Cyprus-Forum.com

[Oracle]

The decision to use the A-Bomb was not taken lightly by Truman or his advisors. The final move to
defeat Japan had to result in unconditional surrender with the fewest number of American casualties possible,
prevent Soviet occupation of territory, and inflict the minimum number of Japanese civilian casualties. The
atomic bomb met the first three conditions, and possibly the fourth, but alternatives were considered.
Using the bomb in a demonstration on an evacuated city or uninhabited area was seriously considered
but rejected on two grounds. The U.S. only had two A-Bombs at this point, and using one in a manner that may
be less than decisive was deemed too risky. Second, if the demo bomb were to be a dud, such a grand failure
would likely fuel Japanese resistance making a full-scale invasion the only alternative.
A second option was an economic war. In 1945 massive bombing raids laid waste to entire cities and
decimated Japan’s war industry and a naval blockade was preventing most imports into the country causing
shortages of food and raw materials. But this was not provoking serious calls for surrender from Japanese
leaders even though it resulted in horrendous collateral damage killing at least 300,000 civilians and leaving 8.5
million others homeless. However, strategic air offensives had not been decisive for the Germans against
Britain or for the Western Allies against Germany. At best this option would require many months, possibly
more than a year, to produce a surrender, and in the process result in several hundred thousand civilian deaths,
the total destruction of Japan’s cities and infrastructure and Soviet occupation of large portions of Asia.
Invasion was the last resort. An assault of the heavily populated, mountainous, island of Kyushu, the
southern most island of Japan, was scheduled for November 1, 1945. 800,000 assault troops would be involved
in this initial stage, five times the number involved in the D-Day landings. In April an invasion seemed
plausible, but by July, Japanese forces on Kyushu had tripled to over 650,000. If the recent battle of Okinawa
was any indicator, the expected number of American casualties would be over 300,000 and combined Japanese
military and civilian casualties would exceed two million in the first months alone. By the second stage, Japan
was expected to have 6,000,000 troops on their home islands and up to 28,000,000 additional “volunteers” of
the Civilian Militia, which consisted of poorly trained and equipped boys, old men and women. Truman and
most of his advisors believed an invasion would be the worst scenario for both America and Japan.

http://www.libraries.psu.edu/maps/text/HIROSHIMA.pdf

Also remember that since the military complexes were the target they were mostly ground zero. Many of the dead were military troops, and a number were military industry workers.

I was almost getting convinced that America had no choice but to use these bombs, because it wasn't making much impact on the Japanese, then I found this link below and it put the bombings into perspective.

Nuclear weapons are for the Americans, a way of causing the same amount of destruction and death on people, as they can well manage by conventional weapons, but it leaves the Americans without a hair out of place, whilst inflicting maximum injuries on the enemy ....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=er2xCn3_QcQ

What is there to make one think twice about using nuclear weapons (or threatening to use them) against all whom you wish to control?

[Novus]

Your anti American sentiment and selective reading of history is unfair.
We burned half of Tokyo and a hundred thousand of their citizens killed in a few days and they STILL didn't surrender!! They showed how little they cared about their own people, or just how much they were willing to lose to win the war at all costs. Using the bomb worked at saving maybe millions of lives.

By the way, firebombing Tokyo was also not a war crime in 1945. In Tokyo there was a war industry on a cottage industry level. In other words, many assembly and machining operations were done all throughout parts of the city. Some of the industry was centralised, some was not in Tokyo especially after when we destroyed the main factories.
The last ditch Arisaka rifle, or the Type 99, had parts made throughot the cities and therefore the weapons manufacture was present throughout the population.

McNamara was talking about "proportioned response" in the video you linked to, but "war is hell" and just like with self defense, you have a right to use whatever force to defend yourself if your existence is threatened.
Japan started the war, Japan made the war the most brutal war in the century, Japan continued the war and Japan was not going to give up until they brought the brutality to its extreme. Using the bombs was the right decision at the time and I hope humanity learns the lesson from it the ultimate costs so that no country starts a war like it ever again.

"You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices to-day than any of you to secure peace."
William Tecumseh Sherman, 1864

[Oracle]

Well I don't consider myself as anti-American just "anti-Republican, foreign policy".

America has established itself as a dominant force through the daring use of these bombs, so it deserves a little criticism.

If it was not an experiment, as you prefer to believe, and the devastating effects, as well as long-term after-effects were known or predictable, then it had a moral duty to warn those civilians or their leaders, of what it was about to do.

I still feel they did not know perhaps how destructive and effective each bomb was going to be (and don't forget, they tested two different types), so they chose to leave people in-situ as if in an experiment.

Meanwhile we have some useful epidemiological statistics on the carcinogenic effects and birth abnormalities induced by radiation.

[Novus]

#1 Truman was a democrat, not a Republican.

#2 The US only had two daring uses of the bombs in one war. None since.
Criticism is justly deserved however as with all countries that have nuclear weapons are open to the same criticism.

#3 The long term after effects of radiation exposure were not well known or well understood. The levels that were thought to be acceptable at that time for even American soldiers and American civillian nuclear research workers in history were hundreds to thousands of times higher than is what is known today to be safe.
Also, Truman and America DID warn the civilian population after the first bomb with dropped leaflets and radio broadcatsts that it will happen again in a major city if Japan does not surrender.

#4 It was not an experiment, they knew the basic destructive aspects of the blast and the blast is what they were trying to demonstrate to the japanese leadership in order to get them to surrender. The fallout effects was mostly unknown because there was absolutely no precedent to learn this from.