Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Truman was right to use the bomb on Japan
Washington Post ^ | August 17, 2015 | By Richard Cohen

Posted on 08/18/2015 9:47:06 PM PDT by Brad from Tennessee

Should the United States apologize for the nuclear bombing of Japan at the end of World War II? The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 70 years ago this month, killed as many as 250,000 people, most of them civilians. For many of the victims, it was a horrible, excruciating death, and for many others, the effects of burns and radiation, although not immediately lethal, produced years of agony. Should we say we’re sorry?

My answer is no, but I do not dismiss the question out of hand. It is, after all, naggingly relevant, raising issues of proportion, race and culture. A recent article on the Web site of the decidedly liberal magazine the Nation makes three points. The bombings were animated by racial animus, they were disproportionate to the number of U.S. deaths that might have resulted from an invasion of the Japanese mainland and the bombs amounted to wretched excess: Japan was ready to surrender anyway.

Maybe so. But an imminent Japanese surrender was hardly apparent at the time. Instead, even as the war was ending, the Japanese fought nearly to the last man on Iwo Jima, a month-long battle in which almost 7,000 U.S. Marines were killed. Of the 21,000 Japanese soldiers on the island, only about 200 were taken prisoner. Some held out for weeks in caves. Still later in 1945, the Japanese fought tenaciously until mid-June to hold Okinawa. That battle cost 14,000 American lives.

There was reason to believe that Japan would never surrender and that an invasion of the main Japanese islands would result in staggering U.S. casualties. . .

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; Japan
KEYWORDS: harrystruman; hiroshima; japan; nagasaki
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-40 next last

1 posted on 08/18/2015 9:47:06 PM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

He saved a lot of American lives. That’s all that matters.


2 posted on 08/18/2015 9:49:40 PM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (Cecil the Lion says, Stop the Slaughter of the Baby Humans!!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

Obama tried to apologize a few years back, but the Japanese told him not to.


3 posted on 08/18/2015 9:50:49 PM PDT by TigerClaws
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

The Japanese were forewarned of the bombs and did not surrender so how the claim can be made that they were about to surrender is a mystery.


4 posted on 08/18/2015 9:51:32 PM PDT by Calpublican (The Republican Party has become corrupt!!!!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

If Truman had been a Republican the WAPO would not publish an article approving his actions.


5 posted on 08/18/2015 9:53:00 PM PDT by Calpublican (The Republican Party has become corrupt!!!!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

Obama tried to apologize to the Japanese:

http://www.hawaiifreepress.com/ArticlesMain/tabid/56/ID/5229/Wikileaks-Japan-refused-Obama-Hiroshima-Apology.aspx


6 posted on 08/18/2015 9:53:57 PM PDT by TigerClaws
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

Truman succeeded in keeping Stalins hands off of Japan, which if defeated just a month or two later would have been divided into a US controlled, South Japan and a USSR controlled, North Japan, as with Germany until recently and Korea to this very day.


7 posted on 08/18/2015 9:55:21 PM PDT by gaijin
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

Truman was right to use the bomb on Japan...


And in other news, Sun Sets in the West...


8 posted on 08/18/2015 10:00:21 PM PDT by cuban leaf (The US will not survive the obama presidency. The world may not either.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Calpublican

The battle for Okinawa was a clue as to how hard the Japanese would defend their Home Islands.

Surrender was disgrace in the Bushido code, and the only way they would surrender, civilians included, is if the Emperor told them to. Which he did when he concluded we were liable to blast all of Japan apart.


9 posted on 08/18/2015 10:00:58 PM PDT by Pelham (Deo Vindice)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: Calpublican

Really??? I have never heard that.


10 posted on 08/18/2015 10:01:40 PM PDT by Dilbert San Diego
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: gaijin

I’ve read that is one of the main reasons we dropped the Fat Man. The message was clear: This was not a “one off” thing.


11 posted on 08/18/2015 10:02:50 PM PDT by cuban leaf (The US will not survive the obama presidency. The world may not either.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

If we’d conducted WWII the way we currently execute war, we’d be speaking German and Japanese.


12 posted on 08/18/2015 10:02:53 PM PDT by umgud
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Pelham

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall

The bombs saved millions of lives.


13 posted on 08/18/2015 10:05:06 PM PDT by cuban leaf (The US will not survive the obama presidency. The world may not either.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: cuban leaf

The Yalta Agreement required Stalin within a short time after Hitlers defeat to be in on the fall of Japan and early signs were Stalin would never leave ANYTHING he laid hands on.

The only islands Japan screams about having lost (two north of Hokkaido) are STILL occupied by Russia.

Also the main reason the Japanese gave up when they did is because they knew a Russian requirement would be, like the Tsar, the execution of the Emperor and probably much of his family.


14 posted on 08/18/2015 10:10:53 PM PDT by gaijin
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: gaijin

Yes. And it would be worse than that. The USSR would have controlled a large portion of China, all of Korea as well as much of Japan. Dropping the atom bomb on Japan stopped the USSR in its tracks at the 38th parallel in Korea. They were all set to invade Japan but settled on taking Japanese held territory they already controlled at the time the bomb was dropped. Long ago I worked with an elderly Russian man who lived in China and was taken prisoner by the Japanese. There were lots of Russian enclaves in north China, and they suffered in prison camps. The Russians would have exacted revenge on Japan if they invaded Japan at the end of WWII, far in excess of what could be imagined.


15 posted on 08/18/2015 10:11:25 PM PDT by roadcat
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: Calpublican

“The Japanese were forewarned of the bombs and did not surrender”

exactly. It was their emperor and their rotten War Council who were still gung-ho. Heck, after the first mushroom cloud, they STILL didn’t say uncle.


16 posted on 08/18/2015 10:13:48 PM PDT by max americana (fired liberals in our company last election, and I laughed while they cried (true story))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: Calpublican
so how the claim can be made that they were about to surrender is a mystery.

Not to liberals, all things are as they feel or imagine them to be. Reality and facts do not matter.

17 posted on 08/18/2015 10:15:37 PM PDT by doorgunner69
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: Brad from Tennessee

My brain saw Trump instead of Truman. I thought, “What did he do now?” Heh. It’s late.


18 posted on 08/18/2015 10:16:51 PM PDT by BuckeyeTexan (There are those that break and bend. I'm the other kind. ~Steve Earle)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Dilbert San Diego; Pelham

Yes, I have read in several histories that the US government gave warning before any bomb was dropped. After the first bomb they were warned there would be another and still they did not surrender. The Japanese were very tough. (See Pelham’s response also on this thread.)


19 posted on 08/18/2015 10:17:19 PM PDT by Calpublican (The Republican Party has become corrupt!!!!!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: gaijin

Yep. Everyone knew even then that it was better to surrender to the US than to the USSR. ;-)


20 posted on 08/18/2015 10:17:38 PM PDT by cuban leaf (The US will not survive the obama presidency. The world may not either.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-40 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson