Originally posted by Delmer
The immediate short term effect was the end of WWII.
Yes, but it was also like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
All it required is to get some Japanese diplomat to see the bomb tests. That would have been enough to scare them into submission.
Even considering this. Was TWO nuclear bombs really necessary?
Originally posted by lauseyThe bombs were not dropped at the same time. The Japanese could have surrendered after the first and avoided the dropping of the second.
Yes, but it was also like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.
All it required is to get some Japanese diplomat to see the bomb tests. That would have been enough to scare them into submission.
Even considering this. Was TWO nuclear bombs really necessary?
"All it required is to get some Japanese diplomat to see the bomb tests. That would have been enough to scare them into submission." That's just naive, lausey.
Originally posted by DelmerExactly, the Japanese were willing to continue the fighting until their homeland was safe from invasion. The U.S. felt that a big message needed to be sent, and it was.
The bombs were not dropped at the same time. The Japanese could have surrendered after the first and avoided the dropping of the second.
"All it required is to get some Japanese diplomat to see the bomb tests. That would have been enough to scare them into submission." That's just naive, lausey.
Originally posted by Wildfire
Exactly, the Japanese were willing to continue the fighting until their homeland was safe from invasion. The U.S. felt that a big message needed to be sent, and it was.
Trueman was still aware of the destructive power that the nuclear bomb had. There were still other possible solutions.
Ok, I admit showing a nuclear bomb test alone would not have been enough, but the US should have also made Japan aware that Russia had rebuilt their army and was wanting to invade. Combined with the US invasion. Japan they could have realised that they would have not had a chance.
The Manhattan Project was initially a deterrent against the Germans. Trueman was so eager to use nuclear bombs in war that he thought that Japan was the perfect excuse. No where near the last resort as the public were lead to believe.
Originally posted by lauseyIt was Truman's call. He made it. The war ended. Maybe he'd have called it differently from 60 years in the future but he didn't have that option.
Trueman was still aware of the destructive power that the nuclear bomb had. There were still other possible solutions.
Ok, I admit showing a nuclear bomb test alone would not have been enough, but the US should have also made Japan aware that Russia had rebuilt their army and was wanting to invade. Combined with the US invasion. Japan they could have rea ...[text shortened]... apan was the perfect excuse. No where near the last resort as the public were lead to believe.
Originally posted by welsharnieActually, weapons do help quite a lot of people. Not in the killing sense, but weapons are an effective deterrent against invasion and other nasty complications like that. As for your comment about America needing to devote more money to domestic issues, I agree with you in the sense that the U.S. needs to cut back on defense expenditures and focus on improving the swiftly crumbling infrastructure.
Maybe America should consider putting money into helping its own people rather than spending billions on weapons which help noone.
The discussion on the dropping of the atomic bombs is riddled with historical inaccuracies. First, the US was perfectly aware of radiation sickness and the long and short term damage it could do; people had died at both Los Alamos and Oak Ridge (where the uranium was processed) of radiation poisoning.
Second, there is little doubt that the dropping of the atomic bombs was NOT necessary to end the war and that was known at the time nor was it, paradoxically, certain to. The Japanese were willing to surrender and had sent messages through the Russians to that effect. The problem was the US insisted on unconditional surrender. The main thing the Japanese wanted were assurances that the Emperor wouldn't get tried as a war criminal; the US never planned to do so and this would have been a fairly minor concession. However, for political reasons the US wanted unconditional surrender only. I still don't see that it would have been a big problem though to announce an unconditional surrender and then do exactly what was done anyway.
The military logic behind the dropping of the atomic bombs has never been impressive; several military leaders, including Ike and Admiral Sharp (Chief of Naval Operations at the time) did not feel the A-bombs were necessary. Japan's war making power was gone and then knew they were beaten. The first bomb was dropped two days before the Soviet entry into the war (the date having been agreed in early 1945 before Germany's surrender); that event alone which the Japanese were dreading may have forced a quick Japanese surrender. As it was, the Soviets smashed through the Japanese crack troops in Manchuria almost immediately; some historians believe that this fact was more central to the Japanese military's agreement to surrender than the A-Bombs. After all, the US had been systemically firebombing Japanese cities for months, in some cases killing more civilians immediately than the first A-Bomb did. Thus, it is uncertain why the dropping of the A-Bombs which destroyed two cities would have caused the Japanese to surrender when similar destruction did not.
It seems clear that Truman wanted to use the A-Bomb BEFORE Soviet entry to scare the Soviets; after all, what would have been lost by delaying the A-Bombs a few days to see if the Japanese surrendered because of Soviet entry? Nothing if the idea was to end the war quickly. A lot if the purpose of the A-Bomb was to be used as a Cold War lever against our then allies.