Why Truman Dropped the Bomb

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I thought that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were military targets.

However, we did target civilians during bombing campaigns in Germany, for the purpose of demoralizing the population. Obviously, that was morally wrong.

A nuclear weapon, in and of itself, is no different than any other weapon, and similar moral rules would apply.

The bombs used in WW-II were relatively small yield, compared to the 1 to 10 megaton warheads that were on alert during the Cold War.

In theory, even a 1 megaton bomb could be used against a military target without targeting civilians. Many missile silos were hardened to such an extent that it would take a direct hit from a 1 megaton warhead to ensure that they were taken out. And most were located in remote areas.

I’m not in any way advocating the use of nuclear weapons. But the moral considerations that apply to their use apply equally to other types of weapons.
 
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Pete2:
Thank you Gilliam, I agree with you. I apologize that I used your name directly and associated you with Vern like that. I don’t mean to personally attack, if that’s what it’s called.
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But I’m still the anti-Christ? http://forums.catholic-questions.org/images/icons/icon12.gif
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Pete2:
Either way, I am deeply offended by people who coldly justify the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians. When it comes down to it, we’re all God’s people on this earth, and states and borders aren’t really all that important in the face of needless death. To just coldly brush off the US’s brutal bombing of Japanese cities like it was some brilliant calculated military tactic is sinful.

Pete
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You might think about how others feel when someone begins to say certain people are definitely in hell. Nothing in Catholic doctrine allows one to make such a pronouncement.

And, analyzing the outcomes of other alternatives forces us to conclude that the most merciful thing was to bring the war to a quick end. Far fewer lives were lost that way.
 
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JimG:
I thought that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were military targets.
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Yes, but they also were cities. It would be like blowing up Alameda, CA or Colorado Springs, CO – Both ground zero sites for the USSR and now for China.
 
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gilliam:
Yes, but they also were cities. It would be like blowing up Alameda, CA or Colorado Springs, CO – Both ground zero sites for the USSR and now for China.
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In an all out, no holds barred war, they are legitimate targets (Colorado Springs is NORAD?). There are several more, Niagara Falls, for example. Not necessarily military, but because of the power generation.
 
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mjdonnelly:
In an all out, no holds barred war, they are legitimate targets (Colorado Springs is NORAD?). There are several more, Niagara Falls, for example. Not necessarily military, but because of the power generation.
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Yes NORAD is in Co. Springs (that is unclassified info by the way).

And carpet bombing or nuking cities is not legitimate anymore. That is way going back into history is so hard. We didn’t have to technology to pin-point strikes and reduce civilian casualties as we do today.
 
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gilliam:
Yes NORAD is in Co. Springs (that is unclassified info by the way).

And carpet bombing or nuking cities is not legitimate anymore. That is way going back into history is so hard. We didn’t have to technology to pin-point strikes and reduce civilian casualties as we do today.
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Mutually assured destruction is still used, even if it isn’t in the front of the training books.

Not the brightest of solutions though.
 
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mjdonnelly:
Mutually assured destruction is still used, even if it isn’t in the front of the training books.

Not the brightest of solutions though.
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In the Infantry, we have a saying, “If it’s stupid and it works – it isn’t stupid.”
 
vern humphrey:
And, analyzing the outcomes of other alternatives forces us to conclude that the most merciful thing was to bring the war to a quick end. Far fewer lives were lost that way.
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No one ever mentions how far along the Japanese government was in their atomic weaponry research either…it was a great deal closer than we were led to think at the time.
 
Doesn’t cathechism 1756 apply here though?
It is therefore an error to judge the morality of human acts by considering only the intention that inspires them or the circumstances (environment, social pressure, duress or emergency, etc.) which supply their context. There are acts which, in and of themselves, independently of circumstances and intentions, are always gravely illicit by reason of their object; such as blasphemy and perjury, murder and adultery. One may not do evil so that good may result from it.
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(emphasis mine).

This seems to apply to the dropping of an atomic bomb that kills innocent women and children, no matter how good the intention of those doing it.

It also seems to me that even if you could put together an argument that somehow manages to circumvent this for the dropping of the first bomb, dropping the second bomb also on a densely populated area can’t be justified.

Mike
 
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MikeWM:
Doesn’t cathechism 1756 apply here though?

(emphasis mine).

This seems to apply to the dropping of an atomic bomb that kills innocent women and children, no matter how good the intention of those doing it.

It also seems to me that even if you could put together an argument that somehow manages to circumvent this for the dropping of the first bomb, dropping the second bomb also on a densely populated area can’t be justified.

Mike
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Why didn’t you stop them from dropping the bomb?

Now, if that sounds silly, it makes a point – those of us who are so removed in time cannot make damning moral judgements like those being made here. We can only look at history and see the reasoning of those making the decision.

We can also look at alternative outcomes – the deaths predicted during an invasion, and the deaths that would certainly have occurred during the winter of '45-'46.

Dropping the bomb saved lives. And since the first bomb did not produce an immediate surrender, the second bomb was dropped. Given the state of affairs in Japan, a few week’s delay would have comdemned half the population of Japan to death in the winter of '45-'46.
 
I’ve asked our friends over on whyislam.org message boards to check out this thread. The allies’ use of atomic weapons to end WWII is mentioned there more than I would have expected.

Jim
 
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LtTony:
I’ve asked our friends over on whyislam.org message boards to check out this thread. The allies’ use of atomic weapons to end WWII is mentioned there more than I would have expected.

Jim
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Of course it is. And if we had let the war drag on until '46, they’d be talking about all the deaths from starvation and exposure in Japan.

People who hate will dredge up anything they can use and put a spin on to justify their hatred. People who don’t hate themselves, but who identify with groups that do will follow suit.
 
vern humphrey:
Dropping the bomb saved lives. And since the first bomb did not produce an immediate surrender, the second bomb was dropped. Given the state of affairs in Japan, a few week’s delay would have comdemned half the population of Japan to death in the winter of '45-'46.
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None of this is relevant if the action of nuking a city is itself immoral. That’s the relevant question here. And before you claim “principle of double effect” remember that this refers to justifying an unintended but unavoidable evil effect, not justifying an evil *action *(if you claim otherwise then may I assume you support embryonic stem cell research?)
 
Philip P:
None of this is relevant if the action of nuking a city is itself immoral. That’s the relevant question here. And before you claim “principle of double effect” remember that this refers to justifying an unintended but unavoidable evil effect, not justifying an evil *action *(if you claim otherwise then may I assume you support embryonic stem cell research?)
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If you were correct, surgery would be immoral, because the action of cutting another person open is immoral.http://forums.catholic-questions.org/images/icons/icon10.gif
 
I love those people that think christianity is a suicide pact .That christians should just turn the other cheek continually. THey must have been great supporters of chamberlain in the 1930’.His policies cost what, 32,000,000 lives.
If Japan or Germany had developed the A bomb how squeemish do you think they would have been in picking targets.
Japan killed approximately 10,000,000 chinese in their un-declared war with China . In Nanking alone they murdered 350,000 people after the city surrendered.
Truman was Right, he was a great man who did the Right thing!!!
 
vern humphrey:
We can also look at alternative outcomes – the deaths predicted during an invasion, and the deaths that would certainly have occurred during the winter of '45-'46.
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We can’t do that though, as Catholics. The Cathechism couldn’t be more clear on this point.
Dropping the bomb saved lives. And since the first bomb did not produce an immediate surrender, the second bomb was dropped. Given the state of affairs in Japan, a few week’s delay would have comdemned half the population of Japan to death in the winter of '45-'46.
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They quite plausibly weren’t given time to surrender - it took a further three days after Nagasaki for them to decide to surrender.

I reiterate - I can see an argument for the first bomb, though I don’t see how I can justify it as a Catholic. I can’t see any justification for the second, at least not in a highly-populated area.

Mike
 
Normally, when we think of people who use consequentialist arguments, we think of liberals, whether religious or secular. They say that an action is moral if its eventual result is desirable.

One argument used in favor of abortion, for example, is that the practice results in a lower rate of poverty (through the expedient of not producing more poor people). Similarly, the confiscation and redistribution of other people’s wealth is good if it results in more money in the pockets of the poor.

In a consequentialist argument one looks not at the morality of an act but at its long-term consequences. It is truly a case of the ends justifying the means.

It is interesting to note that in this thread, and in others about the use of atomic weapons in World War II, it is conservatives who use consequentialist arguments. Many rationales for the bombing are offered:

If the bombs had not been dropped on Japan, more Americans would have died or more Japanese would have died–or both. Hiroshima and Nagasaki really were military targets. Every Japanese older than a child was really a combatant. The Japanese literally would have fought to the last man, woman, and (older) child. Japanese diplomatic feelers regarding surrender were non-existent or just not plausible. The Emperor would have been overthrown in a coup had the war continued. Japanese scientists were working on a bomb of their own. The Japanese did not need oil and so could have fought on indefinitely. Allied losses at Iwo Jima and Okinawa had been large.

The list goes on. What I find curious is that there is not much in the discussion about Catholic moral principles. You can read most of the posts and have no clue that the writers are Catholics or even Christians. Their arguments could have appeared in secular(ist) journals.

And yet most of these same folks, on other threads, are clearly Catholic in their arguments. Yet on this topic it seems that nationalistic considerations trump religious ones, at least in terms of how arguments are phrased. The result is a wide divide between the arguers.

All this makes me think that there is material here for an instructive monograph on how Catholics engage in arguments.
 
Thanks Karl. OK Vern, are you willing to project ‘what if’? Let’s say we had to do it over again. Let’s say we knew as much about nukes then as we do now. Let’s say a decision was made not to nuke Japan. Was there another way to end the Pacific War? Could we have provided heat and food for the Japanese during that winter? Would that have turned the minds and hearts of the Japanese around in time to achieve a lasting peace?

You know, Karl, it’s pretty challenging asking us to consider another option. If it were up to me alone, then I can do that. But I wasn’t even alive. It’s the looks on my parent’s faces when the subject of the Pacific War comes up. My grandmother was interned by the Japanese, you know. Her friend in San Francisco (a wealthy banker) saved her life. Strange feelings come up for me when you ask me to think of it in another way. To tell you the truth, I don’t even know what those feelings are.

The other alternative, of course, is for us to have lost the War. That is the stuff of Philip K Dick novels.
 
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