn’t about “winning the war”, it was about “ending the war” as quickly as possible so as to save as many allied lives as possible - and by extension, many Japanese lives as well.
{Quote]Pope John Paul II declared in 1995: “[T]he direct and voluntary killing of an innocent human being is always gravely immoral.” By definition, this precludes deliberate attacks on civilian populations. As the Roman Catholic catechism sums up the doctrine: “Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities . . . is a crime against God and man.”
And so by the words of the Great JP II, the use of the Atomic Bomb was not a single, unprovoked act to be morally condemned in isolation, but was merely the capstone of one, huge, 15 year, gravely immoral act…Beginning with the attocities committed by the Japanese in their war with China, continuing with Italy’s attacks in Ethiopia, right through Hitler’s actions against civilians in His attacks, and then the “total war” responses of the Allies agaisnt these “aggressor” nations.
The bottom line I guess is this. The use of the Atom Bombs may not be morally justifiable, but there are huge numbers of things that were not morally Justifiable in that war. Singling out the use of the Atomic Bombs for criticism is simply wrong. In fact, in His comments above, JP II is quite correct in NOT singling out the use of Atomic Weapons, but speaks to targeting civilian populations…
Peace
James
S
SnakeMauler
Guest
It’s called a machiavellan decesion, an amoral one. If you think it was bad, then YOU should go back in time and volunteer yourself to invade japan.
R
Ridgerunner
Guest
I’m not a military man or a theologian, so I’m not qualified to give anyone a “definitive” answer. But I will say this. As the lawyers sometimes say about certain kinds of cases, I think the moral jusitifiability of any war or action in war is always “fact driven”. Unfortunately, as they say “history is written by the winners”. Furthermore, at least in modern times, intelligence concerns bury a lot of facts; sometimes well beyond a reasonable time. In the meanwhile, those of us (including myself) who go on facts to which we have access, must realize that there are facts to which we will never have access.
I read an interesting book about a German seminarian who was drafted into the German army in WWII and, oddly enough, further inducted into the SS. He was later expelled from the SS and reverted to plain foot soldier. His book really didn’t detail his activities, but he was clearly involved in some of the fighting. On the other hand, being a seminarian, he did a lot of spiritual work among the ordinary German soldiers, ultimately being specially ordained by the Pope during his own army’s occupation of Rome, notwithstanding that he had not completed his studies. The Pope didn’t tell him to desert or anything, but expected him to bring the sacraments to the German soldiers. I don’t imagine he shot anyone after ordination, because priests are forbidden from shedding blood.
So, was his participation moral or immoral? Whatever the answer is, it was “fact driven”.
A.S. Solzhenitsyn, who developed into a man very much concerned with morality, drew a literary picture of himself as a Captain in the Red Army during the invasion of Germany. He spoke of his pride in his Captain’s epaulets in East Prussia “enshrouded by fire”. He felt shame with that picture, not because of war itself, or because of the evil of the Soviet regime he was defending, or of the casualties his battery inflicted, but because of the pride; a pride he recognized was brought down sharply when he was arrested by SMERSH over some trifle and sent to the GULAG.
On the whole, then, and considering everything, was his participation moral or immoral? He would have said the resolution was “fact driven” but by facts no one else would have thought about.
I think the Church is right in holding that war, in and of itself, is an objectively moral evil. But is one’s participation and are one’s actions, however slight or massive, evil in the subject? The Church does not purport to give us a single answer to that. It’s always “fact driven”, and we are left to form our own (informed) consciences concerning any given war or act in war. And people can, without being morally faulted in doing so, differ.
B
Black_Rose
Guest
So you probably agree that the bombings were not necessary to end the War within a few months, and the bombings were justified because they expedited the inevitable surrender?
Your rhetorical question does not elicit the “correct” response of “yes”.
The Japanese Empire wanted control of the raw materials in the Southeast Pacific. I doubt they had any desire to use nuclear weapons on the civil population of the United States. They may use it to intimidate the conquered peoples into compliance though which would not be inconsistent with the brutality inflicted on the Chinese population during the war.
G
Ghosty
Guest
Read up on the facts of the end of the war. No invasion was necessary to stop Imperial Japan. Their war machine was obliterated, they couldn’t leave their islands as they had no Navy left to speak of, and they were actively offering surrender.
Peace and God bless!
L
Linda_Marie
Guest
This is a little bit off-topic, but there were some miraculous survivals at Hiroshima.
They were all of 8 blocks from ground zero. They not only survived the blast, they did not suffer from radiation exposure and lived for many years afterwards in good health.
This was one of those hard decisions. Either way, thousands would die. Both choices would result in death for innocents. I think fewer innocent died with the A-bomb than would have from an invasion.
I don’t believe for a minute that Japan was ready to surrender before. It was only political distraction in order to buy some time to consolidate their national defense plans.
They were all of 8 blocks from ground zero. They not only survived the blast, they did not suffer from radiation exposure and lived for many years afterwards in good health.
Personally, I’m glad they used the bomb to end the war. My dad, who had served in Europe already, had been transferred to the Pacific and was waiting to invade Japan. They knew that the Japanese would fight tooth and nail for every inch of their homeland. Invasion would be very expensive in terms of lives, both for the Allies and Japanese, far more than died from the A-bombs. Had they not used the bomb, I might not be here.
This was one of those hard decisions. Either way, thousands would die. Both choices would result in death for innocents. I think fewer innocent died with the A-bomb than would have from an invasion.
I don’t believe for a minute that Japan was ready to surrender before. It was only political distraction in order to buy some time to consolidate their national defense plans.
B
beehumble
Guest
I think it has been ascertained that Russian tactical nukes (local battlefield, not strategic missiles or bombers that are used to hit cities) were in the Cuban theatre, and would have been used had we gone ahead with an invasion of Cuba, resulting in nuclear war - WW III.
- Status