To think Obama SHOULD apologise to the people of Japan?

[HappenstanceMarmite]

For his country decimating Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

Yes, he wasn't personally responsible. But I believe a heartfelt apology - and the taking of ownership for his country's atrocity - would mean a lot to the victims' families ...and all of Japan actually.

[Tiggeryoubastard]

My son arrested a particularly violent criminal a couple of weeks ago. During the arrest the criminal was injured (no blame apportioned to son, was also all on camera). Should he go and apologise too?

[badtime]

Happenstance, I think you have misunderstood the responses if you think people are claiming that two wrongs make a right, or that the atomic bombs would be an appropriate revenge or something.

Most people are saying that the actions of the Japanese during the war meant that stopping it quickly (essentially, by intimidation) saved more lives than it cost.

I suggest you read a bit about the size of the conventional bombing raids on Japan, or even better watch the cheery cartoon 'Grave of the Fireflies', then come back and say letting the war drag on would have been a good, or a moral, decision.

[icouldabeenacontender]

My grandad was a POW in Burma.
I can give you a definite NO to your question.

[GreenishMe]

My son arrested a particularly violent criminal a couple of weeks ago. During the arrest the criminal was injured (no blame apportioned to son, was also all on camera). Should he go and apologise too?

Eh??

[Bolograph]

They didn't understand about the future effects of radiation as we do now.

There aren't massive future effects. People died in the few weeks after the bombing from the effect of prompt neutrons, but people died of injuries weeks after Dresden and Tokyo firebombings too. The long term effects have been small and the guy who was present at both bombings only died last year. There is so substantial contamination and no serious next generation effect. And nothing like the effect long term that starving a country of 100m into the Stone Age would have had; estimates have TENS OF MILLIONS as possible deaths by 1947.

[EveryoneElsie]

You dont get it OP.
The Japanese mind set at the time was so severe it took two atomic bombs to get them to quit.

[JassyRadlett]

My great aunt was in a Japanese internment camp and was not liberated until after the war. My grandfather was a POW. Many camps weren't liberated until well after the surrender. If surrender had taken even a few more months there would have been nothing to liberate.

[vvviola]

I've always wondered if the Americans told the Japanese about the weapon they had and that it would be used on them. Then it had to be used twice until they surrendered.

I'm pretty sure some indication was given, Ego, and there was a lot of back-channel stuff ongoing to try to get them to surrender first. However, I'm pretty sure they didn't tell them exactly what was coming.

Part of the point of the bomb was to terrify, and to show Soviet Russia what the U.S. was capable of.

I've lived in Japan, I've been to Hiroshima a number of times (any my perspective changes each time), and I think apologies can be useful things when a country needs to move on from something. Japan as a nation is nowhere ready to move on from its own actions in the war, IMO (I was spat at for reading a book on Nanjing, the refusal to acknowledge what was done to the comfort women, the version of history portrayed in the school textbooks). So I'm not sure an apology to the nation is right. An apology to the people of Hiroshima, now that would be a different matter.

[vvviola]

There aren't massive future effects.

Yes there were. In the same way that the children of Chernobyl suffered decades after the disaster there, there was considerable suffering for years and years after the bombings. One of the hardest parts of the museum in Hiroshima to look at, was the details of the cancers and illnesses suffered by those who survived - and those who went into the city afterwards to help.

[Bolograph]

And they were warned. Post Potsdam they were told that failure to surrender would result in their prompt and utter destruction. I can't remember the exact phrase and can't check right now. They responded to this with a statement, by the government, that they would ignore this contemptuously: mokusatsu. They knew what the usaaf could do with conventional weapons, which was at least as destructive as the nuclear weapons.

[CaveMum]

As someone mentioned on the Jeremy Vine Show at lunchtime, using the bombs probably prevented the Cold War from escalating to the point of utter annihilation - everyone had seen what the bomb could do so no one wanted to be the next to use it.

[GreenishMe]

They knew what the usaaf could do with conventional weapons, which was at least as destructive as the nuclear weapons.

If that's true why did they need to use the nuclear weapons at all?

[Bolograph]

Viola I have been to the museum three times, and seen its perspective change so that there is slightly less denial of there having been a war on than in the 1990s. Yes there were cancers. But at a level barely measurable in difference from the japanese population more widely: about 2000 cancers, total. A day's deaths from starvation in Japan in 1945.

[JassyRadlett]

If that's true why did they need to use the nuclear weapons at all?

Speed and shock. And the Soviets.

[vvviola]

Because there is a huge difference between sending one plane with one bomb (although I have a vague memory there may have been a couple of decoy planes?) than sending squadron after squadron of plane with incendiary devices.

And also, to show they could (as in my post above about proving it to Soviet Russia).

[Bolograph]

If that's true why did they need to use the nuclear weapons at all?

Because that wasn't enough to force a surrender. The bombs proved Japan could not continue: meetinghouse in March did not even though it killed perhaps twice as many civilians.

[Bolograph]

There were no decoy planes but there were weather reconnaissance planes and instrumentation planes. The actual force over Hiroshima was about three aircraft.

[KaRsKiN]

The Nuclear weapons were just a quick way to end the war. The conventional bombing campaign against Japan had been ongoing for months by this point and was at least as destructive if not more so.

Tokyo for example was being regularly firebombed, and the level of destruction there was easily on par with Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

This, coupled with the US Submarine blockade of the Japanese mainland, meant that the people of Japan had been suffering for a long time with no end in sight. The USA knew that if the war continued it would only lead to many millions more casulties on each side. The nuclear weapons allowed them to stop the war there and then, preventing casulties further down the line.

There's a history podcaster called Dan Carlin who makes a point that's something like (I'm paraphrasing); if the rules of the game are insane, can you critcise someone for taking an insane action? We were killing hundreds of thousands of Japanese civillians anyway, what difference does it make if we change the type of bomb used, essentially. Especially seeing as it brought the war to a swift end.

[vvviola]

Really Bolograph? I could have sworn it was much much higher.

My last visit was January 2015 and as they were doing renovations and I was on a flying visit (DH had taken DD1 the previous day, he was waiting in the park with DD1 and DD2 while I did a quick walk through) I didn't spend a lot of time in the stuff on the aftermath, but I could have sworn it was very high (although admittedly, it could have been the radiation sickness things I was thinking of).

Not arguing with you about the potential for huge numbers of deaths had the war carried on - even without the issues of starvation and food supply, the actions of the residents of Okinawa were a good indication of how a land invasion could have gone.

[BeJayKayven]

I don't think so.

[vvviola]

There were no decoy planes but there were weather reconnaissance planes and instrumentation planes. The actual force over Hiroshima was about three aircraft.

It seems my memory must be failing me! I think I need to dig my books back out again. Not sure where I got the idea of decoy aircraft? Perhaps got confused with the idea of multiple possible destinations.

[Bolograph]

The numbers I recall from good quality later studies are about 2000, 10% leukaemia 90% solid. The prompt neutron radiation deaths are higher. Rates of birth defects were up throughout Japan : bad diet, poor ante natal care, dangerous chemicals in factories all at least as significant.

[Bolograph]

Yes, there were weather planes over alternative targets, and Nagasaki was a backup target (Kokaru arsenal was the primary I think). There was only one weapon available for each raid, although there were about ten more in the pipeline which were thankfully never used.

[CaveMum]

There were several different potential target cities, including Tokyo and Kyoto. This is a really interesting BBC article on the cities on the target list.

[Palmtree]

My Grandfather was in a Japanese Prisoner of War camp. Amazingly he was able to keep a diary for 4 years. Herewith a direct quote from it:
"30th August 1945 Since Christmas there has been no incentive to add to this; the surrender of Germany was a great occasion which we were unable to celebrate as firstly we had not the wherewithal, and secondly we were not supposed to know about it. It appeared to us as if the Japs would fight it out to the end as Germany did, in which case we did not think a great deal of our chances of getting out alive. We were very pleased when we heard, first as an unconfirmed rumour and later with certainty of the surrender of Japan. We had visions of the Russians fighting down the peninsular and the Japs making a Stalingrad at Keijo"