If the incineration of Hiroshima was justifiable as a means to end the war and save American lives -- a thesis that even most liberal Americans accept -- what was the justification for the destruction of Nagasaki three days later before Japan had a chance to grasp the message from the first nuclear attack?
First, it is not true that most American liberals (an inapt term for the topic at hand, but let it pass) accept that even the Hiroshima bombing was justified. Even so, it would be helpful to examine the context in which the two atom bombings took place, especially from the Japanese perspective.
At the time of the bombing, Japan was ruled by a cabinet consisting of nine men, most of whom were members of the Army or Navy (there was no independent Japanese air force or marine corps). Emperor Hirohito's role in the workings and edicts of the cabinet was strictly prescribed by ancient tradition plus severe restraints emplaced on royal authority as Japan had westernized in the latter half of the 19th century. Hirohito attended cabinet meetings but did not speak. The emperor's real role was to approve the decisions taken by the cabinet, and the decisions of the cabinet had to be unanimous by law and tradition.
Militarists dominated the cabinet in 1945 although there were civilian members who wanted to sue for a negotiated peace. However, all cabinet members were concretely agreed that no peace could be acceptable that did not leave intact the office and symbols of the emperor. Unless that guarantee could be given by the Allies, even the peace-inclined cabinet members were agreed the war should continue. (However, there was never any agreement in the cabinet what other acceptable terms should be.)
It didn't take long for the cabinet to learn what type of weapon had destroyed Hiroshima on Aug. 6. Japanese physicists realized before Nagasaki's destruction that an atom bomb had been used and had informed the cabinet. Although the cabinet realized the bomb added a new dimension to the war, they did not change their basic perceptions on whether or how to continue the war simply because America possessed and used atomic bombs.
Further excellent historical discussion can be found in Callimachus' recent post, beginning here.
I think we cannot put ourselves back into 1945 and judge those that made the decisions. We weren't living then, and cannot compare our relatively comfortable lives to then.
Most of the criticism I've read regarding nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki is based on the assumption that the US government had god like omniscience powers.
... it is not true that most American liberals (an inapt term for the topic at hand, but let it pass) accept that even the Hiroshima bombing was justified.
Excluding post-sixties "liberals" who change their minds every 20 minutes, I think this is one thing Brahma Chellaney gets right. For decades, liberals (and conservatives, and the legendary middlin' folk) were fairly uniform in their approval.
Apart from that, Chellaney sounds like he went to school in Japan. Or took a correspondence course from Dr. Helen Caldicott, the Dumbest Australian on Earth.
To pick some nits: Tokyo was not bombed with "jellied petroleum" (i.e., Napalm). It was bombed with high explosive and incendiary bombs, and being a city made almost entirely of wood it turned into a firestorm.
"The mass death and destruction set off celebrations in some American cities." Note the very, very nasty moral equivalence that Chellaney is tossing off there. Unlike those who celebrated 9/11 (and what the hell - I hereby accuse Brahma Chellaney, just because I don't like him) Americans did not celebrate "death and destruction", but a long-awaited end to death and destruction. Which they did not start.
"Picturesque Nagasaki became the second victim of nuclear holocaust ..." You can blow your "holocaust" out of your picturesque butt, Chellaney. Selective use of pathos and bathos is typical of moral idiots. So not only are you a moral idiot, you are a boringly typical moral idiot.
>>I think we cannot put ourselves back into 1945 and judge those that made the decisions. We weren't living then, and cannot compare our relatively comfortable lives to then.
Let's try that again:
"I think we cannot put outselves back into 1939 and judge Hitler's/Stalin's decisions. We weren't living then, and cannot compare our relatively comfortable lives to then."
See the problem?
>>Most of the criticism I've read regarding nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki is based on the assumption that the US government had god like omniscience powers.
Well, left-wing peaceniks with no military experience like Douglas MacArthur and Dwight Eisenhower thought dropping the bombs was unnecessary and immoral. But what did they know?
Here's an amusing thought from Aaron over at Catallarchy:
"If saving lives by killing innocents was a valid argument (and there are several unfounded assumptions in the Hiroshima/Nagasaki argument even there), the US could have rounded up the population of Okinawa, and executed one person per minute til the Japanese agreed to surrender. More humane than dying from radiation poisoning, and maybe far less than 200,000 would have died. Barbaric? Absolutely. Terrorism? Unquestionably. But I see no way anyone who supports killing at least as many civilians via incindiary or nuclear aerial bombing could validly object."
T.J. Madison:
"Douglas MacArthur and Dwight Eisenhower ... what did they know?"
What indeed.
It appears MacArthur was never even asked about the matter at the time.
There is little doubt doubt that Japan could have been defeated eventually without atomic bombing.
But is non-atomic bombing also ruled out?
Then you are down to blockade, and presumably "precision" bombing of specific military/industrial targets.
Precisely how precise should such bombing be, and what targets are permissable, to be considered acceptable in a nice moral calculus?
And why is it acceptable to kill in the high thousands to millions range by starvation, or in the course of an invasion, but not by bombing?
Given the standpoint of a higher responsibity for the lives of ones own and allied servicemen and civilians than those of the enemy, military or civilian, which was the nature of Total War, the question was: why NOT use atomic weapons?
The answer for this one is easy. The Japanese leaders would have let us execute everyone on Okinawa. They'd already domonstrated the willingness to sacrifice everyone on Okinawa with the arragements made to defend against it's invasion. Their whole ethos was about death before dishonor, so Okinawan captives, by there very existence, were already proved to be dishonorable.
Bonus point.. executing Okinawas didn't demonstrate any improved ability to visit destruction on the Japanese home island.
>>The answer for this one is easy. The Japanese leaders would have let us execute everyone on Okinawa. They'd already domonstrated the willingness to sacrifice everyone on Okinawa with the arragements made to defend against it's invasion. Their whole ethos was about death before dishonor, so Okinawan captives, by there very existence, were already proved to be dishonorable.
Ok, that changes the scenario slightly: let the Okinawans loose and hunt them all for sport. Send the Japanese government photos of their peoples' honorable (yet futile) deaths.
My question here is, to what extent does the Japanese leadership actually CARE about what happens to Japanese civilians? If they view their own population as merely resources to be consumed, then it makes little sense to kill Japanese in droves with the goal of manipulating the leadership. If the leadership actually feels responsible for the population, then sending them photos of conventional atrocities perpetrated against their people should be enough to make them knuckle under, no? Would lack of surrender after the conventional firebombings be evidence of the former?
Another question comes to mind: why not nuke the LEADERSHIP?
I recall an anecdote about a conversation between Hitler and one of his aides, in which Hitler was discussing intimidating the British into surrender through terror bombing. The aide asked Hitler whether such bombing would work against the German people. Hitler responded (correctly) that no, the German people could not be broken in such a manner, that such bombing would merely stiffen their resolve and improve their loyalty. The aide then asked Hitler why he expected the British to behave differently.
Killing alone will not force a voluntary surrender. The killing must be shown to be (a)replicable (b) at costs that can be borne.
(a) Killing everyone in an isolated location like Okinawa would not demonstrate the capacity to inflict mass casualties on the Japanese mainland.
(b) Would Americans continue to suffer tens of thousands dead in places like Okinawa?
The atomic bomb not only killed many, but demonstated an ability to continue to do so at little risk to Americans. Even the firebombings could not do this.
T.J.,
For this senario to standup, you'll have to show that captive Okinawan's were as valuable to the Japanese junta as the people on the main island or show how their deaths would threaten the leadership in way similar to the atomic attacks.
Keep trying though!
>>The atomic bomb not only killed many, but demonstated an ability to continue to do so at little risk to Americans. Even the firebombings could not do this.
At this point in the war the Japanese had a negligible number of functional interceptors and could not make more. Hitting B-29s at >8km up with AA was pretty tough. So the risk associated with continued conventional bombings was basically mechanical failure. This risk wasn't enough to stop the 1000 plane conventional bombing raid launched the day before the surrender.
>>For this senario to standup, you'll have to show that captive Okinawan's were as valuable to the Japanese junta as the people on the main island or show how their deaths would threaten the leadership in way similar to the atomic attacks.
Didn't the military forces on Okinawa resist with maximum ferocity? This would tend to indicate that the Japanese leadership thought that the territory, at least, was pretty important.
Nuking the main island does demonstrate a capacity to nuke the leadership directly. This brings up the obvious question of, why not nuke the leadership directly? Why try to intimidate the leaders, who were known to be stone killers, by threatening "their" civilians, when repeated firebombing had failed to intimidate them?
The following propositions are somewhat incompatible:
1. The Japanese junta are so hard-core that they are willing to sacrifice their nation's entire population in a national suicide defending against invasion.
2. The Japanese junta can be psychologically broken if we just apply more force against their population.
TJ -- you're distorting the historical record.
1. Okinawa was a total butcher's bill: 110,000 Japanese soldiers dead, only 5,000 surrendered; 100,000 dead Okinawan civilians; and 22,000 Americans, including 5,000 Sailors; 300 ships damaged including two aircraft carriers severely, and over 30 ships sunk. The fighting lasted from March to June.
It's reasonable to assume that the invasion of the home islands would have produced millions of casualties. It's also reasonable to assume that in a democracy, such casualties when other means to forestall them and still achieve victory meant there was enourmous political pressure on Truman and the Cabinet to avoid another Okinawa.
2. The Army Air Force under Curtis LeMay (yeah, him) conducted 1,000 plane raids that killed over 200,000 in Tokyo alone. LeMay's plan to defeat Japan was to strip Europe of all the B-17s and B-24's, fly them out of Okinawa along with B-29's and conduct 10,000 plane raids with intense area bombing down to the VILLAGE LEVEL. He might well have killed as many as 5 million Japanese under this plan.
3. The Navy planned to blockade and starve the Japanese out, under this plan the War would have continued under the same conditions in Manchuria, China, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, the Philippines, and elsewhere with more American soldiers dying.
4. MacArthur wanted of course an invasion, and ignored radio intercepts that told the tale of Japanese troops and prepared strong points ala Okinawa and Iwo Jima right at the invasion points. The Navy under King was ready to revolt from it's assent for invasion and even others in the Army had serious reservations after the Okinawa bloodbath (though not MacArthur who dreamed of "glory").
Troops in China could not re-inforce the Imperial Army at home, but then neither could Okinawa be re-inforced. The Soviets lost 200,000 men in the taking of Berlin when the struggle was already over in practical terms, a prepared and fanatical enemy can inflict enormous casualties.
There was no particularly good strategy available to the President and the Cabinet. The Navy and Army Air Force plans would continue the war, perhaps into 1947 and the American public wanted it OVER and the killing of their men stopped. MacArthur's plan would have invoked horrible carnage in a WWI Somme style horror. Even after dropping the bomb, the reverses in Manchuria with the Soviet entry into the War, considerable elements in the War Cabinet in Japan wanted to fight on, believing that killing "enough" Americans would lead the Americans to offer a deal that would leave Imperial Japan, the Militarists, and most if not all of their gains in China and Southeast Asia intact.
Hirohito used the Atomic Bombs as an excuse to argue for surrender, noting that they were such an order of magnitude greater than anything that Japan posessed that there was no "shame" in bowing to that force. Even so it was a close run thing with a last-minute coup attempt to continue the War.
I don't think the WWII bombing campaign on Japan was intended to be conducted like the current Verizon "Can You Hear Me Know" marketing campaign. I expect the intended results between the two campaigns were different in some ways.
That said, I think Japan got the message. Hats off to the WWII "communicators" who ended that campaign with exclamation marks...!!
>>Beacuse we needed a legitimate Japanese government to surrender to us and order ALL their forces worldwide to stand down.
Using this logic, assassination attempts against Hitler, Himmler, etc. would have been ill-advised and would have prolonged the war, right?
I was operating under the assumption that without a functioning command structure, supply system, etc., modern military forces tend to disintegrate.
>>Hirohito used the Atomic Bombs as an excuse to argue for surrender, noting that they were such an order of magnitude greater than anything that Japan posessed that there was no "shame" in bowing to that force.
So the nukes forced the surrender not through their capacity for mass killing (which could be achieved in other ways) but through their technical sophistication? So presumably the Demo Bomb would have had the same effect?
>>MacArthur wanted of course an invasion, and ignored radio intercepts that told the tale of Japanese troops and prepared strong points ala Okinawa and Iwo Jima right at the invasion points. The Navy under King was ready to revolt from it's assent for invasion and even others in the Army had serious reservations after the Okinawa bloodbath (though not MacArthur who dreamed of "glory").
I think you're underestimating MacArthur. He was an arrogant bastard, but one that was particularly skilled at keeping his troops alive.
Again, T.J., I don't think your understanding of history is correct. MacArthur's operations had a higher casualty rate on average than those of the rival Central Pacific HQ.
MacArthur was in fact a rather inept commander.
T.J., So, have you given up on the kill one Okinawan a day idea? I'd like to close this one out before going on to other topics.
Well before closing it out, I would like to thank Mr. Truman for making the decision he did. Its appreciated even more knowing that it was not a decision that couldn't be second-guessed.
You need to read these pages to put this battle into a contemporary context:
Thanks to AlphaPatriot and the
USS Harry Lee websites, we are provided with
The Planned Invasion of Japan Bibliography of works by D. M. Giangreco.
This is something I posted over on Austin Bay's blog when he did a column on the A-bomb decision.
The option to invade Japan was going to be far less costly in American lives than most post-war estimates pegged because America was planning to use poison gas in a massive way during the invasion.
The price the Japanese would have paid can only be described by the word genocide.
======================The choice that Truman faced was not “Invasion” or “the A-bomb.”
It was gassing Japanese like bugs during an invasion of Japan and the A-bomb.
The autumn 1997 issue of MILITARY HISTORY QUARTERLY had an article by Norman Polmar and Thomas Allen titles “Gassing Japan” on U.S. military plans to gas Japan during Operation Olympic. You can go to this link to purchase the issue with the article here:
https://store.primediamags.com/shop/thehistorynet/viewProduct?pm_id=3189
Allen and Polmar ran across references to a plan to gas Japan and put in a FOIA request. Eventually they got a copy of a document labeled “A Study of the Possible Use of Toxic Gas in Operation Olympic.” The word “Retaliatory” was PENCILED in between possible and use.
Apparently there were only five of these documents circulated during WW2. After the war in 1947, the document was requested by the Chemical Corps for historical study. In an attempt to “Redact” history, another document was issued to change all the copies to emphasis “Retaliatory” rather than the reality of the US planning to use it offensively in support of the invasion of Japan.
The plan called for US heavy bombers to drop 56,583 tons of gas in the 15 days before the invasion of Kyushu than another 23,935 tons every 30 days after that — and that was just the STRATEGIC bombing campaign. Tactical air support was in addition to that. The ground weapons would contribute 1,400 tons of gas shells. At the time of the invasion, 144,762 tons of gas shells were available. Another 9,356 tons would arrive every 30 days after the invasion.
Chemical Corps casualty estimates for this attack plan were 5 million dead with another 5 million casualties. Ultimately, it looks like the plan was not approved, but prepared for, since the gas to implement it was sent to the Pacific — likely as a back up to the A-bomb.
According to Allen and Polmar, the June 18, 1945 meeting where Harry Truman was briefed on Operation Downfall — the over all plan to invade Japan — by Adm King, Gen Marshall and the rest of the Joint Chiefs was when the topic was broached. We know now that the decision to drop the atomic bomb was made then, although the notes for the meeting only referred to “undisclosed topics.”
On 21 June 1945, orders were issued by the Army to produce and ship the necessary quantities of war gas to the Pacific Theater to implement the plan.
The key passage from that Gas Attack Plan was:
“Gas is the one single weapon hitherto unused which we can have readily available which assuredly can greatly decrease the cost in American lives and should materially shorten the war.”
I’d say that this meeting decided that the US was unwilling to take the kind of mass casualties, using Okinawa as a model, that a conventional landing would cost and any available WMD would be used to reduce American casualties.
The Polmar article mentions that Gen Marshall brought up the use of gas in a 29 May 1945 meeting with War Sec. Stimpson. He wanted to use gas against the “outer Japanese islands” with less than our best war gas (Mustard gas) to “take the fight out of” the Japanese soldier and reduce American casualties.
Marshall then commissioned the study I have been quoting from. The American invasion of Japan would have happened behind cloud banks of poison gas.
This article by Norman Polmar seems to have escaped Richard B. Frank, who wrote the Weekly Standard article Austin linked too.